Thread: g'day gents, a shout out from the barossa valley

Originally Posted by EisenFaust

I hear a good Shiraz works wonders on razor burn

Only when it soaks from the inside out...........

Welcome to SRP, Nick.
Hang on and enjoy the ride

well I now have my fourth shave under my belt. this one was both pleasing and annoying at the same time!

here's why;
first of all my lathering is terrible! I used tabac soap today with my omega 6191 badger brush and made up what appeared to my untrained eye a reasonable lather. the prob with this lather was that it started to dry out after just half a pass. it actually started to go chalky! so either im really slow (most likely a little slow) or i didnt add enough water to the bowl.
i also decided today that i would try to do three passes. I managed two and a half as the blade was tugging too much, lather kept drying out, running out of lather etc etc.
Im waiting on a new strop (just a poor man's from whipped dog) as my current strop is really bad! there are massive creases along it in several places and its really stiff! have been attempting to fix it up a little after reading the wiki. Im gonna rub some of the strop oil into it that comes with the poor man and see what becomes of it. if all else fails it can become a pasted strop in the future.
I think the tugging is a combination of all things 'beginner' really. my angles could be off, could be putting too much pressure on the blade aswell but I think the strop has a lot to do with it. Have been trying to be very careful with stropping and was looking really closely today and saw that the blade surface is not able to sit smoothly on the strop as there is an ever so slight downward bow like a shallow 'u'. I also have to try and avoid the creases so its a little bit of a minefield...just imagine if I nicked it aswell :-S
but back to the shave, still really nice except for the attempted third pass ATG. I ended up only doing my cheeks, jaw and sides and left the lip (def not gonna do a fools pass), the neck and soul patch area (have a small mole which complicates things).
I finished up with a warm rinse, alum, cold rinse followed by using some of the geo F trumper skin food sample. It's the coral one, Im not overly sold on the sent but it feels very nice, especially as I had just a touch of razor burn, completely gone now after the trumpers.
also, NO BLOOD OFFERINGS!!

Have a good one gents,
Nick

Hi Nick,
I haven't used Tabac (my SWMBO doesn't allow it) but I hear it's a good product. If your lather goes chalky it needs more water. But if you're taking things slowly (my first shave lasted 40 minutes or something, now it takes 10) the lather will dry out. If I'm doing more than one pass I always add a little water before the second, as I like to use a thinner lather for the second pass anyway.

A bow in a strop is easily fixed; just bend it back the other way. Someone here told me that the hardware can cause this. Also pulling on it too hard.
The only thing I've ever put on my strop is lather; once in 12 months.

Three passes on the fourth shave is brave. Nuff said.

I find tugging is 100% dullish razor. For me, it's always been that. Even if my lather is rubbish I never get tugging. Digging in (i.e. no glide, due to a dry lather) or a sore face (i.e. no cushion due to a thin lather) but not tugging due to lather.


Even now, after a year, I wouldn't really enjoy attempting a fool's pass. I have a moustache, goatee and soul patch, so normally don't have to worry about that; but i did shave off my goatee just to be able to say I shaved my chin with a straight too. One day I'll have to go the whole hog...

It sounds like you're going well. I really would keep it to one pass for now, though, and practising making lather isn't weird, even if everyone tells you it is...

Carl