TLR shaving newb (but not sharpening noob) excited about shaving hopes to learn more here

Started with Japanese hand forged knives. Spending late nights surfing for new knives and buying stones, strops etc. always dreaming and perfecting my methods to get the sharpest edges.

It's always funny when I have company over and let them use my knives. Generally I give them one of the cheap ones because I know they'll F up the edge, by slamming the edge into the board thinking they would have more resistance instead of the just the slight whish of the knife, and I'll have to go back and sharpen again.

So i didn't pull the trigger myself, on the straight razor, I've been talking about it and my wife picked up on it and bought me a Dovo ebony scale silver steel straight.

First thing I did that night is looked at the factory honing job. It wasn't garbage, but it wasn't perfect. Not worthy of shaving. Laying the razor flat on granite revealed the edge had a slight over grind in the middle and wasn't flat. Of course this probably would affect performance greatly but I wanted it better.

Took it to a king 1k and flattened it out and raised a burr. Then to a jnat aoto. Then suehiro rika 5k, king 6k, kitayama 8k, then yaginoshima Asagi jnat, .5 micron loaded balsa, .25 micron loaded horse leather for final polish and strop.

Screaming edge. 1st shave no cuts, smooth. I learned on a DE razor to not be reckless.

I've now shaved 7 times, couple cuts. But this is the first time I've been able to shave consecutive days without getting ingrown hairs and irritation on my neck.


So I would say that's a win. Anyways I'm looking to learn more and browse endlessly in persuit of getting even sharper.

Next up is probably nanocloth and .1 micron.


Also is dovo's silver steel stainless? Seems to be a tool steel but I would say it's pretty rust resistant.