Hi, All;

I've been a lurker for a long time, and I finally took the plunge and got a Kamisori along with hones for Xmas. I've never used a straight razor before, so I'm very excited!

The Kamisori is beautiful. It's second hand but without much hone wear. It was listed as a Kanetaka.

My hones are the Norton 4000/8000 combo along with a Naniwa lapping plate. I also got the SRD modular paddle strop, which is the best product idea I've seen in a long time. I've used 1/2um and 1/4um diamond spray on its two felt pads.

The razor was listed as shave-ready, but it failed every test I tried (hanging hair, forearm hair, thumb pad). So I decided to hone it before trying it out. I watched a lot of videos on honing and went to work.

I first tried honing using a typical approach used on western razors, without any success of course. I honed the hell out of the stamped side trying to get a decent sized bevel. In the end I went back to the videos and saw gssixgun's pair on honing kamisoris. Based on that I did several 7:1 sets on the 4000 just to rehabilitate the bevel, then several 7:1 on the 8000 to hone it. What a difference! Finally it was popping hairs on my arm, but still wasn't really grabbing the thumb pad. I went to the paddle strop and basically tried using it as a hone: several 10:1 stropping sets using the 1/2um diamond felt, then the same on the 1/4um felt. The bevel is even and REALLY shiny now, although the results are qualitatively the same as after the 8000 stone. Still completely fails the hanging hair test.

I felt it was time to try a shave so I did a bunch of stropping on the leather paddle, lathered up, and shaved using the stamped side against my face ...

... OUCH!!

The blade tugs hair and scrapes my face like the rim of a rusty can! Something is very wrong with my honing, so I need some advice. My guess is that I either did more damage than I expected in the first honing attempt, or I need a 12000 hone instead of the diamond on felt.

I'll post some pix of the bevels this evening.

Advice?