Second honing attempt - success!

Over the last few months, I've been building a small collection of Ebay razors to practice honing, and eventually, restoring. About a month ago I bought a set of Naniwas (5k, 8k, & 12k) from SRD and promptly put them in a closet. Last week I decided to put one of the razors on the hones and see what I could do. The razor is a little full hollow 9/16 Geo. P. Haldy Banty spike point with a short 2 3/4" blade that's in decent shape. I lapped my stones with a DMT 325, put the razor through the honing pyramid shown on the SRP Wiki, then stropped it up. I got poor results when it came time for the shave test. I ordered Lynn's World of straight Razor DVD to learn what I could, but still had some questions after watching it. So, I called Mr. gssixgun to beg for help! Glen was kind enough to call me back on a busy razor restoration Sunday and gave me some great tips. After talking with him I ended up taping the spine of the razor and went to work setting the bevel using the 5k, following Glen's advice on number of circular/angled/x-pattern strokes - so far, so good. Then on to the honing pyramid & finished up with 30 laps on the 12k. I stropped it up and put it to the shave test this morning and was rewarded with a silky-smooth BBS shave. :) The razor felt smooth on my face, with no pulling or razor burn afterward. Thanks, Glen! I truly appreciate the time you took to help me! :bow

Cheers,

Larry

Yup, setting that bevel is KEY; moving up doesn't help unless that bevel is properly set. You may want to look into a 1k of some sort to help you out there.

Congratulations on your success, and I hope more follow shortly.

Thanks, Dylan. I'm looking forward to the next attempt. It's amazing what you learn when doing things the hard way (and with lots of help from others), huh? The edge on the Banty was in decent shape, so I didn't have to do too much work on the 5k, but I can see the need for a 1k in the near future.

Cheers,

Larry