Thread: Unable to achieve that last little bit of sharpness

Following str8fencer's advice to post in the honing topic, I copy-pasted my question part from my original introduction post here: http://straightrazorpalace.com/membe...therlands.html
Sorry for the double post!


I own a 10x4 cm coticule, a 20x6 cm BBW and a 10x5 cm C12K. Strikingly, the BBW gives me the best and fastest results, I cannot seem to match that with the coticule. I really like my BBW and want to learn how to use it properly in one-stone honing and I have a pool of patience. My edges are agreeable, but lack slightly in sharpness.

Robbin, who is also a member at SRP under a nickname unknown to me, has helped me greatly by sending one of his straights. I shaved with it and found it had that little extra sharpness that keeps eluding me. Next, I dulled it, sharpened it on my BBW as inspired by Bart's "Honing on the BBW" video and shaved once more prior to returning it to Robbin. Although I was quite pleased, his heavy beard experienced some tugging. He said he would take it back to his 8000 grit Naniwa SS and see if that would solve it. So far, he has not yet had the time to do so, but I will post his findings when he does.

Edge testing
I have found the HHT to be very reliable with my own as well as my girlfriend's hair and can start growing back my arm hair now that I mastered the TPT enough to tell if an edge will shave arm hair and when it gets close to shave-readiness, as well as the difference before and after stropping. Despite the HHT controversy, I will adopt Bart's HHT rating system here.

Robbin's edge popped hairs right upon touching with very little tug (HHT 4-5, I never get 5, even with Feather blades), my best try was pretty close to that with a little extra tug on the hair (HHT 4). Off the hone, my edges vary between HHT 1 and 2-3, while instruction videos show a solid HHT 3. Sometimes I get lucky with a small part of my warped edge and get that HHT 3, but the other parts of the edge stay behind. I could not tell how the good part of the edge became that good, whether it better contacted the hone or endured less pressure or something else entirely.

My honing technique
Honing is done with slowly diluting the slurry as soon as the razor will shave arm hair, although I found I could reach a near-shaveready edge on rather thick slurry. I should note that I use the C12K as a slurry stone, lacking a dedicated BBW slurry stone. On the HHT 1 level I switch to very dilute slurry, almost clear water, but find myself unable to improve the edge. Finishing on very dilute slurry on my BBW, water on my coticule or C12K does not seem to improve my edges, as far as I can tell.

The haziness of the bevel was a bit confusing on my last try. The part where the bevel was widest (nearly 2 mm) on my warped blade stayed hazy, while other parts became quite shiny. My logic tells me a shiny bevel indicates a more even edge, since the scratches on the bevel are also found on the edge. The TPT confirms that: I feel fine teeth with hazy bevels that turn into very fine teeth on shiny bevels. Stropping removes the latter very fine teeth, but cannot compensate for the haze bevel's fine teeth.

The question
What would you advise me to focus on when improving my edges? In my unexperienced opinion, I do not dilute too quickly and I try to keep an even touch. I have great difficulty applying very light pressure and when I do, I slip up at times, keeping the razor at an angle which makes it touch the hone's (chamfered) edge. I read that can set me back a number of strokes, but I don't know how many.


Thank you very much for digesting the rather long text and for all the advice that you can give me!


Regards,

Laurens

Darn, still got the wrong forum. I wanted to post this in the regular honing forum.

How hard can it be

Honestly this stands out to me more than anything else.

He said he would take it back to his 8000 grit Naniwa SS

I suggest you focus on those things that you've already identified as troublesome skills for you. When you have mastered them fully, it will help considerably. If you have anyone who will loan you stones to try out, take the offer. You will soon see the drastic differences one can come to expect when dealing with natural stones. And the practical impossibility of offering pinpoint advice on their use.

Want consistent edges, then you must use consistent techniques, your technique is all over the place, I doubt anyone here can even repeat it to know where the edge is "possibly going sideways"

What is the most obvious information lacking,,

What kind of razor, and how does it shave ????


ps: the Advanced section is fine for this Conversation

Originally Posted by Laurens

Darn, still got the wrong forum. I wanted to post this in the regular honing forum.

How hard can it be

Just pm a mod and ask them to move your thread.

Never mind the mod just chimed in

Honestly this stands out to me more than anything else.

