Advice Request: Razors Rusting

Ok, so I'm having an issue with my straights rusting almost immediately after shaving... The thing is that I'm noticing rust/discoloration spots developing on the blades generally before I'm even finished shaving. The blades are always cleaned prior to putting them away using a dunk in Barbasol (just a quick dunk, not a soak), wiping down with a dry paper towel (including in-between the scales), and then a light coating of mineral oil. The razors are then stored in an airtight container with silicone dry packs which are regularly replaced. If it helps, I don't notice any further rusting after the razors are put away.

I used to shave with straights in college, and have only returned to traditional straight/wet shaving this past year. That being said, I don't recall my blades rusting this easily before... but I may be mistaken; college was a long time ago!

The blades are all new/high quality blades... I guess I'm just wondering if anyone else out there has this issue? Has any ideas? Is this relatively normal due to the high carbon content of the steel? Bad water?

What's the best way to get rid of and/or prevent the rust? I've tried light sanding/Flitz ... thinking of naval jelly... I've been able to get the blades rust free, but then they rust again right away. I'd prefer not to spend an hour de-rusting a blade every day, not to mention my fear of damaging them with constant polishing...

Any thoughts/suggestions/ideas would be most appreciated.

not that i been around here for years but i have never heard such a thing , maybe others can chime in that have ... maybe you have extreme moisture in your house ?
i shave 1-3 times a week and pretty much use the same razors and i can honestly say that after my shave i strop the edge and they sit to air dry and dont get oiled often and i have never had an issue ... now everything else that i rarely use stay oiled , everything i hone or sand gets oiled after sanding or honing but i have never had any rust issues ... one time i did have a spotting issue and that was after not wiping a blade down when done honing after a quick rinse cause i got distracted ... i hope that whatever it is that is causeing your razor to rust can be fixed ..
my only other thought was if you had older razors in celluloid scales that was contaminating your other blades , but if there new razors i highly doubt that is the case or if that will happen that fast ..

Yeah... I honestly have no idea... I thought it was pretty bizarre. In fact most of my relatively intense after care razor routine revolves around multiple steps taken in an attempt to rectify this...

Balistol metal protectant works for me. After shaving, towel dry razor and strop it. I apply a couple of drops of ballistol oil. You can buy it at a gun shop. I use a tissue to remove before shaving it is non toxic.

My guess is that you're oiling while the blade still has some moisture on it. Otherwise check to be sure your mineral oil is pure, not moved into a bottle that held something else that you washed out.

I love ballistol- I'd tried that before, but I might give it a shot again. I'd thought about the mineral oil essentially "trapping" moisture on the blade... The thing is that the blade is spotting before I even get a chance to put oil on it - I'll try and post some pics here tomorrow.

The container is new/original manufacturer mineral oil container opened by me....

Thanks everyone for the suggestions and ideas - really all of them are appreciated and helpful!

Rusting almost immediately after shaving I've also never heard of it, maybe it's your pre shave or something in your soap, I have never had a water spot or staining or rust on a single razor and I never put anything on my blades, just keep my hands perfectly dry the after use I dry them off with kitchen towel strop them and put them away with all my other razors in a sealed food container with a few packs of silica gel.

We don't live that far away and I don't have those issues. What does happen is hard water can stain a blade with spots that sometimes looks like rust but it's not. Actually rust stains come out easily hard water stains don't. They seem to really adhere to the steel.

I make sure the blade is totally dry and then use sterol but if I'm using the blade for a few days I don't put anything on it and have no rust issues.

I hone on J-Nats and sometimes the honing sessions last a while, a few razors that I have honed developed stains before the session was through. Looked like rust but I think they were more hard water stains than corrosion, could have been a little of both.
What I found that works for me is to get the blade cleaned up,Fitz or Maas, as shinny as I want them an then I use Rennesants Wax, it's a museum quality wax, protects the steel and no more stains or corrosion. I don't oil anymore just wax and then store in silicon impregnated sleves, when the razor comes up for honing again I repete the wax application and problem solved.

Again, thanks to everyone for the feedback!

I am also wondering if the local water is in fact the culprit. I live in the desert with an average daily humidity of less that 10%, I have left firearms out for years without rusting... The whole thing has been really strange. BUT we do have hard water ... Super hard stuff with all kinds of volcanic minerals and what not the traditional cleaning products like CLR have a hard time removing...

