Thread: New thiers issard razor blade stamp question

Hello all,

I am a new guy around here but have quickly come to appreciate the wealth of knowledge that is collectively available here.

I recently bought a new razor band while in the store all of the razor (same model) had different letters stamped on the blade down by the tang.

Anyone know what they mean. Mine is stamped K

As far as I know the letters on the back of the shank denote a batch of the heat treating process.
I am not quite sure why they still do it. When they first started trying out their new steel it made sense that they'd run different things and see what the end result is, but now we're 3 years later and I would hope they have settled on a single process. That's why now it's kind of puzzling.
May be we have to check with TI and get their answer.

I think they still use it just as a quality control method.

That way if there is ever any issues they would know which batch and which razors to recal?

User basil is absolutely right.

The letters stamped into the tang of the razor associate it with a group of 300 razors which have been heat treated in the same batch.

To quote from an article I wrote on the process:

"...every single blade to be heat-treated is threaded on special heat-resistant wire and individually suspended within special baskets, each one hanging away from its 299 neighbors. When these baskets go into the furnace, this special hanging arrangement permits all the blades to enjoy equal and even exposure to both the heat of the furnace as well as the fluid of the quenching tank, drastically reducing hardening-cycle distortions."

The continued use of the letter on the reverse of the tang represents ongoing quality control of the blade hardening process; including the hanging process, the heat treating and quenching.

- Ignatz

I bought a new Thiers Issard without a letter stamp into the tang. Do they stop stamping letter into the tang? The razor is made with C135 steel.

The original story that was published by Ti was that they stamped the letter to differentiate the different heat treatments among the prototypes, but the stamps continued long after the c135 became their standard production.
I think only TI/Sabatier can answer your question.

I have a couple of the newer type steel TIs and neither have any letters on them. That was a limited thing a while back.

Thanks! I also notice that the TI name and "Made in France" seem to be laser engraved instead of stamped.

I bought my TI in july (30th bday present to myself) and it has a Z stamped on it and the front tang is all stamped as well. Do you think that is was a razor from last year possibly?

Could it be that you have one of a kind, the last of the latest? Maybe TI stopped once they got to Z. Think what a tale like that could do on ebay.