Success! Somewhat.

I believe I am getting closer to success in my attempts to hone my own razors. The method I tried tonight consisted of a touchup of ten light laps on my coticule and chinese 12k, each with only water and no slurry. This was followed by ten strokes on my CrOX linen strop and a finishing twenty on the leather side. It was sharp enough to shave with, but produced a very painful 'grating' feeling on my cheeks and sideburn area - it was some pretty horrible pulling.

Suprisingly, I cut my neck right on my adam's apple while setting the blade - something I have not done since the first few times I shaved. I got a decently close shave (better then my safety razor) in the moustache and beard areas though.

So, I still need to figure out what I need to do and was wondering if anyone had some input on what to do with a razor that pulls.

how bad is pulling?
if it is not so much go back chinese stone and make 50-100 laps light touch. and no chro2 just straght to the strop at least 50 laps. try shave see what happens.
if pulling is too much
then go to coticule. Question is what type coticule do you have fust cutter slower ones?
if it is fast cutter make 20 laps and move to chinese same way finish
if it is slow one then go head do 50-70 laps on coticule and move forward.hope this helps.

I would of tryed 15 laps on ch5 if that failed i would then go back to ch12k and do 50 if that failed drop back to coti for 50 then 30 ch then 10 cr.5 most coti are not fast cutters with water any thing from 30 to 100 laps on coti cule shoild work depending on how dull blade is . I take it the blade was shave ready and now its just loosing its performance? If your shaving angle is to steep you will get gating sensation this would mean lower your angle other than that it carn't be sharp enough and need to go back to coti try a very light slurry on coti and do 50 laps followed by 50 on plain water make sure your slurry is light like water with a tint of whitness. hope this helps .

I've gone back and done twenty laps on my coticule and a finishing fifty on the 12k. After this I touched it up a little bit with five strokes on the CrOx then around thirty five on the leather. It shaved much better but was still a bit rough. I'm going to keep it in my rotation to see if it gets any better.

Beyond this I have put my old Tadross through all of my stones - 20 laps coarse, 20 laps fine, 10 laps coarse, 20 laps fine, 20 4000, 20 8000, 10 4000, 20 8000, 25 coticule, 50 12k. After this I did fifteen strops CrOx then fifty leather. I'm yet to shave with this blade but I will see how well it works out, it was popping quite nicely. I did so many strokes because I had to breadknife the blade about a month ago and set the bevel but never got around to honing it completely.

I've pretty much had it with trying to hone my razors. The third time I tried to use my keen kutter it was not shaveable and did not remove hair from my face, so I gave it a full one hundred laps on my chinese 12k checking my progress as I went. However,it did not seem to be getting any better, barely removing hair from my arm - leaving quite a bit behind. So I figured I would try the CrOx on it and gave it ten strokes then twenty on the leather. However, this failed.

My Tadross is also unshaveable, and I am losing enthusiasm in my endeavors to hone my own razors.

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Originally Posted by GUESSKOENIG

I've pretty much had it with trying to hone my razors. The third time I tried to use my keen kutter it was not shaveable and did not remove hair from my face, so I gave it a full one hundred laps on my chinese 12k checking my progress as I went. However,it did not seem to be getting any better, barely removing hair from my arm - leaving quite a bit behind. So I figured I would try the CrOx on it and gave it ten strokes then twenty on the leather. However, this failed.

My Tadross is also unshaveable, and I am losing enthusiasm in my endeavors to hone my own razors.

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First of all, dont give up! It is difficult to get this down but if you put the time in you can get there. I just recently honed my first razor from butter knife to shave ready and, although it took me ages (like 2 months!), I did learn alot from it!

It sounds to me like you need to drop back to lower grit stones. the 12k is really a finishing hone and only good for very minor touch ups and finishing the edge.

One thing I had read, and found to be totally true, is putting in the real work on the low grit hones. Make sure you can shave arm hair at skin level off the 1k bevel setter and DONT move on until you can do this. Make sure you can do this all the way along the edge as well. Once I got my head around this, the rest became much easier.

After your 4/8 progression you should be able to shave arm hairs floating above the skin, and lots of them. This is the point where they should be pinging off as you move the blade.

Then you can move on to your finishing stone/ paster strop or whatever it is you use. This is just to give the final polish so dont go mad! I just did 15 strokes on my 16K Shapton and that seemed to do the trick.

Then I just did my usual 25 canvas and 50 leather and straight to shave.

If you're touching up a razor you can drop back to your finishing stone for a few strokes. I went to the 16k Shapton to touch up my DOVO. If that doesnt work then drop back further to the 8k then the 4k and so on. If its totally dull you'll probably need to go set a new bevel and go from there.

The way I think of it is the 1k is the bevel setter, 4k sharpens, the 8k polishes and the 10k+ is the finisher. So using your 12k on what sounds like a fairly dull razor wont get you anywhere quickly, you'll need a lower grit stone.

This is only my advice in my fairly limited experience (fully honed one and touched up a couple), so any honemeisters out there please feel free to correct anything I have said! I'm not too proud to take it..! :D