Thread: Let's talk HHT

I am going to give a few pointers about the HHT from the one side that says "Parlor Trick" to the opposite camp of "HHT 1-5" ...

Please if you are an experienced Honer and use an HHT, add your story of how you developed it into a usable test...

In my personal experience I use a HHT, but not to determine shave readiness, I use it so that I know the edge is keen and ready to be shave tested, Only a shave test determines shave readiness...

Personally I think any HHT before the final stropping is a waste of time, IME it isn't accurate, perhaps you can develop it into an accurate test, myself I think the other sharpness test at the lower levels work better...

This has been repeated so many times it almost hurts my fingers to type it... The HHT is for use by the person that honed the blade, and that has developed an usable HHT, otherwise it is a JOKE!!!!
For a person who just got a professionally honed blade, to type the words HHT and I can't get it to pass, is a waste of typing..

The HHT has to be developed in reverse, if you are going to use it, after you have honed a shave ready edge, and have shave tested it, and absolutely KNOW it shaves... Then, and only then, do you start your journey to an HHT...
Strop the edge like you are going to shave, and then start playing with the HHT, try the hair both directions, try a clean fresh hair, try an old one off the brush, try angles, try no angles, try pulling, try no pulling... once you get it to pop, then try the same edge, same technique, before stropping the edge, and see if it fails... A usable HHT fails at one point, and passes at another...
This testing can take some time, and can be different on each blade, what you are striving for is a hair to pop that gives you information...That is a useful HHT.. BTW your own hair might not work at all, or work to easy, mine is that way, it pops at 1k and is useless as an indicator of anything...
My wifes hair will not pop at all until I am done honing, and have done the final stropping, so hers tells me something... Hers tells me that the edge is keen, it does NOT tell me how that keen edge shaves... Only the shave test tells me that...

I hope that clears some stuff up and helps a bit...

I will add this for all those people that find it necessary to say this over and over, the HHT does not work for everybody, it does not have anything to do with a shaveable edge, it is simply a tool, just like the TNT, TPT, AHT, Only the shave test, works to test shave readiness..

Yes you can have a perfectly good shaving edge, that YOU cannot get to pass an HHT, but I bet I can get it to pass, without doing anything other than stropping that edge...Because I have developed my HHT to work, and you haven't..

Just like everything else involved with honing a razor, consistency is the key to using the HHT correctly...

FWIW I've never used the HHT. I have short, fine hair and find no delight in pulling out chunks of what likely won't work anyway. So there it is. I fiddle with edges until I like the way they shave and then try to rememeber what I did to get it that that way.

The edges generally work better than the memory which, in one respect, ain't all that bad. In other respects

I don't use the HHT either.

During my honing process, I used to frequently check my razor at each stage. The first way I learned to do this (aside from TNT) was by shaving arm hairs. I'd do it after every hone, looking for the improvement. After my finisher, I'd try to cut arm hairs off the surface of my skin. If it worked, I knew I'd get a good shave. After a while, I found I could cut "hanging arm hairs" off my Naniwa 8k. A while later, I found I could do it off my Naniwa 5k.

Regardless of what tests I do on the edge during my honing process, the only test I really care about is the shave test. My razors are for shaving, not passing hair tests.

i'm another one who doesnt use it either.

I much prefer the shaving arm hair test(s). I make sure I can shave arm hair at skin level off the 1k stone. If I cant do that easily and at all points on the blade, I stay on the 1k until I can. I use the TNT to see how a bevel is developing, and a TNT pass lets me know the bevel is close to being formed on the 1k.

Then I'm just watching the edge through a loupe as I move up the stones to see it becoming more and more polished. I usually do the shaving arm hair at skin level test as I move along just to make sure I havent made any huge error!

Once I get to 8k I should be able to shave arm hair floating about 1mm above the skin. I can feel all the hairs catching on the blade and see them getting cut and collecting on the razor.

Then I move onto my finishing stone, then strop on my daily strop. At this point I usually check the razor on my leg hair about 3-4mm above the skin and the hair should just be cut cleanly and easily. You can hear a hollow ground blade going "pingpingping" as you do this test.

I guess these tests are kinda variations on the HHT, but I prefer them as they are actual shaving tests!

i find this is the best way for me to consistently get good edges on a razor.

It's funny how we always come back to setting a bevel.

At this stage, I know that if the bevel is set correctly and I follow my normal honing process, the razor will usually be a good shaver.

