Thread: People who tape their spine, then sell that razor irritate me.

Let's present some facts, or at least what I accept as such.

One layer of tape makes the spine thicker.
A Layer of typical electrical insulation tape increases the bevel angle with approximately 0.7 to 1 degree.
That has no significant effect on how it shaves.
It has no significant effect on durability either.
In some rare cases it can reduce a steel's tendency to microchip.

Let's assume a 7/8" razor with a factory bevel angle of 16 degrees. Honed with tape that become 16.8 degrees. Let's assume, after 2 decades of shaving and touching up and rehoning, the blade narrows down to 6/8". At that point the bevel angle will have increased to 19.5 degrees. Still perfectly serviceable. Another 2 decades of daily shaves later, you might reach the 5/8" mark. Now you're almost at 25 degrees, and you don't like the shaves that much any longer. Suppose you're thrifty and don't want to retire the razor. No problem. You tape the edge and hone down the spine, with nice lateral strokes, till it measures 1 mm less. And the razor shaves happily ever after.

Taped or untaped, the same principles apply. Uneven honing pressure is bad. Tape doesn't prevent a spine from "doing work". It only beefs it up a bit, as if the razor was originally produced with a thicker spine.

That Filharmonica in this thread could have had a warp, which is a common occurrence. The previous owner could have worked around the warp by using a narrow hone. That way his bevel follows the warp. If you take such a razor to a wider hone, the warp rears his head again, by part of the edge refusing to touch the hone. It may take some extra work to dial in a bevel that compensates for the warp. But there's no need to alter the spine for that.
And certainly no need to fulminate against tape, because that has nothing to do with it.

Best regards,
Bart.

Originally Posted by IanS

Well, with eight years of honing upwards of fifty knives and 1-5 cutting plates a week and seeing every kind of damage to an edge you can imagine, I respectfully disagree.

This is the statement I always love...

To reverse this I guess I can go on Knifeforums.com or Bladeforum.com and say I am an expert right?????

I mean I have honed razors I am a Honemiester when it comes to straight razors, so this automatically qualifies me to tell Knife and Tool guys what they are doing wrong???? Or do I actually have to wait until I have sharpened 4-5 of them first, to be a expert???

I sorry to say but if you go back into your post, you can find the problem...


It's not really a question. There was an obvious visible distinction between my honing scars and the previous bevel. The only way that happens is if the razors edge has been brought in (through the use of tape during honing). Upon a level honing the bevel corrected at the heel and toe almost immediately, due to there being almost no edge regression at those points. The center however did not. It required more than ~2mm (flat) of spine to be chewed away before I was able to even touch the bevel beyond it's interior edge through level honing.

and here...

Damnit... says I, this previous owner couldn't hone for crap. So after about 30x (no joke) as many passes as it took me to rebevel at the toe and heel, I finally have a true and beveled razor... but here's the best part... the bevel at the heel is probably ~4-5mm deep... This guy guided the razor with his offhand about 10% north of center, it looks like with either a thumb or fat middle finger. It was noticable enough I can be that exact.

Bad honing is bad honing period end of story, now just think if this same person had not used tape, you would have a torn up spine to boot, along with bad honing, so the razor would have been totally trashed... at least this way you had the steel available to "fix" it....

I have to agree with the rest of the Razor expert's though, we have examined the use of tape for quite few thousand razors and really it doesn't make enough difference to worry about, if you want to tape go ahead, if you don't' then don't...

I am talking 1 layer here...

I use tape, I can afford to lose some blade(usually) but I cannot afford to lose that much spine in comparison.

Please!

I've honed a few razors myself... since that qualifies me as an expert now... my opinion is that you ruined any credibility to dispense honing advice with your original post.

