Honing a Wedge for the First Time

Over the weekend I honed two W&B monster wedges. Both very unconcave. One has a true smile and the other an interesting shape that I wouldn't call a smill (maybe a smile out of one corner of the mouth). 7/8 and 8/8s roughly. I went Shapton 1k, yellow coticule slurry, yellow coticule water, yellow coticule lather.

Shaved with one - very comfy shave but not close enough. I suspect I'm not getting the bevel acute enough.

1. Is taping the spine the answer - does that make it easier to set a sharp bevel?

2. Am I likely to have any trouble setting bevel with taped spine so soon after setting bevel without tape?

1. Maybe, maybe not, depends on how well you sharpened it in the first place...

2. No, you already put the work in, so going this direction is pretty easy.. In fact you might want to look at the threads about creating a double bevel... if you feel confident in your first one...

I'm certainly no expert but I have recently done a couple of W&B wedges and they were tough. The steel is hard on the pair I honed. I used one layer of tape and a variety of hones. What I finally settled on was the shapton pro 1& 2K to set the bevel followed by my narrow nortons 4k and 8k an inch and a half wide. Finished on an escher blue/green. Did a first pass and it was okay but could have been better. So I did 10 round trips on 1.0 diamond paste on a paddle followed by another 10 round trips on chrom ox. Ths second pass was much better. I always use one layer of tape whatever I hone.

Wedges can be a real PITA. I have one, not W&B but it took forever and a day to get a bevel. It still actually needs work coz the bevel isn't very sharp, but the bevel is like 2mm. I taped the spine for that, coz it would be completely ruined other wise.

AFAIK, taping the spine doesn't so much help with setting the initial bevel. It's usually used to prevent wear on the spine.

Hello everyone!

I recently bought a W & B 7/8 Wedge on the bay and I got the same problem as stated above...

I then thought about it a little and I tried to hone/strop it the way we are making it with a..... chisel....

I set a bevel at 1000 grit... carried on at 1500... at 6000... and then 12000 grit and stropped on my green paste and red one...:medvl:

The only point here is that I was making more passes on one side than the other... like 20 on one side and 2-3 on the other...:hmmm:

The result is so far that I can pass with some difficulties the HHT...:o (1 on 3 is being cut)

It is shaving but still pulling a little...:shrug:

I will carry on with the stropping :jedi: and I will revert to you with the results ASAP...

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Originally Posted by OLD_SCHOOL

AFAIK, taping the spine doesn't so much help with setting the initial bevel. It's usually used to prevent wear on the spine.

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I guess I disagree in the context of a wedge. Altering the honing angle slightly on a wedge by using tape can dramatically reduce the about of time spent removing metal.

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Originally Posted by Utopian

I guess I disagree in the context of a wedge. Altering the honing angle slightly on a wedge by using tape can dramatically reduce the about of time spent removing metal.

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That is what I'm finding. I have two wedges. One was very comfy after honings without tape but didnt' give a smooth shave - that prompted this post. The other which I honed without tape and shaved with after this post actually gave a pretty good shave, but it took five passes.

Last night I took the first one and put on two layers of electrical tape and went back to shapton 1k, blue, then yellow/green escher and got a great shave this morning. Still took 3-4 passes and I usually only need two pases, so it's not where I want it, but using tape (and spending far less time) got me 90% of the way to where I'm going.

I'm going to try tape on the blade that I got ok even without tape and see how that goes.

I thought you might enjoy this

I finished up the restores on these two W&B wedges for Dwessel

#1 A heavy 7/8 Fine India steel


#2 A true W&B 6/8 wedge

Now I did these the exact same way, with two totally different results. Both had gone through the tumbler so were completely dull.. I started with 3 layers of tape and a 220 Norton to re-cut a bevel, then went down to 1 layer of tape and the 1k Norton to set a proper bevel, here is where things changed #1 went straight forward through the stones and strops and I test shaved a sweet edge....
Now that #2 PITA is still giving me a hard time I will mess with it tonight and see what happens....
Two lessons here:

One, is that some razors are just different, they require you to think outside the box...

Two, STOP don't push things, whether it be shaving or honing if it isn't going right just STOP take a breather and then approach it again later....

It might not require me to do anything different tonight, it could have been that I was just getting frustrated, like I always say just when you think you have it all figured out these things will throw you a curve ball....

God I just LOVE straight razors !!!! :D

I am having a similar problem. I have been working on my W&B wedge for a couple of days now. My first attempt was a 1k, 4k, 8k, Cr Strop, regular strop progression. It was sharp enough to cut myself with a couple of times, but was not uniformly sharp.

