Thread: The Boker Brotherhood

Originally Posted by rfury

Hello everyone, I am Robert.

I am very new to both Straight razor shaving, and Boker razors.

I bought this razor on Ebay, it was kind of a mess, lots of scratches, and would not cut paper let alone hair.
I figured worst case senerio, I had something to pratcice on.
I followed the instructions from what I learned here, on how to make this razor in to a shaver.
I reset the edge, honed from 4k-8k-12k, and stropped it...Now it is shave ready.
This is my finished Product.

Nice job, I like that worked spine. I gots to get me one of those!

Thanks for the complements on my work... I am so green at this it isn't even funny.

I have a second Boker, I am currently working on, another Ebay special, the price was right, I knew it needed a little work.

When I received it, it had two chips in the blade, it was pretty well tarnished, some deep pitting into the blade, but that was it. Oh yea, duller than my butter knife.

I started the work, with the dremel, I most of the bad stuff off, and went to hand sanding it, I got into a hurry, and moved to 800 grit too soon, so I need to take a few steps back, and start again.
The one thing I was worried about was the two chips in the blade...So, I figured before I get to far into polishing the blade, I need to make sure I can salvage the edge, and make it a good shaving razor.
So, on the Norton stone, 4k, I worked up a good slurry, and started re-edging the razor, after a good 80 strokes, with a bit more pressure than what I should be using, I got the chips out, then I stayed with the 4k for about 50 more strokes, using only the weight of the razor, then onto 8k, for 80 strokes, and finished on the 12k for 30 strokes, I still don't have a Strop, so I stropped it on my pants..100 strokes.

Well, I have to say, this is the sharpest edge I have achieved thus far. So now I am thinking I need to revisit the other razors...

Here is the almost finished product of this Boker.
And Yea I am gonna give it a test drive tomorrow morning...I am sure this will be a great shaver as well.

Oh yea, I forgot to mention, this is a King Cutter, the blade is stamped, but through my work on it, the gold tinting is gone, it is a shame, but I saw no other way to restore the blade and keep the gold...Oh well.
It is still a wonderful razor.

Robert

Here is my newest addtion to my Boker collection. It has a beautiful edge, I did a quick honing, stropped the razor...With my new Leather Strop!!!!...Whoo hooo....gave it a quick partial shave test, and it is ready for shaving.

Dang some you are gonna be as far gone as me soon! Great lookin razor!

Now i know the culprit, scallywag who have been stealing all those bokers from me on the bay!

Some seriously nice scores there!

I was wondering if any members of the brotherhood could help me identify my first boker. The logo stamp matches the late 20s-early 30s stamp in Doc's post on page 2 in this thread.

A link to the item here.

Like this one?

It's very, very close. That is the box. The blade doesn't have the top line of text or the border around it. There's no hint of the tree on the handle, but the handle is worn enough that it's possible there used to be one. Your tang from the blade to pivot is much fancier, mine is much more straight and stamped on both sides. I will try to get some pics up before the weekend ends.

What can you tell me about these blades? Even with the bad handle, do you think I did alright? What steps might you take in restoration?

those of you who know me know that I am constantly searching for historical information on the Boker razors that we all love so much. For some months now I have been attempting to contact the proper people in the boker company to see what they had that they would be willing to share with me and of course you the brotherhood. Today I recieved this email.

your inquiry regarding straight razors reached us in Solingen,Germany. As you know, Boker products are being manufactured here.

On straight razors, you must know, that it was only last year when we came back to producing a line of 6 patterns.They are part of the current Boker USA catalog and probably you are familiar with these.
Before that Boker did not resume to make straight razors after the 2nd world war.
The company has been destroyed in 1944 badly. The only material we have available has been made available to us by private people after the war.
We have one Boker catalog of Herrmann Boker,New York 1906.
In there you find 20 pages of straight razors with various tangmarks,etchings and handlematerials. These pages tell you more than I even know out of our history concerning straight razors.
We'll copy these pages for you and send them by airmail to your attention.
I hope we could help you. Enjoy this old material.

I will be posting these pages here later this evening or tomorrow. Hopefully this will be another great step in reasearch of the wonderful razors.