Thread: #$%^&$@# Honing!

Originally Posted by hoglahoo

I have a stainless razor I made several hundred passes on a 1000 grit to work through a double bevel.

Oh good God....what is a double bevel? Do I want to know? My head already hurts!

A double bevel is when a layer of tape is added to the spine thickness so that the bevel is sharpened at a more obtuse angle. Returning the blade to the orginal bevel angle requires much more work than maintaining one consistent angle like you're trying to do.

Old_School pretty much summed it up, your finishing hone is nowhere near as fine as many of the pros use.

You should be able to get the HHT to work with the the hones that you have, but that just comes with practice and a very light touch toward the end of the honing process.

A pasted strop (Chromium Oxide pasted) will bring most edges up to a similar level of smoothness/sharpness if used in moderation. Do a search for how to make one out of balsa wood, very inexpensive and very effective.

AJ, you can do acouple of things now that you know your razor is not nearly as sharp as you'd like it.

Check whether your hones are really nice and flat. Some hones need lapping before you can use them.
Second: do the bevel marking test which will tell you if you hav a good bevel on both sides along the whole cutting edge of the razor. I am not sure whether you'll ever be able to pop hairs off your arm after the 3K as SteveS suggests (sorry Steve, I do disagree with you here).

When you think your bevel is OK then move from the 3K to the 8K and do about 30-50 laps and check if you can pop hairs now. But strop first before you do the arm hair test every time!. If no good after 30-50 laps go back to the 3K and so on till you notice improvement.

Spending much time on the 8K is pointless unless you got your bevel right on the 3K.

Different apporach: send the razor to a honemeister and ask him to analyse your razor for you.

Originally Posted by BFMC AJ

Oh good God....what is a double bevel? Do I want to know? My head already hurts!

Don't worry about a double bevel at this point. You should focus on the basics IMHO.

I can't think of a good way to do this, but are there any pics of what the bevel looks like when it's good? I'm trying to practice on my FIL's auction find and i'm not sure how it's coming along.

Great advice so far. Getting an idea of where you are in the process is one of the hardest parts of honing a straight. For me, when the razor starts catching or cutting leg hairs (along the whole length of the blade), I know I'm pretty close. There's a certain amount of trial and error you have to go through. Best of luck.



Jordan

Originally Posted by chem_fun

I can't think of a good way to do this, but are there any pics of what the bevel looks like when it's good? I'm trying to practice on my FIL's auction find and i'm not sure how it's coming along.

There should be several threads here at SRP with photos of the edges of razors through microscopes. I've found that checking the bevel through a microscope gave me great feedback on how my honing was going. I use a 60X-100X handheld microscope from RadioShack (it was discontinued though). Randydance uses a similar hand scope, and still others use regular microscopes or models that connect to their PCs. The handhelds can be purchased for under $20.00 -- definitely a good investment IMO.