Thread: Why Pyramid?

I've been intrigued and in agreement with Alan (aka AFDavis11) since his post on duller edge results in smoother shave. I too have a tough beard and sensitive skin so smoothness is primary to me. I can't shave with an edge finished with .25 micron. My skin won't tolerate it. I can't even go cross grain and usually do 2 passes with the grain.

So today I decided to follow through and do something totally off the beaten path. I took my W&B which was already shave ready but not smooth and did 3 backhoning laps on 4k! Followed by 50 on 1 micron paste and 30 on .5 and plain hanging strop for 40.

I shaved 5 days worth of growth. The shave was not super smooth but smoother than this blade used to give me and no irritation at all. I also had an amazing first pass. I did not need a second pass and most areas did not need to be touched up either.

Even on my chin, where most razors get noticeably bogged down with 2 days growth, I found this one plowing through 5 days worth with no irritation afterwards, none at all. I would have expected the razor to be dull but it was not. I even tried going against the grain on my neck as the first pass, again no irritation and a clean first pass.

I decided to backhone after Allan noted that it is the pasted strop with 3 micron that is needed and not a stone of the same grit (8k). Together with Jeff's (aka Threeput) explanation that the rough grit will chip away some of the edge when it gets caught on large grit particles during honing, made me think that backhoning will add the serations without micro-chipping the edge.

The pastes afterwards polish the serations. The pastes are too fine to remove 4k striations so only smooth over the egdes, effectively sharpening them.

I am also thinking that light pressure on a loose hanging strop will dull the edge but if you have serations and can do it so lightly that only the tips of the serations are dulled not the sides then you will get a smoother shave. The tips won't catch on the skin and remove too much of it, while stubble will be cut through by the sharp wedges formed between serations. I am only guessing since this would require a 4000x to 10000x microscope to verify.

At the moment all my razors are in the "to be honed" state. None of them compare to the smoothness of the W&B blade in the violin that Bill purchased. Previously I thought that the Pierre Thiers collectible and the violin were at par but Monday I touched up the voilin blade and test shaved a cheek before disinfecting, oiling the blade and shipping it to Bill (you didn't expect me to just ship it without fretting over it did you ? I was more nervous touching up this one than when I was learning to hone on my brand new TI).

I finished the shave with the next razor in my rotation which happened to be P.T. collectible. In a same shave comparison the voilin (W&B Gentleman's Razor) beat PTC hands down on smoothness. Previously I only compared the shaves from day to day and relied on memory for the comparison. They both seemed equally smooth.

Afterwards I shifted all my razors to the to be honed section of the shelf and decided that I have to get them all that smooth or I won't be happy. Haven't gotten around to it until today and did not feel like shaving with any of them until I tried to improve their smoothness. Hence the 5 days growth.

So I am now going to experiment and see if I can attain that super smooth shave and make it repeatable. I will try again but this time backhone a shave ready blade on 8k not 4k, followed by pastes to see if this improves the smoothness.

I think the pastes will work better than a stone because the goal is to sharpen the serations and paste on leather has a better chance of getting into the crevases than grit on a flat hard stone.

I'll keep on trying until I get that super smooth shave on a regular basis. I would use Alan's method but want to find another route to the same results to prove that his results are not a fluke but have a logical explanation since now there will be more than one way to attain them.