Thread: First Success

Today I tried my hand at honing. I have to thank Max for his help and also a BIG thank you goes out to David Polan for his nine part video demo on honing. Without both of these I would probably not gotten up the courage to try. I honed four razors(3 NOS) that turned out awesome...One an ebay special that shaves like a dream now.the NOS blades were, Filly, cases ace, and a weltmeister and the ebay blade is a yankee shaver no.1. I will add I struck out on the fifth blade, a nice wedge that I could not get to shave, It pulls like a bugger and just won't cut the hair. I marked the edge with a marker and set the bevel again, but alas, did not make a difference. I guess the wedges are just more difficult and I'll have to go back at her when I get more experience. THANKS AGAIN MAX FOR YOUR GUIDANCE AND TO DAVID FOR TAKING THE TIME TO MAKE THAT VIDEO!!!!!!

Try taping the spine on the wedge I usually end up having to tape all the wedges I hone.

Great job coachmike,

My first honing experience was... well.. lets call it educational.. I started to hone a wedge and found out the hard way that that is hard if you dont know what you are doing.. Now I can get most (I did 3 out of 5 ) of my razors shaveready myself and that feels great. I still have a project razor that needs a lot of sanding and then Iĺl have a go at this wedge too...You will probably need to tape the spine a bit more than you are used to..

I was about to post my own success story when I saw yours. I had grave doubts about my chances of success, but I followed the advice here and the honing videos available and got a NOS Boker shaving at least as well as my new presharpened TI and Dovo. Started with a few laps on the 250, then a few more on the 1,000, then pyramid honing on the 4,000 and 8,000 and finished many laps on the Chinese stone. Then paste stropping, leather stropping, and, voila, a perfect razor. I'm still too new to be able to tell much from the TNT or the TPT, but it passes the shave test with flying colors. I think honing is sometimes spoken of in mythical terms, but we forget that once upon a time every 16 year old boy learned to hone his razor .

Originally Posted by Shooter

Try taping the spine on the wedge I usually end up having to tape all the wedges I hone.

I did tape the spine , but alas, that didn't help I guess. I will get back at her again though with re-newed vigor.
On another note about honing, today I honed three more that worked out awesome including a NOS Ti that shaves like a dream. The fourth one i tried, well that one didn't work out so good. It's a small frame back that seems to have the same problem as the wedge, compounded by a slight "smile " on the blade. That one will also have to back to the hones when I have time. Thanks for the encouragement guys.

Congratulations on your success. Now watch out for the RAD and HAD. Honing can get like eating potato chips.

On the wedge, if you go to advanced honing and on the toolbar on the right it says search this forum keyword wedge and you may get something to go with. If not try the same thing in basic honing. Somewhere there are some really good posts on honing wedges. I'm pretty sure at least one by gssixgun .

Some advocate up to 3 pieces of tape to get a stubborn wedge honed but I stick with one and suffer through the drudgery. Keep at it and you will get that wedge shaving for you.

Edit; Here is a good thread.

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

Congratulations on your success. Now watch out for the RAD and HAD. Honing can get like eating potato chips.

Thanks Jimmy and agreed an the HAD,,,I'm already looking for a narrow hone to use on the "smiling" razor.