Thread: Now why did this work???

So, I picked up this razor of the bay and the blade didn't appear to be in terrible shape. So, I foolishly destroyed the scales with the best of intentions to make my own new ones, which is a different story all together.

I spent WEEKS trying to reset the bevel on this blade. I could never get it to do very much more that coarsely shave my arm hair, I wouldn't even attempt to touch it to my face. I tried every stone/hone I had (Naniwa 220,1k,5k, and a coticule) with unimpressive results.

I've been reading ALOT of honing info and I saw a few people taping the razor spines and figured it wouldn't have all that much affect on my blade for no particular reason.

So tonight, out of pure frustration I stuck some tape on the blade and worked it on the coticule for less than 30 mins. All of a sudden, it was swiping arm hair off really well. So I took it to the strop and did 25 pasted linen, and 100 bare leather and took it for a test drive.

Even with no face prep, and no scales on the razor it seemed to shave my cheek very smoothly? I was perplexed and immediately took some pictures of the blade to get some feedback from the knowledgeable community here.

On another note, if you happen to know anything about this blade, that info would be much appreciated. I cant find any info anywhere.

Did you hone it without scales?

I sure did.

Perhaps very simple,pre tape you never had your foundation set (bevel) all that followed gave you an edge that shaves.

It's a bit hard to tell from the photos, but it appears that there is quite a bit of hone wear on the spine. Did you try the Marker test to see if you were removing steel from the edge of the blade? I suspect that what was happening is that you were removing steel from behind the edge of the blade and that the actual edge wasn't making good contact. With the uneven spine wear, it is also likely that the bevel was quite uneven and that in itself adds a completely different challenge. Adding the tape raises the angle ever so slightly and this may have given you more consistent contact with the edge and helps resolve some of the uneven bevel issues as well. I've also found that tape on badly worn spines provides more consistent results, YMMV.

I did use the sharpie test. I could get even wear on the bevel if I adjusted my stroke a bit.
The hone wear is mostly from me. The edge was originally pretty bad and uneven, so I decided in all my infinite wisdom that I
should breadknife it and start anew. Terrible idea!

I was never able to get the bevel right, and I probably did WAY more damage to the razor than I needed to.

Regardless, I think your probably right about the angle and the tape. Whatever it was, I shaved 1/2 my face with it again today WTG and XTG with no scales (Challenging!!) and it shaved very nicely.

I'm going to build a functional set of oak or aluminum scales for it this weekend and it's now going to be my travel razor.

Happened to me as well; worked my bum off to no avail... after adding two layers of tape all went smooth. My (uneducated) guess is that, before adding tape, due to excessive hone wear, the bevel had too low of an angle and just couldn't hold an edge. I've noticed that the bevel was kinda wide, but didn't think it would be an issue... as said, after 2 layers of tape, I was able to shave with it in 20 minutes. I'm not that much of a honer, so I may be wrong, though

This could be, and probably is a honing question. Even though it is less likely, it might be a metallurgical question. In my opinion, the blade has some tunneling rust. I might be wrong, especially since the blade has been buffed, which hides the rust evidence to some degree. But, looking at the blade closeups, I believe some tunneling rust exists.

Surface rust isn't a big deal, but tunneling rust - and even when it doesn't appear too severe, can be a killer!

Sometimes, I can hone past rust to solid enough metal. And, that might be what happened. You might have honed and honed and finally reached more solid metal, but be wrongly equating your final success as related to honing.

Again, keep in mind that I consider this a less likely explanation. But, it is worth considering.

Breadknifing can often mean extended honing afterwards.
That you resorted to tape & succeeded means you may have been pretty close to getting an edge as the tape only puts you up about 1º