Thread: Humbled by a W&B Wedge

That's just one of the reasons once they discovered hollow grounding they pretty much stopped making true wedges.

So, before the recent advent of taping, how were wedges honed?

The obvious answer is that they just honed it without tape. However, the high prevalence of multiple bevels on old wedges makes me wonder how/why those multiple bevels arose? Were they lifting the spine?

Any ideas?

I can only guess that they were honed free hand like a knife w/o use of the spine. Some of the old razors I have hint at that as there was no hone wear near the spine. It's just another thing lost to history.

Originally Posted by Joed

I can only guess that they were honed free hand like a knife w/o use of the spine. Some of the old razors I have hint at that as there was no hone wear near the spine. It's just another thing lost to history.

I think that might make sense. Just as some knives are still honed freehand. If you do it enough, you get sort of a muscle memory to keep the same angle every time. Still i wouldn't mind to try to learn this method with razors. That's why tapes are for.

Originally Posted by Utopian

So, before the recent advent of taping, how were wedges honed?

The obvious answer is that they just honed it without tape. However, the high prevalence of multiple bevels on old wedges makes me wonder how/why those multiple bevels arose? Were they lifting the spine?

Any ideas?

What about like a metal jacket for the spine? I think I've seen some images here (and I forget the context) where a razor had like a C-shaped sleeve that you slid the spine into before honing. Maybe they used those.

EDIT: Here's an image, but it's a newer razor so maybe this wasn't thought of until recently as well:

If you look way back in this forum you will find a rather extensive thread about "How Wedges were honed in the Past" Lee/Hoglahoo and I put in quite a bit of research in it...and found pretty much the same things

Damn! I had it but I lost it. With 4 layers of electrical tape on the spine I did 50 laps on the coarse side. The bevel was well established and I probably could have shaved with it right then and there. But NOOOOOOO! I had to peel of two layers of tape and do the pyramid starting at 15. After this, the edge was nowhere as keen as it was.

I think the ticket may just be repeat the same procedure and leave the 4 layers in place throughout the entire procedure, Thoughts?

Just a thought .
Do you have a loupe or microscope so you can see what's actually happening at the edge ?

Nope, not that high tech just yet, I should probably look one of them up before long.

I find even low (8x) magnification helps but I like a large field of view. Over 1" is good.