As I reflect back to when I started honing, I never used the HHT. For the most part, I just followed the appropriate pyramid based on what I thought the razor would need for honing and shave tested to see if it worked. Over time I tried shaving hairs on my arms and a variety of tests, but really it always boiled down to how does it shave and from there I developed a sense of when it did not, what stone to go back to.

The most important thing about all testing is that the tester really have knowledge of what the test is and what it means. For me the Thumb Pad Test tells me when a razor is pocket knife sharp at bevel setting and I don't leave the 1K until it feels right. This feeling is something some people know and some need to learn.

There are a couple of problems with testing when it comes to new guys. The first is that they tend to over hone until they really learn a specific test or have a benchmark. Another problem is that tests like the HHT cause a new person without much experience to proclaim a razor not sharp and they are pre-disposed to have a miserable shave, not to mention the need to learn proper technique. As Glen pointed out and I agree, a properly stropped razor is necessary for a decent HHT. We have seen people try it with a razor with oil on it or one that just had the oil wiped off and guess what? Think it will pass? The right hair, the wrong hair, oily hair, thin hair, thick hair.........OK OK OK........

Another problem is the expectation that you can sharpen anything because you have sharpened all your knives in the past. The straight razor is a more delicate animal and honing is a learned art. You need to take your time and learn it correctly and correctly can be very individual. It can take a few weeks to a few months to learn to hone with good results. It can take years to be able to hone everything in sight and in every conceivable condition. Jus as honing is a learned art, testing is a learned art. We are always developing our senses.

There is no magic stone or magic test. There are a variety of tests that can help you along the way but none are really conclusive.

At the end of the day, how the razor shaves will be your best indication of how you've done. When a razor glides over the beard and does not remove any whisker, it normally is over honed or still very dull. When it tugs and depending on how much tug there is, it normally needs some more work. Now to figure out how much work or what hones to go back to???

I hope the HHT debates go on forever as every time we discuss them, we reinforce things that really help people. Some great information in the posts above.

When you hone 1 razor, you don't know what you will know when you've honed 10 or 1 razor 10 times. When you've honed 10 you won't know what you don't know till you've honed 100. When you've honed 100, you don't know what you don't know until you've done a thousand and so on. We all continue to learn.........

WOW!!! Did I write all this..................................

Have fun,

Lynn

I rely heavily on the Hanging Hair Test.

If a razor passes my HHT (explained below) it might be shave ready. But my experience tells me if a razor does not pass my test, it won’t give me the shave I want. I’m going to say this again, a razor that fails my HHT will not give me a satisfactory shave.

My HHT is conducted with my wife’s ultra fine wispy barely visible hair cultivated from her hairbrush. I hold the root end and bring the strand down to the edge at the toe, the middle, and the heel. A pass is the fine strand falling away from the edge at all points.

My shave test is a basic single pass north-south shave. A passing grade is a comfortable presentable face. A second pass should be an option not a necessity.

This is asking a lot of an edge but the beauty of the straight razor is that I can have the edge I want.

As an aside, I can’t imagine trying to hone a razor for someone else not knowing what kind of edge they like or how to judge it.

I reamin &c,
LG Roy

I agree with all the above info. I would add that, for me, the HHT is usefull as a base reference point in that I know that a blade will not pass a HHT done by me, with one of my chest hairs when its too dull to bother trying a shave test. In other words, when it passes my HHT, done by me with my chest hair I think its worthwhile to try a shave test, but not before (for me). Shave test is the only test that proves if its shave ready
.

I've tried the HHT on a razor that was freshly honed by Lynn, my hair would just laugh at the razor and stay intact. I've tried the exact same razor with one of my friend's hair, it poped just looking at the edge.

If the HHT works for you and gives you can correlate HHT to shave readiness, more power to you.

For the HHT to work, you need the perfect hair that will ONLY pop when it's time. When do you know you have the perfect hair with those properties ? It's a personal thing that can only be used on your razors with your hair. But saying that your razor passes the HHT doesn't mean much to others. Basically, I'm 99.9999% confident that no standardized HHT can be develloped.

Pretty new to honing and i dont usethe hht, i stick to the tnt and shaving my arm hair, the more i do i seem to get a better feel for it, but i think i have only just got on the first run of the ladder.

The HHT algorithm is made up of two separate functions: training and using. They proceed as follows:

Training <-function(hone, razor, hair, face){

while (still alive and shaving with straights){

10 hone(razor);
20 HHT(razor, hair);
30 testshave(razor, face);
40 correlate(testshave, HHT);
50 if (testshave==good) break else goto 10;

}

using <- function(razor, hair, face, training){

if (training == a lot){
use HHT
use shavetest
}
else use shavetest and do training
}


James.