Thread: Who is honing the Fillys at Classic now?

I can personally vouch for the honing by 'Elbonator". Chris has honed all the razors I sold over the past year and a half as well as doing my own, persoanl razors. he does a fantastic job. I originally honed my own then switched to him as my business grew and my time declined. I chose him over Lynn solely based on him being nearby to where I am. When I stoped selling razors my work for him declined and Chris started doing work for Classic on the in-stock prehoned pieces.

No worries guys.

Tony

I purchased one of the Classic "pre-sharpened" Filly's a couple of months ago. Before I bought it, I sent a message asking if it was "pre-sharpened" by Lynn, and was only assured that it was shave ready. In other words, they never answered my question directly. I said to myself, whatever, and went and bought it anyway. I also purchased a Henckels Friodur from Vintage Blades that I requested be sent to Lynn for sharpening before it was shipped to me.

I am relatively new to straight shaving, but I did find a rather big difference between the two razors in terms of sharpness. The Friodur is a very nice shaver, the Filly... I am still struggling a bit to find a good shave with it. It is just not very sharp. It was certainly ready to shave with, but was still not as sharp as either the Henckels or the Le Grelot I bought (sharpened by Martin at Rasurpur).

So there you go, I guess.

s.

stick with the filly. I have that and a Le Grelot sharpened by Martin as well, and they are both awesome. It is really hard to hone the Filly, I think because the steel is hard and it has a vexaxious smile, but when it's right I like it more than the Le Grelot and hold its edge really well. It's very heavy stiff hollow which really is a cool mix.

I found the easiest way to deal with the smile is the so called professional strokes - namely honing the ends in separate strokes from the middle part. rolling x stroke I'm still working on.

Thanks Loueedacat. I'm not ready to give up on it yet. But vexatious really does describe it well! I use just a coticule and CrO paste. Maybe I need to start at a lower grit and try to reset the bevel? It's sharp, just not very sharp, if you know what I mean...

s.

Originally Posted by Tony Miller

I can personally vouch for the honing by 'Elbonator". Chris has honed all the razors I sold over the past year and a half as well as doing my own, persoanl razors. he does a fantastic job. I originally honed my own then switched to him as my business grew and my time declined. I chose him over Lynn solely based on him being nearby to where I am. When I stoped selling razors my work for him declined and Chris started doing work for Classic on the in-stock prehoned pieces.

No worries guys.

Tony

I'd like to clarify that my objection was that I had no clue who the honer was. I certainly had no objection to Elbonator's honing. That would have been impossible since I didn't know who the honer was.
Tony, I figure if you recommend him we should all accept that Classic Shaving's pre-honed razors are good to go!

persco: Forgive me for butting in, but yes, I know exactly what you mean! I've been struggling to get this guy as sharp as my other razors since I got it. Even reset the bevel twice just to be sure I hadn't done something to the edge. (Though it might be tricky with that hard steel.)

Yes, the bevel might have been set too steep from the factory (I got mine professionally honed after the fact when found this out since I didn't have my DMT then.)

I also use a coticule (combo) & CrO paste--every other razor just about wipes off my beard--this guy? Still figuring it out. Last honing was a complete bevel reset to a good TNT (TPT on this one never seems to dig in as much as my other razors, regardless of grit.) followed by ~ 100 strokes on the blue w/ light slurry, ~120 on a wet coticule, & ~40-50 on Cro pasted balsa. Shave was okay (maybe a little less good than a DE shave), but nothing like what I routinely get on my other blades.

I'll keep playing for sure & I 'll let you know if I find a magic bullet for this setup, but I'm almost thinking I might need to wait until I can afford a set of Shaptons to really get the most out of this razor.

FWIW, I have an older 7/8 TI Eagle I got several months ago from a member here, and it was just honed by Chris Ellison before I bought it - he did an absolutely first rate honing job.

Originally Posted by Utopian

I'd like to clarify that my objection was that I had no clue who the honer was. I certainly had no objection to Elbonator's honing. That would have been impossible since I didn't know who the honer was.
Tony, I figure if you recommend him we should all accept that Classic Shaving's pre-honed razors are good to go!

I'm not sure what Chris' arrangement was with Classic and whether he wanted to be disclosed or not and may be why they are not posting the info. Lynn had suggested him to Classic as a source and the timing was right as I was no longer able to provide a supply of razor to him.

Tony