I went back to the hone for a 4k, 8k, Cr stop, regular strop progression again. This time it is much more uniformly sharp, and will shave, but the shave is not very close and requires a little more pressure than normal to get the blade to cut the beard. The shave is relatively smooth, except for the pulling and tugging. The face does not feel beat up afterwards.

I tape the spine while on the hones, but remove the tape on the strop. I use a paddle strop.

Any suggestions as to where to go from here? I was thinking of going back to the 4k, or even 1k, but remove the tape from the spine (so that the stropping is at the same angle as the honing). I don't to have to apply tape before my stropping, I think that will add drag to the blade.

A follow up on the wedge, it is shaving sharp now, the bevel required 200 more laps on the 1k Norton before it would pop arm hairs.... These were not just normal X stroke laps either I pulled every trick out, to finally get the bevel uniform and even....Now, once I was to that point, the razor went through the rest of the progression like a champ...
BTW on pasted paddle strops I do leave the tape on, but it comes off for hanging strops....
I hesitate to add this, but on hanging strops, for a full wedge I back off the tension, just a hair, when stropping, as it seems to get the edge slightly keener... Be careful if you try this, as it is a fine line from good to bad....

hmmm.... based on that last comment, it seems like I am going to try and spend a little more time on the 1k. I don't have it popping arm hairs yet.

I just know that sometimes it takes forever to get wedges right where you want them, but when you do they shave really nice.

These smiling wedges take ages if you try to hone them on 2 or 3 inch wide hones. You really need a narrower hone. In the olden days most honing was done on narrow hones anyway. Wide (natural) hones were simply more expensive! Synthetic hones were only introduced much later. If you have an old, used razor it most likely was honed with a narrow hone.

If you use a wide hone on a smile you'll find you do not hone the whole length of the bevel. Do the bevel marking test and you'll see imediately if that's the case.

You wil have to remove more metal honing a wedge. Presuming you apply similar pressure when honing on a narrow or wide hone the pressure per inch of bevel will be more if you use a narrow hone, so that'll speed up things. When you start popping hairs reduce the amount of slurry and finish without.

If you do not want to cut your Norton up use a narrow coticule or Belgian blue with lots of slurry.

My 2 cts.

Hi there!

For those of you interested in my progression, I can say that I reach the HHT point.. :y

Furthermore, be sure that your edge is totally even from point to the back.. My blade was warped and I had to fix it...:chop:

Those wedge razor are great shavers if you have a strong beard, it worths to spend some more time on it... :cool:

Take care!:tu

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Originally Posted by loueedacat

That is what I'm finding. I have two wedges. One was very comfy after honings without tape but didnt' give a smooth shave - that prompted this post. The other which I honed without tape and shaved with after this post actually gave a pretty good shave, but it took five passes.

Last night I took the first one and put on two layers of electrical tape and went back to shapton 1k, blue, then yellow/green escher and got a great shave this morning. Still took 3-4 passes and I usually only need two pases, so it's not where I want it, but using tape (and spending far less time) got me 90% of the way to where I'm going.

I'm going to try tape on the blade that I got ok even without tape and see how that goes.

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boy the wedge I used tape on now shaves wonderful and is so silky smooth. not sure I'll be picking up my 3X as expensive quarter grind le grelot very much! But the two layers of tape made it easy for me, a honing near rookie, to get a smiling wedge W&B to work beautifully with not too much effort. I did a little rolling X, a litle professional stroke, a little whatever worked, but man it's smooth and comfy.

The hardest thing about the old W&B wedges has always been that usually the shoulders are honed down unevenly on both sides and also the wear on both sides doesn't match up which means setting a new bevel can really be a pain. Tape can help here, but if used, unless you remove it and correct the shoulder with the bevel, you will be in for a long session. I have always had the most success in honing these utilizing a 45 degree angle X stroke after the bevel is set.

Have fun,

Lynn

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lynn

The hardest thing about the old W&B wedges has always been that usually the shoulders are honed down unevenly on both sides and also the wear on both sides doesn't match up which means setting a new bevel can really be a pain. Tape can help here, but if used, unless you remove it and correct the shoulder with the bevel, you will be in for a long session. I have always had the most success in honing these utilizing a 45 degree angle X stroke after the bevel is set.

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Hi Lynn,
sorry if I'm being stupid, can you explain this more? At what point do you remove the tape and correct the shoulder? And by correct the shoulder, you mean focus especially on removing metal from it? I'm trying to picture this...

and as it happens I'm currently having a devil of a time with an old W & B wedge. It has a beautifully even bevel, escher-polished, is passing HHT, and shaves like &?*!.

Wouldn't you know....with my heavy beard, I love wedges, and they're the biggest PITA to hone....looks like I'd better learn some of these techniques.:rant: