Thread: Koraat 14 2.0 Impressions

When I purchased my Korrat 14 2.0 a couple weeks ago, a few folks asked me to post my thoughts on the razor when it arrived

It arrived early this week and I have shaved with it daily since this past Tuesday.

Before I comment on the razor, here’s a bit of info. on my beard. I have a very coarse and heavy beard type with a few wild whorls on my right neck and lower cheek and other growth that maps in opposite directions in several areas.

When I was active duty with the USMC and not in the field, I usually had to shave twice a day. Even now, with a straight BBS, my bread grows in fast and heavy enough that I still can easy do a 2nd full face shave after about 7 hours.

To achieve a BBS, I need to do 4 passes: 1 WTG, 2 XTG, and 1 ATG
For a DFS: 1 WTG and either 2 XTG or 1 XTG and then a 2nd WTG
Most often I shave one of the DFS options.

This past week, I did both BBS and DFS with the 14 2.0 and then today I did a comparison with it to a Filly EPBD on each half of my face.

The 14 2.0 performed great! Ulrik puts an excellent edge on his blades, so no issues there.

On most full hollow blades, I get a bit of blade chatter/stutter on my 1st WTG pass and usually use slide vs scyth strokes to deal with that (I often get a similar effect with some of my old Sheffields too), so no big deal when this happened with the 14 2.0. After that, my other passes with the 14 2.0 were basically smooth sailing.

I tend to usually not go after BBSs because, regardless of blade type and their level of sharpness, I often have some post-shave irritation from ATG passes. This always is a 4th pass for me, and while I use very light strokes, the light irritation is, I think, due mainly to a too much skin exfoliation by this point. With that said, the 14 2.0 was an excellent performer on my ATG passes and I was impressed.

Today I did a side-by-side comparison with one of my Filly EPBDs. EPBDs are some of my favorite full-hollow shavers—they perform exceptionally well on my beard. And while the 14 2.0 is smooth and held its own, in the end, the EPBD was smoother.

Do I like and recommend the 14 2.0? Yep, sure do—I liked it well enough to order a 2nd one from Ulrik with translucent red scales! If someone were considering building a 7-day set of modern straights, these babies would be one of my recommendations. The scale options are wonderful, the blades are superb, and the shaves are excellent.

As others have mentioned, Ulrik did drop having his logo on the scales as an option. At 250 Euros (about $300 US / $400 CAD; those prices include a polished blade option that I selected and is 30 E more) with shipping to the US, I think these razors are very high quality and a decent value—ya ain’t gonna come close to touching a NOS EPBD at those prices—and their popularity is already showing. When I ordered my 1st 14 2.0, there was about a 1 week wait until Ulrik shipped it; now, the wait is about 6 weeks before shipping!