Help: stubborn Torrey heel busting my *#%!

Hey all, also, i’m having a bear of a time geting the bevel set on this one razor I wonder if you can help. it’as a beautiful old torrey with slick lines and killer faux-tortoise scales. when it came to me it had quite a frown, but it was still rather sharp so I tried honing it without correcting the frown. I managed to get it pretty close to shave-ready, but ultimately wasn’t satisfied with it and decided to correct the frown and start from scratch. But somehow there is this one area I just cannot get the bevel set on – and, oddly, I think that area was fine in the “frown era” hone. The area starts about 1/16” or 1/8” from the heel, and runs about a centimeter. Unlike the rest of the edge, it doesnt shave arm hair. The bevel is noticeably narrower there than on the rest of the edge, though still substantial; oddly, the spinewear is not narrower there. I tried EVERYTHING I could, every stroke possible, every hone possible, to focus on that area. I ended up wearing out the razor a lot – the spinewear has almost doubled, all to no avail. I’ve attached some pictures, though I’m not sure you can see anything of much use. any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Mijbil, I moved your post from hones to honing where I think you will have more exposure and feedback. Your photos did not come up yet. If you click browse to upload you have to then scroll to the right of the browse buttons to hit the upload button. Did you 'breadknife' the blade to get rid of the frown ?

Sounds like some of the frown may still be there towards the heel, back to square one! BTW, you should try taping the spine to avoid spinewear.

THanks, Jimmy. I'm so used to posting in "Hones" I forgot there was a honing forum ;) Yes, I did breadknife to remove the frown. I'm pretty sure I did remove the entire frown - checked by laying it on the edge and checking for light getting through, BUT even if I didn't, my various attempts to focus just on the heel should still have been able to hone that area. However, now that the photos are up you should be able to see that the frown isn't there. My apologies for not checking that they were correctly uploaded.

And, yes, I know that I could tape the spine - I suppose I'm just lazy. If I were doing this on a blade a really valued I would. Plus that's not ideal for blade geometry - the spine and the edge are *supposed* to both wear, as far as I understand it?

PS - dont know if any of you noticed my post a few weeks ago about trouble I was have with scratches on the blade face, especially with DMTs - though I have *almost* entirely solved the problem (it did have to do with honing off the edge), you can see examples of the scratches in these photos. The little ones, 2-3mm long, starting from the edge and running toward the spine.

I feel the rumblings of another Tapefield and McNo-Tape feud coming. I hope I'm wrong.

I'd use a magic marker to make sure you're hitting that spot right. Also, I'd try heel leading circles on the 1K (or whatever you're setting the bevel with). That's what I'd do anyway...

+1 on the magic marker, try different strokes and see which one works best.
Also as nun2sharp said there might be some frown left but the magic marker will help you find out what the issue is.

yes, I did try circles, and every other way I know to focus attention on the heel. I didnt use magic marker in this case, because I *know* which area isnt getting honed right. The question is, why, and what can I do to fix it? I've had wickedly curving sheffields and framebacks where I had to do all sorts of acrobatics to get the heel properly, but for some reason none of them are working here. And btw, I'm using a Naniwa 2K primarily - although I also tried my DMT Fine and Extra-Fine to see if it would make any difference (it didnt)....

have you seen the bevels under magnification? Are they nice and flat or there is a double bevel in that area?

I dont have a good way to magnify the razor enough to see that, I think - just a loupe. But anyways, if that were the case it might ex[lain why it's not as sharp there, but I dont see how it would explain why it is resistignng honing there - because the steps I have taken *Should* have rebevelled that area....

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Originally Posted by Mijbil

I dont have a good way to magnify the razor enough to see that, I think - just a loupe. But anyways, if that were the case it might ex[lain why it's not as sharp there, but I dont see how it would explain why it is resistignng honing there - because the steps I have taken *Should* have rebevelled that area....

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well it could be that the spine there is uneven and needs to be fixed, I can't tell for sure from the pics.
I think the magic marker will tell you which stroke works then stick with it until you fix the problem.

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Originally Posted by Mijbil

yes, I did try circles, and every other way I know to focus attention on the heel. I didnt use magic marker in this case, because I *know* which area isnt getting honed right. The question is, why, and what can I do to fix it? I've had wickedly curving sheffields and framebacks where I had to do all sorts of acrobatics to get the heel properly, but for some reason none of them are working here. And btw, I'm using a Naniwa 2K primarily - although I also tried my DMT Fine and Extra-Fine to see if it would make any difference (it didnt)....