I think the Renaissance wax is a great idea. The spots are stuck on like glue - no "easy" removal at all... I think my next step is a freshly polished blade and a 100% distilled water shave. Not that I'd do that all the time, but at least I'd have found the culprit.

I'm pretty sure it's not the soap. Have used both Tabac and TOBS... Nothing exotic or obscure.

Anyway, I will post my results. Sincerest thanks for all the ideas and suggestions! Hopefully this is the solution and I can at least help someone else with the same or similar issues.

So first, photos would be helpful and second I would suspect the Barbarsol.

Why are you dipping in Barbarsol after each use if you are the only one using the razor.

Are you shaving post shower with high humidity in the room?

It may be the razor, is it happening with just one razor?

By the way, is this like old-car rust (i.e. reddish and lumpy) or more like stains or dark spots (grey-black and flat).

Ok: attached is a picture of the spots I'm seeing. They are flat and do not have any perceptible texture to them. I haven't shaved today, so these are post oiling/rubbing with a cloth. Also, this razor has been sitting with a coat of mineral oil for a few days, and honestly it looks WAY better than it did when I put it away...

I don't think it's the barbasol. The spots develop before I dunk it in the barbasol solution. As to why I do it? Well it really has to do with me being a near 20 year medical provider who has a particular aversion to germs. Couple that with the anti rust/lubrication properties of barbasol and the fact that the human face is perpetually touched and a great place for germs to accumulate? ... I'm not going to tell anyone else what to do, but I've seen too many instances of flesh eating bacteria and other nasties to take any chances, especially when I'm exposed to this stuff every day... It just takes one careless touch, one door handle, one casual eye rub... And yes, I am neurotic... ;-)

The spots don't change when scraped, and even flitz's seems to take quite a bit of rubbing to get them off. They have a reddish tinge to them, but the volcanic rock out here tends to leave reddish spots...

After all the suggestions, I'm really leaning towards hard water.... But maybe the pics will provide some more insight?

If it is hard water, does anyone have any super ways to get rid of such spots?

Oh, and I do shave post shower: room definitely has high humidity, but the razor stays in the airtight box until I start shaving, gets dried off and put back after, and is never stored in bathroom. Maybe 15 mins total high humidity/high heat exposure.

And it has happened to all my razors thus far... All quality high carbon blades from different manufacturers.

Well I think the mystery is 99% solved. I shaved today with a brand new razor I'd been saving, very similar in construction to the other razors I had been using, albeit from a different maker.

This time I used all distilled water: distilled water for lather, for rinsing the blade, for soaking the brush, etc. Everything else was the same: the same soap, same brush, same shower/shave routine, same exposure to the elements, relatively the same environment... And ZERO spots! ... All that remains is to try one of the razors that rusted/spotted before that I've cleaned, but this is the first out of a handful which have not shown the spotting/rusting immediately upon being used to shave.

Strop them after use, wrap them with toilet paper, put titanium oxide powder on them for long term storage. These are what I do.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Pinacle72

Well I think the mystery is 99% solved. I shaved today with a brand new razor I'd been saving, very similar in construction to the other razors I had been using, albeit from a different maker.

This time I used all distilled water: distilled water for lather, for rinsing the blade, for soaking the brush, etc. Everything else was the same: the same soap, same brush, same shower/shave routine, same exposure to the elements, relatively the same environment... And ZERO spots! ... All that remains is to try one of the razors that rusted/spotted before that I've cleaned, but this is the first out of a handful which have not shown the spotting/rusting immediately upon being used to shave.

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but this is also the only razor you have used with distilled water right ?

hopefully you have figured it out so you can protect those shiny blades !!

I had the same problem with one of my razors. I think I let it sit too long with water on it while honing other razors. I will dry each one after I finish honing them from now on. I was restoring a few that I recently acquired so I was going from bevel setting each razor then on to the next hone etc... Only one of them got stains on it but I will be more careful next time.
Good luck with it.

Guys lets keep it civil, I'd hate to have to lock the thread because of the way some are acting here.

I've pretty much given up on the spot issue. I have a water softener and I still get the spots. Typical metal polish like Simichrome will remove them but it's not easy. Cape Cod Polishing Cloths do a better job.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by thebigspendur

I've pretty much given up on the spot issue. I have a water softener and I still get the spots. Typical metal polish like Simichrome will remove them but it's not easy. Cape Cod Polishing Cloths do a better job.

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I once found water spots on one of my razors and used easy to find Nevr Dull wadding and it worked just fine.

As I stayed clear of it, it did not deteriorate the edge and the usual pre-shave stropping ways all that was needed before the next shave.


