Honing

[Nick08]

I am new to this forum, but I have been reading for quite a while, since I first became interested in straight shaving and then when I was ready to make the dive and purchase a razor and some equipment.

After about a year of shaving with my Edwin Jagger imitation ivory DE razor, practicing with a Parker shavette, and various blades (finding Feather to be perhaps the best), I bought a black Dovo full hollow 5/8 from SRD. It came shave ready. For Christmas, my wonderful girlfriend bought me a beautiful Illinois Razor Strop Co. 2 1/2 in. strop, a Norton 4K/8K water stone, AND a DMT 8-inch Dia-Sharp continuous diamond, course bench stone for a combination use, lapping and knife sharpening.

I got the hang of shaving with a true straight razor (not a shavette), and never looked back. A regular stropping of maybe 20-30 round trips seemed to usually be enough to get the job done fine until just recently. Since I have not yet purchased a pasted strop or a Naniwa 10K or 12K for polishing, I decided it was time to touch it up on my Norton. I let it soak for 20 minutes or so, and did approximately 3 or 4 round trip passes on the 4K side, and 15-20 round trip passes on the 8K side. I stropped it after I was done and it might currently be sharper than it was when it arrived.

If I had purchased the Dovo Pearlex, like I had intended to at one point, I would have almost certainly taped the decorative spine to protect it. Some users pointed out that the width of the tape makes a difference so minute, that it is negligible. After further reading I noticed that some comments were supporting honing without tape to show the true age of a razor, I decided that I would hone without tape, and I noticed some significant spine wear after my first honing.

If this is a process that I may have to do a few times a year I want to make sure that I take off as little metal as possible from here on out but I hope that any damage I may have done is not serious. I did not hesitate to take it to the 4K side first because I noticed a few micro-nicks. In hindsight I realize the 8K probably could have honed them out. I hope the spine wear is at least even and that I did not reset the bevel.

I just have a few questions going forward. Should I tape the spine in future honing? Is it essential to have a clean canvass side to a strop? If not, should I paste mine for future use and periodic polishing, and to lessen the frequency of required honing in the future? If spine wear is uneven, what should I do?

Also, I try and pay close attention to make sure that I completely and thoroughly dry my razor after I am done using it, but am starting to notice some water spots/marks on the face of the blade and also on the lower portion of the tang around the pin.

Down the road I am thinking I want to add a Hart Steel razor to the arsenal. I will try to post a picture soon of most of my gear including a nice Walnut stand that I made, and a Rosewood shaving mug that I purchased.