Thread: To buff, or not to buff?

Originally Posted by stimpy52

I just hope this never comes up again. Nobody really reads this stuff, right?

Ya never know! LOL

ShavedZombie;

If you feel up to some very fussy work, then here is a way to buff that blade while still retaining the etching on the side of the blade.

In short what you want to do is create a buffing mask to protect the lettering.

Please note: I have not yet tried this method, but in theory it should work. In any case, I cannot think of anything better just yet.

My suggestion is as follows:

Take a thin sheet of tracing paper, tape it in position and using a thin pencil trace the outlines of the existing lettering.

Once that is done, arbitrarily add a bit of space around the lettering on your tracing. (see the attached image for example).

Now, sandwich the tracing paper with some slightly thicker paper and using either extremely fine scissors or a hobby knife cut out the form, being sure to follow the enlarged outline. Neatness counts here, since your cutout is going to be the buffing mask. I would actually suggest that you cut a number of identical masks if you have the time and patience, since you might need them.

Now comes yet another tricky bit:

Take the razor blade (hopefully removed from the scales) and clean it carefully with some acetone to remove all traces of skin oil and grunge around the lettering.

When the blade is dry, place your paper mask in position over the existing lettering and carefully apply super glue to it. The idea is to saturate the paper thoroughly so that it simultaneously holds to the razor blade and becomes very hard.

A few hints are in order here:

You have to saturate all of the paper, but do make sure you don't use so much super glue that it starts running all over the rest of the blade. It will help to use a then applicator tip for this purpose so that you can direct the super glue exactly where you want it, letting it flow in between paper and mask without having it bead up at the edges to form round droplets.

It might help to pierce the mask in a few places with a sewing needle in order to make holes for the super glue to more easily penetrate into the space between the paper mask and the blade.

Don't use your fingers to hold the paper mask in place. Not only are fingers kind of large and clumsy for this purpose, but you may end up stuck to your work. Try using toothpicks or else the points of some fine tweezers to hold the mask in place while it sets.

The super glue will not set up right away on its own in this situation. You can speed it up by either (a) using a commercial spray-on accelerator such as "Zip-Kicker ", or else (b) by sprinkling on a little bit of ordinary baking powder.

Make absolutely certain that there are no 'voids' between your paper mask and the blade (areas without glue). The buffing wheel would 'erase' these in seconds.

Once the glue has hardened, you should (in theory) be able to buff the blade while the mask protects the lettering.

Naturally, you will want to keep your eye on the progress of the buffing. Use light pressure in this area. If there is any sign that the mask is being buffed away or is loosening, then you will have stop the buffing process, clean the blade and reapply a fresh mask.

Once you have finished buffing, the mask can easily be removed with Acetone (which dissolves super glue).

Naturally, one will end up with a buffed blade having a slightly duller area just surrounding the lettering. This to me seems preferable to losing the lettering to the action of the buffing wheel.

Good Luck,

- Ignatz

That is a reallly cool theory... But that's also a little outside of my skill level... I'm happy with it as it is now. Thank you, though!

Best regards,
Jeremy

I'm intrigued by Ignatz' masking suggestion, even copied and saved it. That being said, I'm not sure I could ever come up with the required patience and dexterity to actually do it. Any chance, though, to play with superglue and multiple razor-sharp blades deserves some consideration.

Hey guys, I got around to testing my theory and it works a treat!

Follow the link to my write-up of same. http://straightrazorpalace.com/works...tml#post637914

I'm not a huge fan of the mirror fininshed razors that are buffed on a wheel to within an inch of their life, but that's just my personal taste. I don't like to see the crisp lines and edges of the steel rounded and blended. To me it's a dead giveaway that the blade had lots of problems that have been overcorrected by secere polishing.
Just my opinion, but I'd prefer to see a few warts and a finish closer to original.

The highly buffed mirror razors are beautiful... just not to my taste..

It's like the car salesman's analogy... There's an a** (butt) for every seat!

Originally Posted by BlacknTan

I'm not a huge fan of the mirror fininshed razors that are buffed on a wheel to within an inch of their life, but that's just my personal taste. I don't like to see the crisp lines and edges of the steel rounded and blended. To me it's a dead giveaway that the blade had lots of problems that have been overcorrected by secere polishing.
Just my opinion, but I'd prefer to see a few warts and a finish closer to original.

The highly buffed mirror razors are beautiful... just not to my taste..

It's like the car salesman's analogy... There's an a** (butt) for every seat!

I kind of think perhaps you haven't seen very good restores... a properly handled blade shouldn't be significantly altered in profile.

I'm with Ben on this one... sometimes a blade is terribly pitted and goes to greaseless, but, generally, when I buff, I keep with non-greaseless (Greased?) compounds, to keep the lines as original as I can.

I am, however, always partial to a nice shiny finish. Pitting doesn't bug me, but I like the shine where possible.

Cheers,
Jeremy