I agree with Glen. I embarrassed myself when I arrived here. I thoguht I was using a shave ready razor and boy I was wrong. I have honed probably 100 razors now, and my standard is what I bought from Classic that was supposedly honed by Lynn. I have a new one honed by ether him or Don, and I am using that as a standard.
In my limited experience though I have noticed one thing. IF the bevel isn't right you might get one good shave, but then the next shave is worse and after about three its awful. But, if the razor is hone right it will shave well for months. My only problem with Classic is that they have a monopoly on TI in the US. Hence I will continue to shop with SRD, plus I like SRD much better. I encourage you to let them help you adn they will if you ask. Lynn or Don are great businessmen and have a lot of knowledge they will willingly share.
I can tell you that I like my new Naniwa hones. I can tell you though, its the honer, not the hone. I can also tell you that I have yet to hone two razors that honed the same. I have HHT positive razors that shaved like crap and had some that would never pass that test that cut me beard like hot butter. Hone a few and let someone test your skills adn I promise you will discover you aren't the best most likely. So, listen to Glen and Lynn and the others more experienced here, otherwise you will feel as dumb as I did when I got here. And believe me, I got a lot of criticism an deserved every bit of it.

I do not mean any of this as criticism because I am the unofficial SRP village idiot for very good reasons. I wish you all the best with your future razors.
Thanks,
Trey

Trey you always bring a smile to my face reading yer posts my friend...



I know I know, off topic.....

Originally Posted by Thechef

After all what did they do berore insulation tape was invented lol

Most likely they used a honing aid like a faux frame back only one that slides on and off... At least on the heavy wedges...

We have been doing some research into that area also...

The real difference is, when you went to the Drug store or Dry Goods store "Back in the day" you did not have to do what we have to do, to get a razor shaving...

You took your new razor home, did maybe five Lather covered swipes on your barber's hone, that you got (most likely)free, when you bought the razor... You stropped and you shaved... Every single razor I have ever seen the Ad sheet for, have one thing in common, they were shave ready/hair tested when you bought them...
We are just now getting factory razors that are attempting to do that again...

Again making statements about straight razors you need to be very careful, there are very, very, few rules set in stone....
I could write out an entire list of what I see as positive things that come from taping the spine, but why bother anymore, it is on the forum dozens of times where I wrote it, and it doesn't make a bit of difference, you either tape, or don't tape, it is in your hands...

Originally Posted by Bart

Let's present some facts, or at least what I accept as such.

One layer of tape makes the spine thicker.
A Layer of typical electrical insulation tape increases the bevel angle with approximately 0.7 to 1 degree.
That has no significant effect on how it shaves.
It has no significant effect on durability either.
In some rare cases it can reduce a steel's tendency to microchip.

Really it's not even that significant. The damage it does to the edge is caused by exactly the reason it is used. Preventing spine wear can increase edge angle by upwards of 5 degree's over the life of the razor. You're turning your razor into a kitchen knife. And while the adjustment in angle due to the tape that is presently on it is insignificant. The adjustment in the working angle by preventing proper spine wear is very significant. And effects shave quality adversely (unless you want to argue that razors can be too sharp, I know some people believe this) and durability beneficially.

Let's assume a 7/8" razor with a factory bevel angle of 16 degrees. Honed with tape that become 16.8 degrees. Let's assume, after 2 decades of shaving and touching up and rehoning, the blade narrows down to 6/8". At that point the bevel angle will have increased to 19.5 degrees. Still perfectly serviceable. Another 2 decades of daily shaves later, you might reach the 5/8" mark. Now you're almost at 25 degrees, and you don't like the shaves that much any longer. Suppose you're thrifty and don't want to retire the razor. No problem. You tape the edge and hone down the spine, with nice lateral strokes, till it measures 1 mm less. And the razor shaves happily ever after.

All my razors fall in the 10-13 degree range. Go get a wustof kitchen knife. They are honed at 15 degree's. Try shaving with it. Tell me that the shave is of the same quality as your razors.

Taped are untaped, the same principles apply. Uneven honing pressure is bad. Tape doesn't prevent a spine from "doing work". It only beefs it up a bit, as if the razor was originally produced with a thicker spine.

The spines job is to hold the razor level during honing and maintain angle. It never does the latter when taped and when too much pressure is applied it fails to do the former either, because electrical tape compresses VERY easily, that is actually one of the requirements for it's application, it only requires a slightly heavy hand to do edge damage that you likely could not do without deliberate focus on a section of the edge without tape. Using measurements off my Puma, and assuming the Etape can achieve 50% compression (not unrealistic)*, I calculate a divergence in bevel angle of .3088 degrees. Keep in mind this is ALONG the edge. That is, your edge will behave as if warped to such an extent despite the spine being true.

