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I certainly haven't read them all, but I've looked through two or three from after 1920s and I am pretty confident if there is the relation that you suppose it would've made its way in them. After all stuff that is false like x-pattern honing being necessary for creating the correct 'razor teeth' has made its way there. They are copyrighted material so in the library section there is only a partial sample of one or two, but I'm sure you can find such books through your local public library.
The point is that you are setting unreasonably high burden for the claim - if the dependence really existed it would be obvious in any setup where one skilled person shaves thousands of different people most of them multiple times. The fact that there is no high profile for such an important dependence means that one is not easily observed.
True, I might be asking for too much. I have read a few shaving manuals, but I have not made an in-depth study. I am not sure the public library system in North Carolina will yield much. Though I do have a friend who is librarian. Maybe I can ask to see if she can dig up some info. As well, observational studies have their merits, but they also have weaknesses.
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DublDuck is among the top 5 brands in terms of numbers. Right now there are 135 dubl duck razors on ebay.com, so that's on the order of 5000 of them per year. If you want to quantify it you can run the statistics from the past auctions and get an estimate for the relative production numbers.
I thought it is clear from my post that 'oddball customer in the low price market' is something I derived from the structuring of their product line and the relative production ratios, which come from my personal observation of those razors that have survived until today. (Not formally quantified but I've been on ebay and on the forums for a bunch of years to observe thousands of them and if your own perception is different it is trivial to determine the correct one.)
OK, so you are making some inference based on observation. Thank you for letting me know how you arrived at your conclusion.
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This is incorrect - properly made and properly honed razors are equally easy to hone regardless of the grind. In fact the wedges are much easier and cheaper to make. You would note plenty of aspiring razor makers who produce wedgy razors and almost none who can even execute full hollow grind let alone would do it for the price of a quarter hollow.
Now, if you do abuse the razor then yes you can go much further with a hollow ground, and perhaps that's the underlying reason why full hollows took over looking at the surviving razors, but that's a rather different thing.
Exactly, why would they start making full hollows which are more difficult to make? No more difficult to hone, sure with electric tape.
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Sure, commoditization plays a role, but the diversity is there so it does not explain it. Filarmonica seems to have put out 5/8 6/8 and 7/8 razors in similar quantities, while DublDuck and most other american brands typically have primarily 5/8, quite a bit less 6/8 and very rarely 7/8 razor. Among the French production there seems to be more equal distribution between 5/8 and 6/8, Germany is similar to US and England seems to have gotten out of the game in the early 1900s. Again, my observations, and I can argue them based on evidence not on authority, so I hope you do not expect a citation.
If it is personal observation, I do not mind. I know you do have a wealth of knowledge about shaving. I am not attempting to be inflammatory in my comments either.
You do cite different sizes as evidence of diversification, but not sure razor width would be a great example. It seems most razors would come in two sizes. That is really not diverse. Given modern production examples, not much has changed either. Most razors will be around 5/8 or 6/8. Probably because those are the sizes most people will like to use. Of course, you have the occasional 7/8, but for the most part we have two choices. Though I did find it funny when I ordered a 6/8 TI razor once and it was coming in at almost 8/8.