Barber hone instead of pasted strop?

This has probably been asked and answered, but I'll try anyway...

For those of you who like to use barber hones, once the razor starts to feel like its pulling a little bit do you prefer to refresh it with a pasted strop or do you go directly to your barber hone for a few passes?

For me, I get about a weeks worth of daily shaving off a fresh blade before it starts to pull noticeably and I have tried both methods and am trying to decide whether the barber hone would cause excessive wear if used weekly (ie: 4 or 5 light strokes per week).

Thanks,
Dave

I have both a barbers hone and a pasted strop, and like them both, if i was in your situation i would use the pasted strop until you cant refresh it anymore then use a barbers hone, also i would invest in getting another razor( or 2 or 3 or 4 hahaha) and use a rotation that way your razors will alot longer with out having to touch up as often

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Originally Posted by thewatermark

I have both a barbers hone and a pasted strop, and like them both, if i was in your situation i would use the pasted strop until you cant refresh it anymore then use a barbers hone, also i would invest in getting another razor( or 2 or 3 or 4 hahaha) and use a rotation that way your razors will alot longer with out having to touch up as often

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I disagree, if you have the hone, what do you need the pasted strop for?

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Originally Posted by nun2sharp

I disagree, if you have the hone, what do you need the pasted strop for?

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Well i originally I had a pasted strop, and wanted a barbers hone just to have one, and In my experience only (could be different for other people) the pasted strop works great for me when i need a little touch up or i first start to notice it pulling. When i need something a little more ill use the barbers hone, it may just be me but i can tell a difference, but to each his own :)

Ok dumb newbie question What is the definition of a "barber hone"?

Is it as i believe a slow cutting stone with a fine grit rating like a chineese 12k?

Also i asked a similar question on here and this is the reply i got, makes sense to me

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Originally Posted by niftyshaving

Yes.... and no.

Barbers hones have a reputation for being very different.
Some are fast, some slow, smooth, rough.... In general
they are all light touch, five strokes and you are finished hones.

CrOx is softer and finer than all but perhaps the finest barber hone.

I think the only answer that makes sense to me is that CrOx being
less abrasive is better to use as a touch up first. Eventually CrOx
will not improve the edge so a more aggressive hone will be needed
and a good barber hone could do the trick. If you have one
of the better barber hones sure, a bad one no.

One hint might be to use lather with a barber hone unless it
is one of the rare ones that does not need it.

Edit: I am not sure but if you are on Ebray and the barber hone
has an original box it is not as good as a well used one. The good
box might have held a hone that was almost never used.... If the
odds are 1 in four of winning a good hone for less than 40 bucks
the smart money goes for a modern man made finisher.

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Originally Posted by BigIan

Ok dumb newbie question What is the definition of a "barber hone"?

Is it as i believe a slow cutting stone with a fine grit rating like a chineese 12k?

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A hone for barbers, was once used to keep the edge of your razor as sharpas possible. When the barber(or you) felt the blade starting to catch, pull or tug and stropping wasnt enough to bring it back into line, he could reach into his pocket, grab the barber hone, give the blade a few licks, re strop and go back to work in a very satisfactory manner.

BTW, sometimes a little pasted strop action after the barbers hone aint so bad.

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Originally Posted by nun2sharp

A hone for barbers, was once used to keep the edge of your razor as sharpas possible. When the barber(or you) felt the blade starting to catch, pull or tug and stropping wasnt enough to bring it back into line, he could reach into his pocket, grab the barber hone, give the blade a few licks, re strop and go back to work in a very satisfactory manner.

BTW, sometimes a little pasted strop action after the barbers hone aint so bad.

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cheers for that i was just wondering as to the construction of a barbers hone. and how they differ to a normal "finishing hone"

I have not had the experiance , if you use paste to touch up your razor that fine . Then there comes a time when your paste does'nt work. Why because the very cutting edge becomes a little convexed. So you have to go back to rehone so then you can carry on using your paste for a thew more months. Going back to barbers hone, may not be enough you may need somthing like 4k to reset the bevel. To avoid this happening i'd just use use your barbers hone and may be one touch up with paste then barbers hone to keep the bevel in a nice v shape at all times.

if you use it right BARBER HONES will do the job forever. gl

Barbers hones are typically fast- like 5 laps is all I need to do on my swaty to bring an edge back (provided I do it soon enough)

I use barber hones exclusively (Swaty is my fave) & here's my experience.

