Thread: First honing required

First, allow me to officially state that you should approach this conservatively. If you have little honing experience, it's easy to make a razor duller than sharper and difficult to get it back.

That said...

I don't think your razors are in need of a touch-up. You did your touch-ups on a pasted strop, which is fine, and you seem to have had good success with it. But one of the typical things of pasted strops is that they convex the edge a little. At first that puts some new keenness on the edge, but there's always going to be a point in time where the very edge becomes so convexed that it's almost round. That's not a fault. It's just the way of the pasted strop. At that time, it is time for honing. Something tells me that you probably have got the maximum out of the pasted strops. Am I wrong in assuming that the last pasted touch-ups did not nearly work as well or as longlasting as the first ones? If so, that's just more evidence that the very edge is pretty convexed by now.
It takes some steel removal to hone the "cheeks" of the convexed bevel into straightness again. It is very unlikely to achieve that on a Coticule with water. Hi_bud_gl shouldn't dismiss Ben.mid's advice so bluntly. 100 laps on a Coticule with water is nothing outrageous. 100 laps may be outrageous on many fast cutting synthetic hones, but certainly not on a Coticule with water. (slurry is an entirely different story) I also happen to agree with Ben.mid that it probably takes at least your Belgian Blue with slurry to deal with the situation and reestablish a good keen bevel with flat planes. If at one point you decide to go to the Blue, you'll actually need 70 to 100 laps on the Coticule with water to finish after the Blue with slurry. Keep the slurry on the Blue very light, a hint of purple in the mix is enough and work in series of 30 laps, checking with the TPT in between. Once the razor feels extremely sharp and shaves armhair extremely well, finish on the Coticule with water. Add a drop of dishwashing soap to the water (one drop for a small mug with water). Rinse the razor well between different stones. Strop 60 to 100 laps on clean leather before test shaving. If the shave is very reasonable but still below Lynn's standard, try about 10 laps on your pasted strop. Because all convexity is gone, the pasted strop will do its magic again.

Good luck,

Bart.

I wonder how may touch ups on the cr0 would convex the edge. Every time I do a touch up with the cr0 I usually proceed to do about 5-6 strokes on a swaty before going to the cr0. Would that change anything?

Bart,

Well said: nice analysis and good recommendations.

Originally Posted by Dups

I wonder how may touch ups on the cr0 would convex the edge. Every time I do a touch up with the cr0 I usually proceed to do about 5-6 strokes on a swaty before going to the cr0. Would that change anything?

Yes that would keep the bevel flat, certainly if you use a pasted paddle strop. In that case the barber hone touches up the keenness and the CrO is only included for some extra smoothness.


Bart.

My typical routine is barber hone (swaty or sometimes coticule with water) followed by Cr0 on a paddle strop. I've also been using some plain newspaper lately as well. I wrap a page of newspaper around and old barber hone I no longer use and do about 60 strokes on that followed by linen then red latigo.

Thanks for all the feed back. Couple of things to clarify.

Razors in question are a Micarta and a Buffalo horn Dovo. Both according to classicshaving website have been 'ice tempered' and are stainless steel.

Bart - yes the last time on the pasted strop didn't give me an edge as keen as the first time. I have used the pasted strop probably 5 or 6 times over the 8 months. I shave every other day and normally do 16 laps on linen followed by about 30 on leather.

The Micarta definitely wasn't taped when honed by Lynn as the spine shows the smallest hint of wear.

Barts comments seem to fit my situation pretty well. I shall start on the blue with a little slurry and then progress to the coticule. if it all goes wrong, I will send the razors to Poona, a member here who provides an excellent honing service.

Just got to find some time now to do my honing.

thanks

You seem to be knowledgable about the whole honing-thing. Ok let me make my brief introduction to this topic.

I haven't even begun shaving with a straight razor but it will be here in about a week. I ordered a dovo half hollow ground razor. Being someone who loves collecting swords and knives and edged weapons, I have somewhat of a knowledge of putting an edge on steel; but from what I have gathered, straight razors require a more meticulous and detailed honing than does my 3 foot renassiance war sword. And even though many of you elder members advise newbies like myself not to learn honing yet, I admit I am stubborn and find that learning how to properly hone the blade is imperative, at least for me.

