Thread: Eager novice here in Illinois

Hi folks. I just registered on here tonight. I can shave without bleeding finally but dont understand the equipment maintenance yet. I bought two vintage razors and a hone on ebay. they both shave well if I hone them each time, they dont seem to hold an edge. After some reading here and other places I dont know if they are over honed or if I am not stropping enough or properly. Any advise???

I'm too new to give you suggestions yet but I do know that those more experianced are going to ask you a few questions before they can advise you. What kind of hone are you using? What is your stropping routine like? Are you sure you are stropping correctly? (basically the edge of the blade should never touch the strop without the spine touching at the same time, keep the strop taunt) what condition were the razors in prior to you attempting to shave with them, ie sitting for decades or did you get them shave ready from a reliable source? Anyway welcome to SRP!

Welcome to SRP. I moved your honing ebay razors thread into the honing forum where you may get more attention on that topic. In the meantime here is a 1961 barber manual excerpt on honing and stropping from the SRP Wiki help files. It is in PDF format and I found it helpful. So much so that I printed it out for easy reference.

Welcomke to SRP. I had a razor professionally honed (cost +/- $20) when I started out and it made all the difference in getting off on the right foot. You may consider this route.