Machine sharp...

I've always heard how sharp blades such as feather AC razors and scalpels are. That they are in fact much sharper than even the most well honed razor. Which makes me wonder... how do they get them that sharp?

I mean, some honemeisters have quite the assortment of equiptment at their disposable to put a super edge on a razor, yet, feathers are sharper? Seeing as we can go as far as 0.25µ diamond pastes (though I remember seeing a link which sold finer pastes) we are working with some literaly nano-sized stuff. It just really pokes at my curiosity is all :)

It's not just that they are so sharp, but they go for 10-15 shaves without stropping.

There's evidence in the straight community that harder steels take finer edges and hold them longer, so my guess is that it's a combination of extremely hard steel and special blade coatings. They don't have to worry about resharpening the blades, which opens up a lot of possibilities that aren't available to straights.

I also wouldn't be surprised to discover that the bevel angle is slightly steeper than for straights, because they aren't constrained by the need to have a thick spine to set the honing angle.

I really don't think that surgical scalpels are any sharper than a good straight. Ask anyone who's cut themselves badly with a straight and they'll provide the evidence. I know I've cut myself while cleaning a straight where I've just touched the blade ever so slightly. Nowadays they use laser cutters for surgery anyway.

As far as feathers go your talking about a oneway mission there. Use it and dispose so you can use the hardest metals and the steepest bevels. You could probably hone up a straight to be as sharp but the edge would not hold up very long and you would probably need to use a steeper angle. It probably wouldn't last one shave.