He said he would take it back to his 8000 grit Naniwa SS

What does that tell you? I have only shaved with his razor finished at the SS12K, CrOx and .25 micron diamond paste, so I cannot tell what the 8K level will bring.


I have two razors that give distinctly different edges and shaves. My favourite is a 7/8 extra hollow The Crown & Sword Razor in excellent condition. It is the easier of the two to hone and for me, the shave is very smooth but could do with a little extra sharpness.
The other one is a slightly warped Birko that I will shave with tomorrow morning, although it seems to be not nearly as sharp as the The Crown & Sword Razor.

Glen, could you move this question to the honing topic?

Shaved this morning with my warped Birko, but had to switch to the The Crown & Sword Razor after half my face, after which I had a brilliant shave! The Birko is simply not sharp enough. It seems the The Crown & Sword Razor was honed well enough for my taste, but my shaving technique needs some more practice, especially keeping the very light pressure.

Even so, my warped Birko is tricky for me. I kept most of the length of the The Crown & Sword Razor on the BBW making very narrow X strokes, which worked well. The Birko does not apply to the same rules, I need wide X strokes to get an even edge. I will experiment some more today, see if I can get the edge similar to the other razor's.

Do I just need a lot of practice or am I missing something? Is a very light pressure really the key?

Whether your intention is shaving or honing with "very light pressure", it's hard to go wrong with it.

My opinions only, based on my own experience, not according to anyone else:

1/If you insist on using any slurry at all, and I believe its net effect at any point is often negative, pull the edge through it, don't push. Pushing the blade into slurry dulls the tip while it's cutting the territory that doesn't matter, just behind the tip. If, as people say, running the edge over your relatively soft thumbnail ruins an edge, what do you think that constantly pushing it into a pile of rock is doing? Once the tip is rounded by that, at any stage, you've lost. I learned this decades ago, sharpening violin knives, and it holds just as well for razors. If you want to see it clearly, use a turntable Japanese honing station as lots of woodworkers do, where everything happens much faster than for manual razor honing: if you use slurry, the side of the edge forced into the slurry picks up a very visible rounding at the tip. Because I was looking for it, I quickly saw the same with razor honing on stones.

2/If C12K is the grey Chinese hone, lose it. I have two and am convinced that people have been led astray by its slowness into thinking it's a fine stone. By my measure, it's around 6000, according to the results it leaves. I bought one for my violin shop, and gave it away as a definite step backwards from my 30 year old 8000 Japanese water stone: I don't get why razor people are into it, except that it's cheap. Just buy a Naniwa 12K and be done with it.

3/For just a bit more moxie, at the end, before leather, "hone" your edge on a piece of clean, fresh glass, using it just as you would a stone, with a little water, then dry. For me this was the last step in getting an edge that approached a factory DE blade. I have been intending to start a discussion thread on this step, which I think is burnishing the edge into better order than leather will subsequently do, but will mention it now. Although I haven't mentioned this here, my violin friends are all reporting great results from this additional step.

Originally Posted by mdarnton

My opinions only, based on my own experience, not according to anyone else:

1/If you insist on using any slurry at all, and I believe its net effect at any point is often negative, pull the edge through it, don't push. Pushing the blade into slurry dulls the tip while it's cutting the territory that doesn't matter, just behind the tip. If, as people say, running the edge over your relatively soft thumbnail ruins an edge, what do you think that constantly pushing it into a pile of rock is doing? Once the tip is rounded by that, at any stage, you've lost. I learned this decades ago, sharpening violin knives, and it holds just as well for razors. If you want to see it clearly, use a turntable Japanese honing station as lots of woodworkers do, where everything happens much faster than for manual razor honing: if you use slurry, the side of the edge forced into the slurry picks up a very visible rounding at the tip. Because I was looking for it, I quickly saw the same with razor honing on stones.

I think perhaps you have created a self defeating attitude before you have learned enough about slurry and SR's therfore it will never work for you...Your Hypothisis is not so much wrong as it is incomplete.
If you want to actually learn about slurry and how it works the information is on here in many thousands of threads, you simply have to want to find it.. But to call it negative without learning how it actually works is just showing inexperience with Honing SR's and bias from working other tools...