take a close look at this

i'm perplexed by this ebay purchase...has the right name, had several other bidders...doesn't look right or feel right to my admittedly untutored eye. the stamping is not clean and crisp, the little ridges (and I know there's a name for them) are muddled, the blade appears to be plated and not very well polished underneath the plating, the wedge is loose and the thing feels a little light in the hand. what do you think. and i'm annoyed that my $1000 canon with the fast lens can't go in on this, and when i blow it up in photoshop i get 18 megabit images which i'm sure no one appreciates.

From the pics, it appears to be a poor example of resurfacing with abrasive buffs. Look at the steel through magnification and see if you can see a good bit of depth to the grind marks on the blade's face. Factory grind marks are very shallow on good quality razors, whereas the abrasive buffs tend to leave deeper marks. Grind marks also hide damages, such as small pitted spots, light surface pitting, etc, so examine that closely as well.

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Originally Posted by RazorTalkin

From the pics, it appears to be a poor example of resurfacing with abrasive buffs.

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I agree. It appears to have been heavily buffed. How poor of an example, depends on what the razor looked like originally.

As for blowing up your images in Photoshop... Feel free to PM me if you need help resizing or enlarging anything; there's no reason that an enlargement has to have huge pixel dimensions.

under a loupe you can see how the plating flowed into all the letters. the little ridges are battered and the blade is pitted. the seller takes returns so i contacted him. too bad for me. i've seen the name Boker bandied about here and was psyched to get one.

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Originally Posted by Noisykids

under a loupe you can see how the plating flowed into all the letters. the little ridges are battered and the blade is pitted. the seller takes returns so i contacted him. too bad for me. i've seen the name Boker bandied about here and was psyched to get one.

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Plating is an unusual method of restoring an old straight razor. I too would ask for a refund. You can find another good Boker with a little patients. Find a good example and you'll have yourself a nice shaver that will last a lifetime. Good Luck!

Looks like someone who knows little about straights decided to do a cosmetic restore and really went to town with a buffer on that one. I would pass on that.

Hold on. First, I highly doubt that plating was done. That seems like a lot of effort for little return. Instead, what you perceive as plating is as others have stated, is incomplete buffing. That's not necessarily a bad thing. Not every razor can be made pristine. If deep pitting is present, sometimes all you can do is shine up those pits. I've done that. You buff away the active rust and polish it up a little. There's no point taking it close to mirror and the reality is that the more you polish it the more pronounced the pitting will appear.

Cosmetically, it may not be a great razor. It's still a Boker so it still can be a great shaver. I don't know what you paid for it, but I would state my case to the seller and offer what I consider to be a fair price given the razors actual condition. The seller can take it or leave it. To avoid hassles, odds are he'll take it and refund the difference.

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Originally Posted by Utopian

Hold on. First, I highly doubt that plating was done. That seems like a lot of effort for little return. Instead, what you perceive as plating is as others have stated, is incomplete buffing. That's not necessarily a bad thing. Not every razor can be made pristine. If deep pitting is present, sometimes all you can do is shine up those pits. I've done that. You buff away the active rust and polish it up a little. There's no point taking it close to mirror and the reality is that the more you polish it the more pronounced the pitting will appear.

Cosmetically, it may not be a great razor. It's still a Boker so it still can be a great shaver. I don't know what you paid for it, but I would state my case to the seller and offer what I consider to be a fair price given the razors actual condition. The seller can take it or leave it. To avoid hassles, odds are he'll take it and refund the difference.

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If THIS is the same razor, then my theory on abrasive buffs & grind marks appears to be off base altogether. In these photos the blade appears to have an unnatural shine and no visible grind marks. Maybe it has been plated? The pitting doesn't appear to be severely deep....perhaps it needs to be refinished properly.

Look at his last sale

Attachment 51114

Look familiar???

Here are some hints at buying razors on e-bay...