I have been shaving for over a year with a safety razor and its worlds better than a mach3, but I believe a shave can be much, much closer than what merkur blades can do.

So my question is guys, which stones do you all recommend to hone a non-pre honed razor??

Originally Posted by hlee8791

You seem to be knowledgable about the whole honing-thing. Ok let me make my brief introduction to this topic.

I haven't even begun shaving with a straight razor but it will be here in about a week. I ordered a dovo half hollow ground razor. Being someone who loves collecting swords and knives and edged weapons, I have somewhat of a knowledge of putting an edge on steel; but from what I have gathered, straight razors require a more meticulous and detailed honing than does my 3 foot renassiance war sword. And even though many of you elder members advise newbies like myself not to learn honing yet, I admit I am stubborn and find that learning how to properly hone the blade is imperative, at least for me.

I have been shaving for over a year with a safety razor and its worlds better than a mach3, but I believe a shave can be much, much closer than what merkur blades can do.

So my question is guys, which stones do you all recommend to hone a non-pre honed razor??

Well... when I started out straight razor shaving, I expected honing a razor to be easy. After all, I was shaving hairs of my arm for years whenever I needed to hone my chisels, plane blades or various knifes. So how hard could it be?
The problem is: arm hairs are no beard and I didn't mind having a little irritation at a small spot of arm after testing a chisel. The fact is, that we use all those tools for cutting something that doesn't complain being cut. We slice up a carrot in the kitchen without any concerns about hurting the cutting board. Now, shaving your face with a self-honed edge is an entirely different game. The edge needs to be smooth, but the smoother you make it, the keener it needs to be to have the same cutting performance. You could opt for less smoothness, but then it will drag your upper skin layer with it in its slipstream. On top of that, razor performance is very influenced by proper shaving technique, or adversely, by lack thereof. As long as you can't confidently shave successfully with a straight razor, you're completely in the dark about your honing results. Almost daily, we have straight razor aspirants arriving at SRP that state their razor isn't up to par, while in fact it's their skills that aren't up to par.
Bottom line, learn to shave before to hone, and enjoy the learning of that. Every journey has to start somewhere. The straight razor shaving journey starts with you, a sharp razor, and a mirror. Next shave, there's the mastery of the hanging strop on top of that. It will take weeks or months before you start feeling satisfied with your basic skills and years to perfect it. But do yourself a favor, and hold off with the honing for a month or two. It will help your shaving and it will help your honing.

As for which hones, you can post a new thread about that and receive 3 pages of different answers. In the end, it all comes down to personality and personal preference. Stick around for a while on SRP, and you're going to be attracted to a certain type, or brand of hones. Perhaps, you'll read about hones you already know and/or own.
But for now, my advice is to await the arrival of the DOVO. If it comes new from the factory, there's a limited chance that it comes "shaveready". Most likely not, regardless what they write on the sealed box. In former case, you're ready to go, in the latter case, it's best to get it honed professionally. The only way to find out is to try shaving, so there's your first adventure...

Welcome to SRP,
Bart.

Typically in these situations and being as you have a coticule, I would give it 10-15 strokes on the coticule with just water and then do 10 strokes on either .5 micron diamond spray or paste or chromium oxide strop and test. That might be enough to bring the edge back around. If not quite there, you can repeat this once and see if it takes you there. Another conservative approach is 10 strokes on the 8K, 10 on the Coticule, paste, strop and test. You can always go back to 4K if necessary. The Dovo Micarta razors usually come around pretty easy. I am not a fan of taping the spine unless I intend to take off a lot of edge, but if you do, you will need to start from scratch as you will be creating a new bevel.

I've honed, touched up and re-honed hundreds of these and they do not tend to be problematic.

Good luck.

Lynn

Well I appreciate the messages and replies I got so quickly. I had no idea I would get a response so quickly as I have seen on other forms days even weeks before someone replies with helpful information. The finest stone I have right now is a 4000 grit so I think I need to update my limited collection of stones because from what I have read from these forums is that 4000 isn't going to put the best polish on the blade. Sheesh, some of the stones cost every bit as much as a razor . Again thanks for the info and the replies, you will soon here more posts and replies from me when the razor gets here and we get this ball rollin'.