Thread: Making razors ready to shave

I've been shaving with a disposable blade straight razor for about 3 years now. It uses half of a DE blade, just snap it in half and off you go.

I've tried going to fixed blades a few times, but neither of the ones I have have worked. I can feel the hairs being pulled rather than cut. Alas, it didn't occur to me until recently that neither is ready to shave.

I have two razors. The first is a Dovo 7/8" Astrale, model 5 from the blade etching. The second is a Filarmonnica 3/8" with INCX etched into the blade. The former is somewhat useable, the latter isn't even close. The Dovo's edge looks fine, but there are some extremely fine nicks on the Fimarmonica that likely need to be ground off.

Now, here's what I've got to work with: A Dovo leather/canvas hanging strop, and a Spyderco Sharpening system.

I'm a little strapped for funds ATM, so does anyone have any suggestions on what I can do with what I have?

I'd send the 7/8 to Lynn for honing. You can buy into several methods of honing the other razor and keeping the 7/8 shaving sharp. One, a barber hone off Ebay, two a pasted strop from Tony Miller (he is a member here) or three you can buy a really good hone like a Norton. I recommend using Lynn for the 7/8 and getting a barber hone or a pasted strop, say a two sided from Tony. If you want you can send the 3/8 with nicks to me and I can hone it for you, likely it'll never be a great shaver. Postage is cheap as long as you don't send it out Priority. There are so many millions of ways to hone a razor and get it shaving we could talk about it for a week. It could be its own thread. Suffice to say there are 1,000 members on here that each have a few ways to hone a razor. So its up to you. I can only tell you this. Its more about learning a skill than buying a hone.

Oh, and welcome! Sorry I'm not familiar with the Spyderco honing system. Sounds like a knife honing system, very different needs a razor has!

...thats my Yoda impression!

That's what I love about straight razors, it's all about skill, and you buy that skill in blood, skin, and sometimes steel.

The Spyderco is a knife system, but it allows me to set the two alumina ceramic rods to simulate a solid stone. It won't work as well, but it's better than nothing. I might give it a try with the filarmonica, but I'd never risk honing the Dovo myself.

Don't even think about using the Spyderco. It has nothing to do with straight razor honing. The grit on it is too coarse, and you'll need flat smooth surface and not rods to hone on. For the "cheaper" alternative you can buy barber hone from Tilly, www.redtrader99.com and for the standard here, get the Norton 4000/8000 grit combination stone. It will give you more constant result than a barber hone. You can also search ebay for a swaty type hone.

search the forums, and have fun,
Nenad

Originally Posted by Ted Stewart

The Spyderco is a knife system, but it allows me to set the two alumina ceramic rods to simulate a solid stone. It won't work as well, but it's better than nothing. I might give it a try with the filarmonica, but I'd never risk honing the Dovo myself.

Spyderco is too coarse to finish razors. It may be OK for removing the chips and setting up the edge initially.

If you like Spyderco, get the superfine ceramic stone. If you true it flat, it will be a good substitute for the Norton 8K, maybe a lot finer.

Filarmonicas are great razors and they sharpen up really well, but yours is kind of narrow if it has chips. I restored a 5/8 that had tiny chips and it's now one of my best shaving razors.

What you'll be missing is a good intermediate grit, like the Norton 4K. The Spyderco fine is about right, but then you're spending more money.

One possible other approach is to buy a barber hone starter kit (3 hones) from Tilly (redtrader99.com). She'll give you a discount if you tell her you're a member here. That's pretty good but it still leaves a big jump between your Spyderco system and the hones.

By all means forget the ceramic rod method. They simple are not fine enough and you cannot maintain a constant angle which is necessary for a razor.

Originally Posted by Ted Stewart

That's what I love about straight razors, it's all about skill, and you buy that skill in blood, skin, and sometimes steel.

The Spyderco is a knife system, but it allows me to set the two alumina ceramic rods to simulate a solid stone. It won't work as well, but it's better than nothing. I might give it a try with the filarmonica, but I'd never risk honing the Dovo myself.