Thread: Light touch up work

Hi everybody,

I'm new to the site, but I've been feeding off the juicy tidbits of info for a while now. Thanks to everyone for that.

I've been shaving with a shavette ever since I got an old timey classic shave overseas. I will still use it for travel, but I just got a real straight razor not too long ago, and boy did I get a deal. It's a vintage Henkel Co. Ohio that looks like it was never used and I paid about $25 for it. It's a precision surgical tool.

The problem is that I'm a douche and instead of just giving it a light stropping (which in hindsight is all it really needed) I tried to apply my wood chisel sharpening skills and...well...I've been trying to get it back to the condition it was in when I first got it. Can I get an amen from somebody out there kicking themselves for making all their learning mistakes on a little treasure like that?

Well, after about an hour on the slip stones I got it razor sharp and shaving like a charm, but only recently learn about taping the spine. I did a little damage to the spine on one side and it appears there is already a little pitting going on where I had ground it.

I have two questions. (1) what is recommended for buffing those tiny pits out (preferably things you can find in your neighborhood hardware store)? and (2) Is buffing out the small scratches all across the blades a vanity thing, or is it recommended? If so, is very fine diamond paste recommended? It's such a pretty little piece I would really like to see it shine every time I take it out.

Thanks in advance!

Originally Posted by jbrentoniv

(1) what is recommended for buffing those tiny pits out (preferably things you can find in your neighborhood hardware store)?

If the razor was new and didn't have any damage I'm confused on how it got pits. I would say post some pictures so we could give you a better guess as to what would fix that. With rust pits (actual dimples in the metal) you can only remove them by sanding.

Originally Posted by jbrentoniv

(2) Is buffing out the small scratches all across the blades a vanity thing, or is it recommended? If so, is very fine diamond paste recommended?

It is mostly a vanity thing. i would think that minor scratches aren't going to interfere with any sort of oil or cleaning maintnence that you do to your razor. With repairing the key is always to start with the least aggressive. In this case a metal cleaner such as Maas or Fliitz would be recommended. Put that on a clean cloth and see if you can buff out the fine scratches. If that doesn't work then you'll probably need to step up to a buffer. You might be able to use some sort of Chromium Oxide homemade slurry but I have no experience trying that.

Thanks for the reply.

I actually don't know if I did the damage when I honed it or not, but I know there were no signs of small pitting when I received it. I actually don't think I did it because there is a pretty significant flat spot there on the spine and I was only using an 8000 grit slip stone, (when I say "significant" I mean that in terms of a precision tool, it's actually quite small and the electrical tape seems to have correct it.)