Reset the bevel?

Greetings to those who possess higher knowledge,

I use a 4000/8000 Norton to hone my 5/8 Dovo straight. I can get it sharp enough to shave with but it still pulls on the hairs. That hair popping/HHT sharpness seems to continue to elude me :(
The razor used to be in the possession of my younger brother and I think he was abusing the edge :( I can see that there are some odd patterns on the edge and I can't grind away enough metal on a 4000 stone to make the edge uniform all across. ( No actual chips or nicks )
So I'm starting to think that the only way to get it back to its perfect edge will be to reset the bevel with a 1K stone, then work back up to 8K again ( and a stropping obviously ).
Any information and experience in this area worth sharing will be very appreciated.

The Norton 4k is actually more than capable of setting a bevel unless there is damage on the edge.. Now if you have the 1k go right ahead and use that...

But the 4k with circles or a bit of slurry or both is a fast cutter...


I left the thread in honing, and deleted the one in beginners you only need to post in one place,,, Thanks

Welcome to SRP. Since you said that you never did get the hang of honing a razor your best bet might be to send it out to a honemeister. SRP member Floppy Shoes is in Canada and I hear that he puts a heck of an edge on a razor. His classified ad is here.

If you still want to have at it yourself the circles Glen (sixgun) mentioned are what I would begin with. As Lynn Abrams, SRP founder, recomended to me, 20 each side with firm pressure. Follow with 10 x strokes and try a TNT. If necessary another 20 and so on with less pressure. Using the TNT until it is good and then stop using that and use the TPT. From there do pyramids is what I would do. Here is a video of Lynn and Glen at Razor Con '09 honing.

You would be better off sending it out and getting some used razors in good condition to practice on. That would give you a benchmark to assess your own honing and something to shave with until you got your practice razors up to speed. :gl:

Thanks a lot guys.
I appreciate the quick responses. Much obliged.

Do you have magnification? I used those little handy microscopes on Amazon.com for 10.00$, they're excellent and useful. You can look at your edge through one of those and see if the bevel is set even on both sides all the way up the edge of the razor. It helped me a lot when I was learning how to hone bevels back. Slurry on the Norton is a good idea that Glen gave you too. I've actually used BBW slurry stones on my Norton before with success, it's worth experimenting with.

A little spy glass may help more than you think. TNT is good as well if you can really listen to your thumbnail closely. using both will help you tune into tnt if you have seen a chip and dont feel it you will already know at what point on the blade you should feel something and eventually you will get it.

Since you are shaving the bevel is already set. I believe you do not need a bench mark. You will know when it is right. you will know. If you were to ask a honer to sharpen with only the tools you have available that would be helpful in pointing out any other lack in your technique.

you get the blade back and it acts the same; you can guess it is prep or some other aspect of your shave stroke. It will not be helpful if the blade you get back was microbeveled on 30k and stropped on .xmicron diamond on wool, etc.

that edge requires a different shaving technique than 8k and leather.

You may only need to address your stropping. Do you have a linen? Overstropping 200 on linen 100 on leather worked great for me just last night. the difference between the shave the previous night remarkable.

the two most important things you can do is direct the pressure- very slight pressure gents) toward the edge and not on the spine and watch the wave in front of the edge. (assuming a clean and flat stone)

An overstropped 4k should shave without a lot of pulling(well maybe not under the nose) you may wish to test shave at that point so you may note the improvement from 8k.