Thread: my first honing experience

http://straightrazorpalace.com/razor...us-dirlam.html

I thought I just tell you all about my first honing experience...

well I'm not sure if I succeeded but i havent got hair left on my arm for the armhair test..

This is just my third attempt to hone it since I cleaned it up a bit..

The first I just honed the DMT until The TPT was good on the whole edge.then went to the coticule..
This wasn't good enough for a smooth shave.. it shaved some bt it pulled and clearly wasnt sharp enough.

Then I followed the steps of Barts
atricle on the wiki A simple honing method with DMT-E , Belgian Blue Whetstone and Coticule - Straight Razor Place Wiki

this was a lot better but still not quite as sharp as the one Bart honed or the one I got from Don.

I guess I still wasnt done on the DMT so I went back to that until the hairs of my arm voluntarily came off as soon as the aura of the razor came close..

Now I hope that its some where close to shaveready.

By the way one thing nobody mentioned in any honing article is the nice smell of fresly honed steel!.. I love that smell..
I also bought a new hone.. another DMT the C/F combo... I think I need some ebay razors to practice on

I love it..

Maarten

Good job.My new hones are in the mail.Soon I'll be smelling that steel smell.

AT first congratulations for the work.as long as you are keeping it going you will be successful.To help you one need to know what grits are you using DMT 's has so many grits from which grit you went to coticle?then how did you finish?what did you use.About the smell of the blade you must hone a lot steel from that blade to smell that steel .Give us a little more information then we will be able to help.great work

I have been using a DMT D6E and a coticule/BBW combo.. its working pretty good so far.. I've just been spoiled so far with the razors that had been honed by Bart and Don (or Lynn I'm not sure)

The razor is almos a wedge and I havent taped the spine so I guess some steel is lost there.. on the first attempt I did tape the spine but after some honing I found some particles on the hone that came from the tape..so I removed the tape..

I guess the edge has not been even when I got the razor so it realy needed some work.

Maarten

Thir morning I tried to shave with the razor again but it failed the most important test.

It shaves tho long stubles but it feel realy rough.. it pulls and is no were newar shave ready.

Could it be I'm not honing correctly on the BBW.. I even start to doubt its a BBW.. it is actualy more dark purple.. Am I honing on slate?

I'm pretty convinced I honed it correctly on the DMT-E but then I'm in a haze..

what sould I see on the BBW and when should I go to the Coticule.. I just did about 100 passes on the BBW.. seemed that should be enough..


Maarten

if i am not mistaken i think dmt 6 e should be 1200 grit?
then after dmt you don't have to use blue side of belgian.
now i am not sure from where you bought belgian and is it mention for straight razoror not . lets assume it is the right belgian if not you will not go anywhere.let me explain what i mean.
after dmt 1200 you have set bevel already and more then that .you need to go belgian yellow side.
the question is if this yellow corticle really for straight razor then you should be ok.if it is for chizels or etc tools then sorry you are in trouble.what happen is after you get out dmt 1200 you go back to belgian corse ones and you destroy edge again.
now if your belgian is right(for straight razor) one then do this.
Make a slurry and 40-60 passes on yellow side.try shave your arm ,cut hair see what happens.if it is getting better then start dilute the slurry(less slurry) 15-20 passes no pressure on the blade.then try cut hair again if you are getting better lastly use just clean yellow 15-20 passes .after that go to paddle strop with chr02 20 passes you should be good now.strop and good luck.

hope i didn't confuse you.
Don't be shy if you need help just ask we all learning

Thanks hi_bud_gl,

Nope you didnt confuse me too much.. I'm pretty sure the belgian hone is ment for razors but I'm not convince that the blue side is blue and not just slate..

So I could try to make a slurry (I dont have a slurry stone so I'll just use the DMT to create a slurry) and go from there...

i checked regulary if the razor still shaved armhair and it actualy did that so well that I dont have any hairs left on my left arm...Maybe I'll try my leg..

Thanks again...

yes go for it forget about blue side.use yellow

The razor shouldn't be touched to the skin when shaving arm or leg hair. It should "pop" the hairs with the razor suspended over the skin and just lightly touching the hair. If you have some sort of magnification such as an eye loupe or better a microscope of say 30X or better you will be able to check out your bevel. That helps.

The razor should pass the TNT after the bevel is set and then rely on the TPT. To get the feel of the TPT using a new DE blade helps. Moving up in grit doesn't do any good until the bevel is correctly set. When you do move to the coticule use slurry first and then as Bart described dilute the slurry with your spray bottle until you are using water only.

Yesterday I tried honing on the coticule with some slury.. the results are encouraging..
Although I'm not out of the woods yet.
I also got a 20x17mm loupe today so I could check out the scratch patterns of my honing and compare them to what Bart did on my ERN..(not even close) I never managed to "pop" hairs on my arm.. not with the ERN or the Crown I got from Don..The hairs on my leg do pop I haven't got hair on my left arm anyway from honing
The shave was a lot better than yesterday but still not good enough..I didnt dare a ATG on the upperlip with this razor..it pulls a little bit and just doesnt feel sharp enough.

The bevel looks pretty decent although there are areas that look a bit uneven.I did see some pitting near the bevel before I started honing. so maybe I honed them into te bevel. there are a lot of scratch marks I suppose still from the DMT.. Maybe if I hone those out on the Coticule it will get a bit smoother.. or maybe I'll go to the DMT again to smoothen out the bevel..

Thanks for all your help so far!

without SRP I'm sure I would have given up by now.. now i'm just having fun honing.

Maarten