Thread: Beginners, The 1k shave . . .

Greetings gentlemen,

I hope it isn't too late to join in on this test. I, being a humble beginner and coming up on my first year of straight shaving, would love to try this. I have "polished" my razor on an 8k, but never even used a 1k. I bought a few razors to practice on restoring and they need new edges. Even if I missed the deadline I would thoroughly enjoy reporting my findings with the 1k shave.

... Now to pick a razor ...

Cheers,
JackofDiamonds

I'm taking your advice, Roy, and will shave off the 4k when I go to hone my next 2 razors. But, maybe I should try this 1k challenge. Wow.

Originally Posted by cudarunner

Great Idea!

I’ve done this experiment in the past!

It was when I first started honing, and I’ve encouraged every ‘apprentice’ that I’ve had to do the same! I recommend that after the blade is off the stone that they strop 100 on the cloth and 200 on the leather.

As suggested do the same off of the 4K! You will be surprised!

While I typically finish off of a Naniwa 12k I could very easily live with the edge off of the Norton 8K to the end of my days!

I bought the Norton combo's a while back and have been hesitant to learn the art of the hone.
Spring break is next week and I have the whole week off with my son. Sounds like a good time to learn.
Count me in. I'll choose my razor tonight. I have a Tony Miller strop, but I'll stick to the limit.

For my razor, I chose two: J R Torrey, and an FWE Leader. Both are in great shape, so I hope I don't ruin them. Yikes.

Just test shaved 3 blades.

Genco 6/8 - Bevel set on King 1200

Torrey 1/4 hollow - Bevel Set on Norton 1k

Morley 4/8 - Bevel Set on Chosera 1k

The coarsest of all three bevels was the King. Could be me, could be the razors, but the Norton and the Chosera were both "smoother", and I use that term loosely. The Norton was nice. It cut well, and had very little irritation. The Chosera was the smoothest of them all. It cut easily, and had almost no irritable feeling.

Sorry guys, this is all I can muster this evening. It's been a long week at work, and I'm shot.

this is a great idea... i may try this out this weekend... at least half my face.. while i don't think my edges suffer, i've never shaved off something lower than 8K probably if not more... with a La nouvelle coti..

I've been working on a pipe this week, so not much time for the hones. I'll have to remedy that...

The interesting part about Maxi's results for me is that his results mimic exactly what Gssixgun says in his thread about dedicated bevel setting, IIRC. I can't read bevels with a scope, so shaving off each 1k would be about the only way I could make those bevel readings tangible. Getting a bit better at the difference between 1k and 8k btw...off topic..sorry.

Tonights shave was better then the last.
I tried some spine leading strokes for some reason, major fail....
20 x strokes then 20 zero pressure x strokes.
50 on linen and 80 on leather, no construction paper!
Conclusion, as regularjoe put it "I could shave with this way if I had to"

Originally Posted by regularjoe

The interesting part about Maxi's results for me is that his results mimic exactly what Gssixgun says in his thread about dedicated bevel setting, IIRC. I can't read bevels with a scope, so shaving off each 1k would be about the only way I could make those bevel readings tangible. Getting a bit better at the difference between 1k and 8k btw...off topic..sorry.

Good point, I use magnification to check that there are no visible "chips" on the bevel, but other then that the scope is useless to me ..

Knowing that I would be shaving directly off the 1k has improved my bevels without question. I have never dedicated so much time or used so much finesse on a 1k....

I think I have excellent edges.... Im also thinking theres going to be a dramatic improvement coming up!

Does anyone have a problem shave testing the 4k in this thread next, Im not sure I can handle 2 more 1k shaves with that escher staring me from the shelf....

This was a great idea, sometimes we forget what can be done with very little. With so much common knowledge seemingly set in stone as the gold standard, it's very easy to not remember what we can do with the tools at hand. It's experiments like these that help refresh our minds on the boundaries of what can and can not be done.

I don't know how valuable my inputs will be as I've only been SR shaving for three months, and this is my first time touching a razor to a hone, but here goes...
I noticed on my Torrey that there's a faucet ding on the toe. Doesn't affect the edge (I think), other than the bevel on the toe is a bit thicker than the rest of the edge. I don't know of any way to correct this. Ideas? I did find myself, when doing the circle strokes that I was lifting the heel off the stone a little bit, I could feel it as it made contact again with the stone. I tried out the X stroke and didn't do this. I'm sure with practice I can figure out exactly what I'm doing wrong and correct it. I didn't count strokes. I was busy just feeling the blade and the stone.
With my Leader I didn't try the circles, just the X. No issues. Half as many strokes as I did on the Torrey.
What I learned... Since this is my first try at honing, I learned a lot! The stone is crazy thirsty! Even after the 15min soak. X works better for me than circles. Still not sure on the TNT (I'll have to read more up on it). I tried it out, didn't do a before, but after a couple strokes, the blade grabbed evenly through my whole nail (is that what it's supposed to do?)
The results... On both blades, before stropping, hairs were popping off my arm no problem. After the 50 linen, 80 leather, I didn't see any noticeable difference in hair popping action. I just shaved my cheeks, as I'm still learning, and no major irritation or discomfort. Definitely not a finished edge, not as close a shave as my other blades.

Thanks for doing this. It gave me the kick in the arse to man up and put steel to stone.