(1) Chrome Ox gives me a finer edge than the Swaty alone.

(2) However, if I put the Chrome Ox on a hanging strop & use the strop exclusively to touch up, the edge gets slowly convexed over time. At first, the convexed edge is quite nice, but eventually it becomes too convex to shave with. (How long this takes depends of course on how often you touch-up). When this happens, you have to do a good bit of work to undo all that convexing & make the edge triangular in cross-section again. I have had to resort to coarser hones than the Swaty to do this quickly. There are 3 remedies for this that I know of:

(2.1) Ditch the Chrome Ox and just shave right off the Swaty.

(2.2) Every time you touch up, do a few laps on the Swaty, then finish on the Chrome Ox.

(2.3) Apply the Chrome Ox to a non-compliant surface, such as a lapped piece of oak, which will not convex the edge. Then use the Chrome Ox exclusively for touch-ups.

I am still experimenting with 2.3 & it's too soon to say anything conclusive, but so far the results are quite pleasing. I have also done 2.1 and 2.2, and they work fine also. My least favorire solution is 2.1, since I like a slightly finer edge than my Swaty can give, but the Swaty is an excellent hone, and this, admittedly, is nit-picking.

I got a method like this from watching Lynn... I don't know why he does it, or if the results vary /that/ vastly, but if it works for him, and the blades of mine that he does it on shave this well, I might as well do it too.

When my blade starts to tug, I will give it 5-8 laps on a Barber's Hone. After that, I give them 10 laps on Wool Felt with .5 micron Diamond Spray, after that I do my normal stropping progression (way in depth and way more than you need to do, just strop it, fabric and leather afterwards) Dunno if it makes a big difference, but I get GREAT results!

My lazy everyday kinda touch up is 5 laps on the swaty, 10 laps on a sharpening strop (very fine, like CrO or less) then regular stropping (30/30 cotton/horsehide)
My full ultra touch up is 5 or so on the swaty, 20-25 on my Thuringen (its small so laps are high) 15 laps sharpening strop, then regular stropping.

LOL Like everything alse about this crazy hobby, it appears there are as many opinions as people! I see that nobody said 'My god don't do that, I did that and wore out my blade in no time!"... so I guess I'll play around a bit. Keeps it fun. The barber hone is pretty fine (Velvet Edge) so I am not too worried. Thanks for the responses.

no idea how many razors you have, how well you take care of your razor, tough your beard is, but you shouldn't have to touch up every week, even if you shaved every day (this is the point of stropping... to hold an edge) but even if you did it would take a while to wear out a blade, and the pasted strop would be no different either way a touch up removes metal to restore an edge

Another member here told me they use the barbers hone after every shave. 2 or 3 passes with lather, strop on leather and store the razor for the next shave. They said they had done that for a very long time. I'm doing a little experimentation along that line myself now.

Possibly, honing overkill. Don't know...

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Originally Posted by khaos

no idea how many razors you have, how well you take care of your razor, tough your beard is, but you shouldn't have to touch up every week, even if you shaved every day (this is the point of stropping... to hold an edge) but even if you did it would take a while to wear out a blade, and the pasted strop would be no different either way a touch up removes metal to restore an edge

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I have a possible rotation of about 6 usable razors but I am just using one to try and minimise the variables while I experiment with this (stropping vs razor hone). At about 1 week of daily shaving is where I notice a drop off in performance, so thats when I touch up. But, you may be right about the stropping being a factor. I am currently using a home made one of Latigo (Tandys) and belfast linen with chalk on it, with 25 passes on each. My results might vary with different technique, different material, different number of passes... etc .. more to play with. Finding out what works for you is half the fun, I guess.