Thread: need to tighten up my edge

Randy:

I thought I understood the pyramid procedure, but now I seriously doubt it.


If I picked up a razor in the described condition, I would test it and end up doing 5 swipes on a Swaty and test. It could require 5 more. Strop. If I wanted to take the time to really keen it up, I would go to the .5 for 20 and test. It might need another ten. But I would be done in 2-4 minutes. Ready to shave.


Instead, you’re suggesting 39 passes on two different stones, 25 on a .5 strop, and 30 on leather before you even test. Shouldn’t the razor be tested (evaluated) before you touch a hone? Or is this just a brute force approach?


I’m sure your procedure would work eventually, especially if you repeated the whole approach, but so would forming a new edge each time and finishing from there. Would you do that on a razor that just needed a little refreshing?


It just seems to me that instead of developing some judgment and learning to hone you’re following a brute force approach that’s processing the razor too much. I thought that all these newbies that jumped into this and ruined the edge were not doing it right, but now I wonder. At some point you need to learn to assess the razor, to decide what it needs and to take a direct route to the solution. Or has that idea been abandoned?


If I’m misunderstanding this can somebody please explain it?

Originally Posted by Tony Miller

I would agree that the TIs are a little slower to respond. I recently bought two of them and one was shave ready one was not. the "not" one was close though but very slow to respond using just a pasted strop. The first shaves like a dream.

Tony

So what did you do on the "not" one, a pyramid?