Thread: tape honing

I never hone with tape unless real serious bevel setting to stop hone wear.
I have a thew razors that i dull and practice diferant honing methods.

Tonight i thought i best protect the spine on my kropp as i don't want to wear it out the bevel is a little broarder but not bad. Any way i dulled razor and ran it throught the 4k norton reset the bevlel and then polishedup on the 8k norton untill i was happy with the edge under 30k loop i can clearly see i have developed a smaller bevel i stroped and shaved the shave was better than ever befor on this razor even thought it always shaved well i will add coticule on next shave for any extra smoothness but to be onest it fine as it i. razor passed hht straight of 8k after stroping passed on fine stomach hair thats when i no i have a sharp edge (real test is the shave but agood indicator)

This got me wondering when a razor gets hone wear and bevel starts to fill out a little can this have an efect on the edge so creating athinner new piece of bevel can improve and make it easier to get a good edge i'm not sure on this one if theres any one who does i'd like to hear your opinion?. i no its like a second bevel but i did the whole process on tape to create new bevel which i will now keep.

seeing as there is not much response those of you that hone on tape all the time what is the reason and benfit apart from spine wear? and if you go to paste from last hone to a paddle do you leave tape on at this point or remove? i no mostly the tape is removed for daily stropping as my tm paddle as no give i thought it would be best to leave tape on? then remove.

Originally Posted by gary haywood

This got me wondering when a razor gets hone wear and bevel starts to fill out a little can this have an efect on the edge so creating athinner new piece of bevel can improve and make it easier to get a good edge i'm not sure on this one if theres any one who does i'd like to hear your opinion?. i no its like a second bevel but i did the whole process on tape to create new bevel which i will now keep.

What the big bevel does is make it slower and more tedious to create a properly sharp edge, so there's a tendency to jump to the polishing stones before the edge is really sharp. Using tape reduced the amount of steel you needed to remove to get it sharp so that it was actually sharp by the time you moved to the polishing stage. This is a common technique for honing wedges because there's so much metal to remove that they're slow on the coarse grits and interminably slow at the higher grit levels. It's much easier to hone them with a 4000 grit hone to remove as much metal along the entire side as possible, then put a layer of tape on the spine to raise it up so you're only honing a small bevel after that.

As for the second point you're making, what you'll find is that gradually that second bevel will increase in size until it encompasses the entire main bevel, at which point you'll be right back where you started.

For the wedges, you solve this problem by every now and then removing the tape and honing the entire side flat again on a 1000 grit hone, or 1000 grit sandpaper, or something like that. Of course, on a flat sided wedge you don't have to worry about the bevel getting unsightly large...

Originally Posted by mparker762

What the big bevel does is make it slower and more tedious to create a properly sharp edge, so there's a tendency to jump to the polishing stones before the edge is really sharp. Using tape reduced the amount of steel you needed to remove to get it sharp so that it was actually sharp by the time you moved to the polishing stage. This is a common technique for honing wedges because there's so much metal to remove that they're slow on the coarse grits and interminably slow at the higher grit levels. It's much easier to hone them with a 4000 grit hone to remove as much metal along the entire side as possible, then put a layer of tape on the spine to raise it up so you're only honing a small bevel after that.

As for the second point you're making, what you'll find is that gradually that second bevel will increase in size until it encompasses the entire main bevel, at which point you'll be right back where you started.

For the wedges, you solve this problem by every now and then removing the tape and honing the entire side flat again on a 1000 grit hone, or 1000 grit sandpaper, or something like that. Of course, on a flat sided wedge you don't have to worry about the bevel getting unsightly large...

very good explanation and it makes sense what your saying so its like a short cut but intime the new bevel will merge with the old bevel oviouly through honing in the future

Originally Posted by mparker762

As for the second point you're making, what you'll find is that gradually that second bevel will increase in size until it encompasses the entire main bevel, at which point you'll be right back where you started.

For the wedges, you solve this problem by every now and then removing the tape and honing the entire side flat again on a 1000 grit hone, or 1000 grit sandpaper, or something like that. Of course, on a flat sided wedge you don't have to worry about the bevel getting unsightly large...

Or, you set the first bevel with X layers of tape and the second bevel with X+N layers. It is easier than to hone the entire side.

as i said i honed the whole blade on tape if i went to my tony miller pasted paddle would or do people leave tape on while using paddle as there is not much give in paddle strop i would of thought best to leave tape on then remove for normal stroping any sugestions?

Originally Posted by sparq

Or, you set the first bevel with X layers of tape and the second bevel with X+N layers. It is easier than to hone the entire side.

Yes. But eventually that bevel made with X layers of tape gets too wide as well, so you go with X+1 layers of tape to make your main bevel and X+2 layers for your second bevel, until that gets too wide, so you go with X+2 layers for the main bevel and X+3 layers for the second bevel. Since the increase in angle from a layer of tape is only about 0.3-0.6 degrees for a typical sheffield wedge, it doesn't take long for that new bevel to get unwieldy. At some point this stops being a useful strategy, and you have to reset all your second and tertiary bevels back to the starting state, and that's what I was talking about honing the entire side of the razor.

If your wedge still has substantial concavity in it then it's not as likely, but then it probably doesn't need tape anyway.

You are correct of course.