Greetings All,

Well, I finally spent too much and got my first "vintage" (cool) razor----a HESS "Forty-four". It's my second straight, my first being a new Dovo Tortoise, which is great!

My problem is getting the HESS sharp-----I can get the Dovo to pass HHT pretty easily, but the HESS is giving me some trouble passing HHT. After stropping the Dovo on the linen and leather sides, it will pop hairs pretty easily. But the HESS is giving me trouble.

I tried honing it on a wet medium Spyderco stone and then the wet ultrafine Spyderco hone, then linen, then leather using the standard advice of making sure to keep it flat on the stone, light pressure, etc. etc. and it STILL just won't get sharp enough to pass HHT.

I'm wondering if maybe the bevel was so rounded over from use/improper honing by past owners or blunt that the edge hasn't been established yet and therefore needs more honing on a coarser stone to reshape the bevel first.

Any advice? I know I could send it off to any of a number of guys to have sharpened, but I need to learn how to do this myself!!

Thanks!
Mark