That Filharmonica in this thread could have had a warp, which is a common occurrence. The previous owner could have worked around the warp by using a narrow hone. That way his bevel follows the warp. If you take such a razor to a wider hone, the warp rears his head again, by part of the edge refusing to touch the hone. It may take some extra work to dial in a bevel that compensates for the warp. But there's no need to alter the spine for that.
And certainly no need to fulminate against tape, because that has nothing to do with it.

Best regards,
Bart.

Yes, I considered a warp. It appears level, certainly not warped to the degree that would have given such uneven wear along the edge. It would be a very visible warp to account for that.

Gsix, this deals specifically with edge true and maintaining a bevel. One of which is applied identically to any straight, bladed object, and the other of which requires much more skill to perform on a knife than a razor. When it comes to attaining 20k grit polish, I'll admit ignorance. But when it's a task that is performed more often, more difficult, and more varied for a knife honer (as setting a bevel is) then yes, I'm going to claim that my experience is certainly applicable.

It's possible that I would have a seriously worn spine if he hadn't honed as he did. However there are two reasons I doubt it. First, he would have seen clearly the damage he was doing and been able to stop. Second, the razor was actually not honed very much at all. The only problem was it was almost exclusively honed in the center. The toe and heel were very close to the original edge. This tells me that he did very few, very bad strokes. And the additional, specifically yielding, spine bredth given by the taping focused his pressure on a single point in the blade, whereas with an untaped spine the thickness of the spine and the fact that Steel is far more difficult to compress than tape would have caused more even, albeit still uneven wear. It's possible I would have ended up with less metal on the razor, but as I said, that would have required very deliberate abuse of the razor.

Mcwolf, you prefer drag at the spine? I'm quite the opposite, I find that I have to slow down to prevent the edge lifting if the spine is dragging more than the edge. I much prefer to have each creating the same drag, so the razor levels itself (like a bicycle moving staying up).

* edit: I actually totally neglected that both sides of the spine are taped. So it only requires you allow for the possibility of 25% compression. Or slightly more as the bottom tape will compress more uniformly than the top.

Originally Posted by IanS

Gsix, this deals specifically with edge true and maintaining a bevel. One of which is applied identically to any straight, bladed object, and the other of which requires much more skill to perform on a knife than a razor. When it comes to attaining 20k grit polish, I'll admit ignorance. But when it's a task that is performed more often, more difficult, and more varied for a knife honer (as setting a bevel is) then yes, I'm going to claim that my experience is certainly applicable.

Yes we know you knife guys all think that, This is why you will find repeated many, many, many, places on the forum

DO NOT LEFT A KNIFE GUY TOUCH YER RAZOR !!!!

Honest I am not making this up, look through the Newbie section...
And really it is usually in red and highlighted just like that...

Honest there is really no true offense intended here, but you are continuing to type things that are just not true, so we are going to try and continue to correct this as best as we can...
Sooner rather then later, we will give up, and leave you to try and figure it out on your own, which most people do, and realize how far off they really were...
Again use tape if you want or not if you don't but the "science" you are trying to explain is just plain wrong...

And yet you trust the japanese folks who mine stones for chisels, swords and knives to pick out razor stones for you?


Maybe setting a bevel is harder when you tape your razor, in fact I'm fairly sure that it is. But straight razors were clearly designed with the idea in mind that the edge sets itself. That's the whole reason you want spine wear. It maintains that design.

Beveling a knife requires that you perform all your passes with even pressure while holding a fairly significant bit of weight at a constant angle and elevation. Microbeveling is required for multiple kitchen knives and in many kitchens a honer must be able to bevel a knife to a specific angle required for whatever task is ahead of the knife that day. This can be anywhere from 12 to 30. Some Japanese chefs take their knives even below twelve.

The reason a knife-guy shouldn't pick up a razor with no instruction and attempt to bevel it is simple that he'll assume it actually requires his skills. When in fact razors were designed so that honing them requires only a moderately steady hand and a little basic knowledge. Now beveling a warped or damaged blade is another story. But this blade was not warped, and I was not interested in maintaining the damage and simply achieving an edge despite it. I wanted it fixed.


I'm not arguing science. I'm arguing Mechanical design of what is one of the most fundamental devices on earth.