Thread: What's your toughest razor to maintain?

Ladies and Gentlemen

Of all my razors the one that's easiest to maintain is my Le Coultre frameback - this is a razor you can hone by speaking to it nicely. I've sharpened three of the five blades it came with. and probably didn't spend more than a total of ninety minutes on them.

On the other hand the Greaves 7/8ths wedge my wife gave me for my birthday two years ago has been, shall we say, a labour of love? It gives me a decent shave these days, but it's spent alot of time on the honing bench and has been dropped back in the drawer more times than I can count.

I've heard it said, here and elsewhere, that wedges are the most difficult to hone, and I suppose my experience bears that out, but I do like the challenge, and maybe that Le Coultre is just a little too easy.

How about you guys? What's your easiest razor, and what's your most difficult?

goshawk

Are you talking about initial honing or maintaining? These are two different things. Personally, I have had a bunch of Reynolds blades that have been huge PITA's to hone. On the other end of the spectrum, I also have always (I think) had a very easy time honing framebacks.

As for maintianing, I've not really used any of my blades all that much, and I've yet to have to touch one up.

If you're talking about getting them sharp to start with than the easiest I have encountered are your average Solingen or Swedish full hollows. The most difficult have been the TI Damascus, an ATS 34 and an S30V stainless. Sheffield wedges can be tough to get sharp for me as well.

Once I get them sharp maintaining is about the same for one as the other as long as I touch them up at the first sign that they need the TLC and don't let it go beyond needing a simple touch up.

Zeepk!

Originally Posted by gugi

Zeepk!

The question was about razors, not razor shaped objects.

Thanks for the replies so far

Holli4 and Jimmy are quite right - I've asked two questions here. I think the maintenance part of the question just clouds the issue. My motivation was to find out whether the grind of the razor makes as much difference to others as it seems to do to me in honing. It seems I'm not alone in finding the wedges difficult.

That's good to know

goshawk

I have had a difficult time with the 1/4 hollow razor. I have tried to shave with it several times - I got a couple of decent shaves, but nothing like what I was hoping for and it was always dul,l by the second shave. I finally took it back to the DMT 1200 and reset the bevel. Now it has a pretty nice edge. I still don't trust it, however. I always have a back up razor in case it suddenly reverts to its old ways and turns on me.

I agree on the wedges. Tricky to get right (and worth the effort).

I also struggled with my Friodur (stainless) but once I finally got it right it was fantastic. Hasn't needed a touch up yet.

Mike

Well, I don't really think that wedges are difficult to hone up, they just take more time. There are two possible reasons for this.

One is that with a wedge, there is more material on both the bevel and the spine that has to be removed in order to set the bevel.

Second, there has been some talk around the forum that perhaps old wedges were honed at a "non-traditional" angle. It has been noted that many arrive in forum users' hands with relatively narrow strips of hone wear on the spine and bevel, but actually setting the bevel leaves rather large strips in both areas. I have seen a few different opinions as to why: perhaps from honing on dished stones, maybe from honing with the spine off the stone, maybe there was some equivelant of taping. I myself don't really have any opinion, and I've never actually bothered to check the bevel angle of an old wedge before I take her to the hones. All I can say is that there is often more steel to remove.

Another factor that comes into play is that many of the old wedges have smiling blades and swayed spines. This makes the honing take longer too. The enitre bevel will usually not rest on the hone at any give time, and a small contact area means that each portion of the blade is seeing less time on the hone per lap than a larger contact area. Also, if the angle of the blade with respect to the hone (i.e. the lead angle of the heal) is not kept constant), the bevel angle will be changing with every pass, which results in inconsistant honing. This can also add on to the required number of laps.

I think my Dovo's are the easiest. I have this one Puma, I' pretty sure it's an 88. An ebay special, it has lousy looking scales on it, they'e not original. I'm going to send off to Max for Maxing....This thing is terrible. Normally, I'll just go ahead and breadknife it, and re set the bevel, but I guess I like torturing myself. It shave OK, but just OK, not like most Puma's and it doesn't take an edge well. I'm not sure what's up with it, but it's my PITA razor...