Thread: Is there such thing as a bad "vintage" razor?

Originally Posted by shuredgefan

Alas, in this disposable consumer society, manufactures can get away with turning out El Crappos.

+1 and don't forget the barbers who were a big market in those days. These companies that make the cheap junk new razors probably don't know that people are actually attempting to shave with them.

I do wonder if there were poor razors. I notice seeing a lot of text on razors and boxes making "big play" of the words warranted, guaranteed and such. Maybe poor razors were sometimes encountered?
On the other hand, a cutler of the Victorian era wouldn't have had a problem getting suitable metal and men with the skills to temper and grind the stuff. I think some of the furniture (scales,pins and spacers) was bought in. I know in this country (the UK) skilled metal workers were two a penny.

I think all would agree that there are variations in performance, preference, edge quality, shaving, etc between vintage razors. In my limited experience I have not come across a vintage brand that I think is poor. However, IME some I like and think are better than others. I have a few that give acceptable shaves but overall I'm not as impressed with as other razors I have. I won't mention any brand names because I think it could come down to heat treat and hardness or lack thereof of individual razors. So, yes, I have a few razors that I think are "so-so" but none that I would consider to be poor.

Chris L

Originally Posted by Chris L

In my limited experience I have not come across a vintage brand that I think is poor. However, IME some I like and think are better than others. Chris

+1 on that and on what fpessanha said about "warranted and guaranteed" being marketing ploys. Most all of the barbers I knew back years ago favored Solingens with Sheffields being a close second. The ones I knew never mentioned American made razors and that surprises me because the Case, Robeson and Cattaragus I have gotten are all first class shavers.

I guess if your razors were poor, you went out of business! Also, in the 50 - 100 years since they were made, most survivors were of the quality persuasion (other than those given as 'gifts' and stuck in a cupboard!) - the crap has long since been chucked in the bin!

I Think all vintage razors are good because if a particular razor was bad you wouldn't keep it for more than 30 years before throwing it in the bin.. The vintage razors we get are the ones that were used for decades and given from father to son and I wouldn't give my son a zeepk... well ok maybe some razors werent used for decades but at least someone took the effort not to throw them away..

Maarten

Remember that in Solingen for instance very few razor makers did it all. Most bought the blanks from one supplier and the scales from another and sent the razors out for this or for that so in the end there were few actual sources for the blanks which is why I think there were so few bad razors. Yea you can get one warped or badly ground or maybe with poor heat treatment but in the end though some makers had a reputation as premium and some maybe not so premium I can't think of any German makers who made bad stuff. I would assume this scenario was the same here in the U.S and in other places.

About the only razors that were consistently made 100% in house were the Japanese Traditional Straights and I'm not even totally sure some of them might have bought blanks also.

Originally Posted by littlesilverbladefromwale

I do wonder if there were poor razors. I notice seeing a lot of text on razors and boxes making "big play" of the words warranted, guaranteed and such. Maybe poor razors were sometimes encountered?
On the other hand, a cutler of the Victorian era wouldn't have had a problem getting suitable metal and men with the skills to temper and grind the stuff. I think some of the furniture (scales,pins and spacers) was bought in. I know in this country (the UK) skilled metal workers were two a penny.

You might have a point there, refering to the warranted and garanteed on the boxes. However I think this is not because of poor quality brands being the competition. I think this is pure marketing and good to excelent brands competing among eachother. They had to advertise... the bad brands wouldn't have survived the preasure of the good ones.