B.

Thanks for all the great suggestions. I had forgotten about NeverDull! Man we used to go through that stuff by the crate in the military! Always shining or polishing something - Today or tomorrow will be the final test. I polished out the spots from a previously used razor and will try a 100% distilled water shave with that one. If no spots then I think I've found the culprit and my solution. I've also got some Renaissance wax coming to try, and I'll see about these cape cod polishing cloths-

I kinda already said this, but the final test involving a razor which previously exhibited spots used in a 100% exclusive distilled water shave has proven my hypothesis correct: water in my area is the culprit! The re-shined razor displayed absolutely no new spots despite every other variable being the same (humidity, post shower, shaving cream, Barbasol, etc.). SO, if anyone in the Albuquerque/central New Mexico area (especially south of the city in the Rio Grande valley) stumbles on this thread and has been experiencing similar issues, take note: our water SUCKS! and it can cause spots which are in no way easy to remove. I've tried almost every "internet" chemical process/formulation/voodoo I could find, and nothing but mild abrasive/metal polishes and quite a bit of elbow grease have succeeded in removing said spots. I haven't yet received the Renaissance Wax to see if that will allow me to use tap water, and I don't have a softener, so I can't speak to whether or not that would work... but the distilled water DOES work just fine, and, honestly, it isn't too bad.

As a reference (if anyone would like some ideas): I heat up some distilled water in a braun water heating/tea appliance (not to boiling), pour it in a cup to soak my brush, and save the rest for forming the lather. Whilst shaving, I "rinse" off my blade using the water I had been soaking the brush in, and I use a touch more of the distilled water if I need "running" water to remove used lather from the blade. All-in-all, I use maybe 1-2 cups max of water per shave. At about a dollar a gallon of Walmart distilled, this isn't bad at all, just slightly inconvenient.

I probably won't post anything further on this thread. Hope it helps someone else having similar issues! And tons of thanks to everyone for the suggestions. I was so fixated on rust that I missed the much more obvious water quality...

If I had seen this thread sooner, I would have piped up right away. As you have found out, water is usually the culprit.

MOST often, its not that the water is hard, but that it has been treated. Municipal water often has chlorine or other bactericides added to it. I have been in places where the concentrations were high enough to cause immediate rusting on exposed steel surfaces. Destroyed a good kitchen knife that way when my water well was given a "shock" treatment and It didn't occur to me until it was too late what was going on. Of course, there may also be issues with a waters ph and acidity levels. I get a water test done on my well every 2 years, just to be sure of what I'm drinking!

Thanks for your reply! That's all good stuff to know, and, honestly, I've been thinking for quite a while now that I need to have my home water tested. Water in NM is generally tasty and of good quality, although being "hard" is pretty ubiquitous throughout the state... that being said, where I live now, the water... doesn't taste right... Add to that the extremely high instances of rare cancers...

Maybe I'm just being paranoid, but I'm almost afraid to find out what we bathe in on a regular basis. We only drink bottled water, but the everyday cooking and cleaning are with tap water. Still, knowledge is power, so I think I owe it to the family to find out what we've been coating our bodies in for the past several years...

Thanks again for the response!

never, ever store something that can rust in an air tight container. Oil it up and let it sit out or in an open box or drawer

I'm curious what your reasoning is - not meaning in any way to be argumentative, just curious:

Have you had bad experiences with it? Do you mean that something that was wet will increase the humidity and thereby trap moisture, hence increasing the chance of rusting? Something I haven't thought of?

My rationale is this: I live in a dry environment, and I keep the razor in an airtight box mostly so I can bring it into the bathroom while showering without exposing it to high humidity. The box is never left open in high humidity, and I have a silicone pack in there which I change out frequently. I don't put a freshly used razor in there; rather I let it dry on a stand for several hours before putting it away again in its box.

Anyway, just curious about what your rationale is and thoughts are so we all can learn from shared experiences.

Thanks for your input!

Our water was good quality until they started using surface water and routed it through the Rio Grande.

I have a water softener and I still get the spots so it's not the typical hard water offenders.

Maybe it's the Radon Gas-har har.

Radon!!! Now why didn't i think of that??? Ha ha! Or it might be the increase in silvery minnows and spotted owls!

I do remember as a kid hearing my folks talk about some salt or ash present in our water which made all the standard spot removers (CLR and the like) ineffective... Then again, I did grow up in LA so I do glow at night...

(Lots of New Mexico humor here...)