Greetings from a resurrected straight razor shave enthusiast
Hello everyone,
i am a Noob from the NY/NJ Metro Area and have again found my love for this elegant little device. My first experience with a straight razor goes back to the mid 80's where on an impulse, purchased a new old stock Heljestrand 4/8 wedge straight razor. I did ok shaving with it for about 3 weeks to a month until stropping no longer made it cut well. So at the advice of my local barber I sought out a hone to tune it up. I found a little 00 frictionite hone and proceeded to completely destroy my razor. In hindsight i was trying to hone it like a pocket knife, hey i didn't have internet forums and Youtube to teach me anything, so i forgot about it and returned to my evil ways of disposable blade shaving.
Last Christmas was a turning point when a friend gave me a Merkur 23C and i loved it. Shaving was again something fun and pleasurable so I started getting soaps and brushes from the local AOS and also bought the Merkur Progress as well and i also enjoy that razor. A month or two passes by and i was haunted by the old straight i gave up on but its nowhere to be found so my enthusiasm to rehash my old experiences led my to purchase a Thiers Issard 5/8 from AOS. That got me hooked i'm really enjoying the shave even though i'm not too great at it, like it takes me an hour to finish the shave but it feels like 10 minutes. So already i have invested in Norton hones, Strops from SRD along with a Dovo 6/8 and ralf aust 5/8 (incredible razor) and a 6/8 Boker tortoise from Vintage Blades as well as Crox and pastes.
that being said i do have a love / hate relationship with the 6/8 size razors they seem to flex more and its really a bear to clean whiskers under my nose and parts of my chin. Any tips on how to handle larger razors would be welcome. I do find that forcing myself to use the 6/8 makes my shaving with the 5/8 much more confident and easier. To wrap this up i just want to say thanks to Lynn and all of the members of this community for posting noob friendly videos they helped me a ton. Now where is that old razor i lost i need to fix it!
Cheers
