Thread: Sterilizing "New to Me" razors

Okay, I did a little checking:

Bakelite is probably up to being boiled or autoclaved. It is said to be very temperature resistant once set.

Not sure about celluloid, but since table tennis (aka ping pong) balls are made from celluloid one could run an experment using one.

Natural materials such as bone, ivory, wood - don't know. I would be very nervous about exposing wood to high temperature steam or hot water howerver.

If you want to see what barbicide or clippercide might do to celluloid, spray, dunk a ping pong ball and let us know.

fccexpert you are correct sir, I miss typed (Shhhh) I'm at work. Yes I did mean to say 20psi. But that dosen't count the time to get to heat, and cool down to alow the autoclave to be opened. Full cycle on a flash autoclave is 30 min approx.
Phil

I use hydrogen peroxide to sanitize mine.

I use an alcohol based hand steriliser, the type they use in hospitals. I think it is mostly alcohol, so i just use it on the blade, nowhere near the scales.
I was wondering if it is possible to autoclave the wapienica razors, which are all steel. I have an 18 litre pressure cooker left over from various mycology serilisations i was doing last year, so i guess you could probably use it for an all steel razor. Just not sure if it would create tarnish on the blade at all as when i sterilised a scalpel blade it went black probably due to some aluminium foil i had in there on top of a jar.
Nick

Can I ask why anyone would want to autoclave a razor? Autoclaves are for use on heat resistant material only. What do you think you're dealing with here? Ebola? Use Milton fluid - it's essentially a 2% bleach solution used for baby's bottles and will kill anything likely to be anywhere near a blade stone dead. If it doesn't kill what's on the blade then you my friend are living somewhere mighty dangerous! Seriously - what is this obsession with sterility? Just be careful and don't cut yourself in the first place!

Blueprinciple - In case you missed it, bleach solution, even a 0.5% solution will attack metal blades and pins. Autoclaves are not really that hot, only about 250-270 deg F. Some, but not all, scale materials can probably handle that. An autoclave is actually the only way to sterilize a razor, the other methods discussed only disinfect. The biggest concerns are hepatitis B and C. I'm personally not worried about B since I have been vacinated.

Originally Posted by fccexpert

Blueprinciple - In case you missed it, bleach solution, even a 0.5% solution will attack metal blades and pins. Autoclaves are not really that hot, only about 250-270 deg F. Some, but not all, scale materials can probably handle that. An autoclave is actually the only way to sterilize a razor, the other methods discussed only disinfect. The biggest concerns are hepatitis B and C. I'm personally not worried about B since I have been vacinated.

Barbicide is approved by health departments for hep b&c and hiv

Barbicide is certainly an adequate disinfectant, but it contains alcohol, which may attack celluloid scales.

Originally Posted by fccexpert

Barbicide is certainly an adequate disinfectant, but it contains alcohol, which may attack celluloid scales.

Have a small container with a lid that you can hang the blades in with the scales on the outside. That way you can sterilize the balde without touching the scales.

I'm sure I read results of some tests somewhere that showed alcohol was less effective against some virii than the physical washing process with soap for example on your hands. I think it showed it was better against bacteria.
I guess you could always use uvc but then you'd have the problem working out the exposure needed as it varies considerably iirc depending on your likely pathogen. Then again some handle materials might not like that either.

I think many of the previously mentioned methods like bleach or barbicide wouldn't do too much harm if only used when you buy a new used razor. I mean if your the only person using a razor you aren't very likely to catch something from yourself.