Thread: Stright down the hone

I was just looking at a video under the links section of this site--Great razor info--"Sharpening a Straight Razor 11/05". The person there simply moves the razor straight down the hone without any angle to the blade. At one point he does lead with the heel first but most of his work is done with a 90 degree push-pull motion.

What do you folks know about this technique. It must work for him since he is demonstrating it. But don't know if it is worth trying.

What do you think?

jmsbcknr

If I am remembering the video you are referring to correctly he is creating a bevel on a razor he has no intention of shaving with. He will be selling that razor as new and you'll be stuck trying to shave with it. You'll ofcourse be a little perplexed by the fact that they are selling razors that don't actually shave anything but . . . what they heck right? Its the level of quality we have come to expect. Honing a razor that will shave is prohibitively expensive, so I'm told. I would think, honestly, that someone with say, half of Lynns expertise honing razors all day would be a very high salaried employee.

If I've said it once I'll say it a hundred times the old X pattern we all love came about because the old razor hones were small and you had to use it. The newer larger hones don't require it. If I on rare occassion use a barbers hone I use the X pattern but most of the time I use either a 3 inch coticule or the Norton and I use a straight push pattern with the heel leading. It works fine for me so X fans put that in your pipe and smoke it!

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

If I've said it once I'll say it a hundred times the old X pattern we all love came about because the old razor hones were small and you had to use it. The newer larger hones don't require it. If I on rare occassion use a barbers hone I use the X pattern but most of the time I use either a 3 inch coticule or the Norton and I use a straight push pattern with the heel leading. It works fine for me so X fans put that in your pipe and smoke it!

I will, every time I sharpen my 'smiling' W&B.

X

Its not worth trying . . . absolutely either use a heal leading stroke or use the X pattern. Ofcourse most on here will tell you as long as you really don't believe in the cutting effect of striations it won't matter. Click your heels together too when you miss home.

Hey bigspender, I am on your team. I use the larger stones, I only push the blade as in slicing the hone. I keep the blade relatively in a 90 degree angle to the edge of the hone. It works for me. My razors like it, I like it and my face likes it. The final test is the shave and I pass the test everytime.

Now that I have one of Tony's 3" stropps, I stropp the same way. I pull and stay at 90 degrees.

I say hone as you like, but dont get caught up in hype. When shaved, the face is the judge and jury.

Most guys use either the classic X pattern or the heal leading stroke. It really depends on the size of your hone, the shape of your blade's edge and your personal preference.

The 90 degree straight across push is the least popular of the strokes.

But... try it and see how it works for you.

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

If I've said it once I'll say it a hundred times the old X pattern we all love came about because the old razor hones were small and you had to use it. The newer larger hones don't require it. If I on rare occassion use a barbers hone I use the X pattern but most of the time I use either a 3 inch coticule or the Norton and I use a straight push pattern with the heel leading. It works fine for me so X fans put that in your pipe and smoke it!

You got it backwards. The smaller stones were made to force X pattern on all blades, giving them slight curve on the blade, or "smile" which is more desired than straight edge for comortable shaving. You cannot maintain a, let's say nice old W&B meatchopper, or that purty TI Pierres hand forged, just pushing it straight along the 3" wide Norton... Just think, there was no problem for old barber's hones manufacturers to just add another inch lenght and width wise, and up the price for 1/3rd.

Nenad

Originally Posted by superfly

You got it backwards. The smaller stones were made to force X pattern on all blades, giving them slight curve on the blade, or "smile" which is more desired than straight edge for comortable shaving. You cannot maintain a, let's say nice old W&B meatchopper, or that purty TI Pierres hand forged, just pushing it straight along the 3" wide Norton... Just think, there was no problem for old barber's hones manufacturers to just add another inch lenght and width wise, and up the price for 1/3rd.
Nenad

Hi Nenad,
I don't know if this is just a case of semantics, but rather than saying "they were made to force the X pattern" I would be inclined to say that barber hones were made small simply because it wasn't necessary to make them any larger. Their size is adequate to the task; besides they are easier to hold in the palm of the hand when honing which would be convenient for a barber who might not have workbench space in his small shop. Larger hones are no better or worse, but we should keep in mind that the modern 3" Nortons weren't designed originally with razors solely in mind; they were made for heavier and larger tools.
Hal

I'm with Hal on this one. Since the correct stroke was common knowledge the barber hones were made as small, light, and inexpensive as practical, IMO. I'd like to know how it goes with a 90 degree angle on the hone. I'd be even more pleased if someone else was the one to try it out...let us know how it goes.

Just to clarify the discussion here is not about the x pattern or heel leading, this is about a 90 degree angle.

BTW, Randy, nice to see you back . . .

I spent over a year practicing and learning to hone. I concluded that the x pattern works best, heal leading works pretty well, and a 90 degree angle works ok until you try to shave with it and then its more mediocre. But then I realize that it makes more sense to follow the guidance in books, even my little year means squat. Then I think, you know, I don't really know the true effect of any of this stuff that well. You could have a blade that needs 10 more passes to get sharp and decide at that moment to try an x pattern and BLAM its sharp and conclude that the x pattern (or whatever) is the best. And although I know that the heal leading approach works I find it doesn't work as well unless you work harder at lapping the stone more often. I have found you can sharpen a blade using the x pattern on a wicked bowled unlapped Norton because you run the blade over the edges of the bowled section (which we all know is higher).

I believe firmly in the effect of striations too, so I think that biases me against a 90 degree angle.

But I've also experimented (alot) and been told that back honing sucks and is only good at removing a burr, which I have concluded is crap. You do need to learn how to do it, what grit to use, when and most importantly why. Takes a lot of time to learn and then you get an incredible shave and your like "Hey, what a sec". That isn't supposed to work. But for me it sometimes works great, but more importantly, taught me two things (ok maybe three), one: it works and works well if you know what your doing and you know why, two: it does remove a burr, but later it does more than that, and three: were all just opinions here biased by our experiences of what worked for us at a given moment for a given razor.

Now I'm still not too worried about a video with a guy honing a razor in a factory. I've seen the product that comes out of the factory and it makes sense to me that the purchasor should be the one to apply the final bevel, grit choice, and striations based on his preference.

I guess I'm curious about two things: one, can we as a group agree on one preferred methodology of honing and stropping (and make it a sticky maybe?), two, should we as a group consider opening up an experimentation section and open threads like "HONING WITH A 90 DEGREE ANGLE" or "MAKING THE SMALLEST STRIATIONS POSSIBLE" and have guys post into them with their research? And allow others to open threads or reply based on their attempts at trying the idea?