just a little over 2 weeks ago I decided that I wanted to start shaving with a straight razor. I found an inexpensive one at a flea market (W&B), brought it home, honed it with an arkansas surgical black oilstone, stroped it on a piece of leather and attempted to shave with it after seeing how easy it shaved my arm.
the first pass on my cheek was great, i told msyelf i knew why people liked to straight shave. Then I got to the tougher parts of my beard and it felt like someone was pulling all the hairs out by the roots. away goes the SR and out comes the mach 3.
After that debacle, i went to the help files and found out that you should hone the razor until it is keen and passes the thumbnail test, then strop it until it passes the hanging hair test. it said " DO NOT SHAVE UNLESS IT PASSES THIS TEST". No kidding!
SO I get a norton 4k/8k and a tony strop and go at it. I finally get to where the razor passes MY HHT after stropping. MY HHT involved holding a hair and wacking it with the razor like an ax.
The shaves were much improved but the razor would dull before the shave was over. And I would have to use to much pressure in some areas.
Researching this site I found Randydances posts regarding the HHT and that it should be done before stropping and be done SLOWLY. GEEZ, I was nowhere near that good.
So I sat down wiht the norton and 2 of my razors and decided i would make one of them keener or hone them to nubs trying. I got a bit more agressive and started using a 2 hand touch on the razor to apply a bit of pressure and to keep the razor flat. I also started paying attention to the water on the hone and made sure that it was moving ahead of the blade so i knew that the edge was in contact with the hone.
Eventually I finally was able to get the razor to pass MY HHT before stropping. My honing is still not perfect, but at least i am seeing incremental improvements! NExt step is getting it to pass the slow HHT before stropping.