Thread: unidentified gunk on a razor

hello everyone,
today i had a shave with a one month old dovo bismark , and during the shave i have noticed this weird dark discolouration .
i am pretty sure it was not there before the shave .
i have tried to gently scrub it off under some hot water thinking its just soap but nothing seems to change .
what is it ? and what should i do to remove it ?
i am pretty worried for the blade
thank you

Seems your soap/water/cleaning agent/moist environment/drying procedure after shaving is oxidizing your steel. Black color is haematite formation (patina) usually. Normal thing, let it be.

thank you very much for your fast reply .
so from what i understood this wont affect the performance of the razor in anyway , but is there something i can do to keep this from getting worse or occurring on my other razors?
after a shave i am very careful to properly wash my razor with water and then i dry the blade with a paper towel and make sure that the scales are dry , then i leave it open on a paper towel for about ten minutes to allow further drying , and lastly i apply a thin coat of mineral oil, is there anything wrong or lacking with this ?
thank you all

It looks to me like you are not getting all the soap off of your razor. That can be removed with metal polish but then you would probably have to re-hone your razor. Don't get the polish on the gold plating as it would remove that too!


Mike

When I first began shaving with a straight my shave took so long and the blade being constantly wet sometimes began to tarnish or spot before the shave ended. My shaves are much quicker now , although being a bit anal I do use a wet sponge to scrape off the lather and "carefully" wipe the blade with a microfiber cloth between passes, I also treat all my razors with Renaissance wax. YMMV.

Adds character to the blade, my friend

It might be caused by leaving lather 'dry out' or by leaving it on the blade for a while, that's what had happened to me when I first started out.

I can't remember what exactly I did back then, but I do know that it bothered me.
I think I tried to clean it off with some Oil first, Ballistol I believe; but eventually I had to use some polish to clean it.
The only downside is that it's very close to the edge and might damage the edge if you do use polish. If you do, I'd suggest maybe using a q-tip with some polish on it, barely any just enough to get the patina off and carefully avoiding touching the edge.

Originally Posted by azourital

after a shave i am very careful to properly wash my razor with water and then i dry the blade with a paper towel and make sure that the scales are dry , then i leave it open on a paper towel for about ten minutes to allow further drying , and lastly i apply a thin coat of mineral oil, is there anything wrong or lacking with this ?
thank you all

Nothing lacking at all, that seems perfect to me!

I've had a couple of citrus artisan soaps do that to my blades. Not really sure if it is the soap reacting with the blade or with something in the water. A little bit of Maas or Mother's on a q-tip will buff it off without any problems. A microfiber cloth will usually wipe it off if you wipe immediately after the shave.