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I have mention this in early threads.
Problem is not in your edge .
You will need to fix spine of the blade. as soon as you done that your edge will be fine.
(i understand you can come back and say right away my edge is dull )
Visual problem in the edge which you can see it doesn't cut but actual problem is in the spine.
gl

IME it is one thing to breadknife a few chips, or even a large chip, out of an edge and it is another thing to breadknife a frown. I've done it on two razors and it took forever to get a bevel back. Will the blade lay flat on the hone ? Do the marker and if it will lay flat see if an x stroke with the blade at a 90 degree angle to the hone removes the marker for the length of the blade.

If it will do circles (more like ovals) alternating with back and forth strokes until you get a good TNT from heel to point. Once you get that go to x strokes and clean it up further until it will shave a bit of arm hair. Proceed from there, you know the drill. I don't know if that way is right, wrong or indifferent but that is what I would do. :)

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Originally Posted by hi_bud_gl

I have mention this in early threads.
Problem is not in your edge .
You will need to fix spine of the blade. as soon as you done that your edge will be fine.
(i understand you can come back and say right away my edge is dull )
Visual problem in the edge which you can see it doesn't cut but actual problem is in the spine.
gl

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________________________
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Sham
Can you refresh our memories as to where we shold place a 1 inch piece of tape to correct the problem. My PC shut down as I was saving your advice in that earlier thread.

Thanks.........:)

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Originally Posted by mrsell63

________________________
__________________________________
Sham
Can you refresh our memories as to where we shold place a 1 inch piece of tape to correct the problem. My PC shut down as I was saving your advice in that earlier thread.

Thanks.........:)

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Sorry Jerry
i will explain.
(this is example to make easy)
Lets say OP says he blade is dull toward to heel 1 inch length.
Now to fix that problem what we need to do.
Use 1 layer of black electric tape (you may end up replace couple times tape if it wears down fast)and tape rest of the spine (except 1 inch dull part)
In reality (if you want to do perfect work )you should not tape 1 inch 1/16 .why i add 1/16. because of the tickness of the tape while you hone you will not hone exact 1 inch part. if you give a little more space then you will be able to hone 1 inch.
Now you hone the blade until you are getting similar spine wear from heel to the tip.
As soon as you got closer you will need to stop and take tape off and start honing whole blade without tape at least 10-15 strokes on the 1 k norton(by the way i use 1k to fix or take chips away. it takes long time but it is safe)
after you get perfect spine(equal spine wear all length of the spine all problems resolved)
you can hone blade starting 4k 8k etc.
in this situation whole edge will have same sharpness.
I should add(please my personal opinion)
(I wouldn't recommend anyone to use bread knifing except to person who really knows what they doing.)
i hope i am clear if not let me know i will try again.

+1 to this.

Sounds like the bevel isn't set yet in that area. Don't think you will get there in 15 minutes either...remember you are removing steel from the WHOLE edge, not just that spot. Takes a while to do that when you're not using an extremely coarse stone. Slow and steady wins the race! Keep working on it and I bet it will get.

Good luck and have fun! :)

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Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

IME it is one thing to breadknife a few chips, or even a large chip, out of an edge and it is another thing to breadknife a frown. I've done it on two razors and it took forever to get a bevel back. Will the blade lay flat on the hone ? Do the marker and if it will lay flat see if an x stroke with the blade at a 90 degree angle to the hone removes the marker for the length of the blade.

If it will do circles (more like ovals) alternating with back and forth strokes until you get a good TNT from heel to point. Once you get that go to x strokes and clean it up further until it will shave a bit of arm hair. Proceed from there, you know the drill. I don't know if that way is right, wrong or indifferent but that is what I would do. :)

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it just takes long time. removing the amount of metal that you need to remove can take hours even on coarse hone. you can speed it up a bit by precutting the bevel with the spine lifted off the hone so that you can use some more pressure, but it's not going to be dramatically faster anyways.
it will help you however to quickly judge your progress without magnification. the double bevel would be rather easy to notice with a light reflection off the edge. and then you hone until the double bevel is gone at which point your razor will also be sharp. or you could just keep honing until it's sharp, it's the same thing.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Mijbil

I didnt use magic marker in this case, because I *know* which area isnt getting honed right. The question is, why, and what can I do to fix it?

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The magic marker test won't just tell you what parts you're missing on the hone, but also what stroke GETS that part. Mark up the edge, then see what stroke takes off the marker. THAT'S the stroke to continue doing.