There are very very very few quality sellers on there and all 4 that I know of are members here too :)
You should stay the heck away from e-bay until you have enough experience with razors not to have to ask about whether they were a good buy :)

Either way this was done "Buffing" or "Plating",,, and I can't tell which could have killed the temper of the razor... (I doubt Plating)
There is a very delicate balance between restoration and wrecking a razor... in fact that balance can switch in less than 1 second on a buffer with a hollow grind...
BTW look at the pins on both razors, they look in the pics to have been popped and replaced so he has to have some knowledge of razors...

With an E-bay name like GunGuy he can't be all bad though :D and maybe he does know about how far to take a razor and you might have a good shaver there... :gl:

I agree with Glen, Ebay is always a crap shoot, and if you don't know a lot about razors, you can get burned..Thank God for paypal...Your better off sticking to our classifieds here...I don't think it's a plating... so he must have sanded/buffed the hell out of it, and you'll know when you shave or try to hone it if he over did it.....I had a blade that was overheated, and in turn it was impossible to get a good edge on it...

I like the etching on the blade, it looks like a nice razor, let's us know how it shaves.....Are you sure the lettering isn't messed up from sanding...? When razors are pitted and you restore them, Guys basically sand them to get it out, and clean it up before buffing....

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Originally Posted by gssixgun

Look at his last sale

Attachment 51114

Look familiar???

Here are some hints at buying razors on e-bay...

There are very very very few quality sellers on there and all 4 that I know of are members here too :)
You should stay the heck away from e-bay until you have enough experience with razors not to have to ask about whether they were a good buy :)

Either way this was done "Buffing" or "Plating",,, and I can't tell which could have killed the temper of the razor... (I doubt Plating)
There is a very delicate balance between restoration and wrecking a razor... in fact that balance can switch in less than 1 second on a buffer with a hollow grind...
BTW look at the pins on both razors, they look in the pics to have been popped and replaced so he has to have some knowledge of razors...

With an E-bay name like GunGuy he can't be all bad though :D and maybe he does know about how far to take a razor and you might have a good shaver there... :gl:

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Agreed! Buying on ebay without some knowledge of what's good and what's bad is never a good idea.

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Originally Posted by RazorTalkin

Agreed! Buying on ebay without some knowledge of what's good and what's bad is never a good idea.

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+1, or anywhere else for that matter. :)

RazorTalkin...that is the same razor. i really think it's been plated. the surface looks completely artificial and the engraving has plating in it, and also pockmarks where it didn't stick. the letters are all filled up and blurry. the second i saw it i thought it was a fake, it looks that bad. i've bought several razors from ebay, including a red point917, and a worcester razor co that i;ve been shaving with. this is the first one that has disappointed me. the red point was only 27 bucks and i haven't paid more than 6 bucks 'for any of the others.

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Originally Posted by Noisykids

RazorTalkin...that is the same razor. i really think it's been plated. the surface looks completely artificial and the engraving has plating in it, and also pockmarks where it didn't stick. the letters are all filled up and blurry. the second i saw it i thought it was a fake, it looks that bad. i've bought several razors from ebay, including a red point917, and a worcester razor co that i;ve been shaving with. this is the first one that has disappointed me. the red point was only 27 bucks and i haven't paid more than 6 bucks 'for any of the others.

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Sorry, but everything you describe matches with an incomplete buffing job.

I may be crazy but the tip looks different on one side then the other,looks like a french nose and then not....is it me?

I'v seen razors like this before it's a poor attempt at restore, this is what happens when greaseless compounds are used by inexperienced restorer(the corners are rounded over , letters are not sharp, and most of the time you can see vertical line on the face of the blade )

I thought that particular Boker shoulderless was always a french point. I have just worked on three of them and this one is not only missing the point.....but a lot of steel in the shoulderless area as well. Just my 2 cents.

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Originally Posted by Utopian

Sorry, but everything you describe matches with an incomplete buffing job.

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I'm sure Ron is correct here.

The slick sheen comes from the proximity of the unmasked light source - it is direct light that has not been softened or bounced in any way. The fact that the light is a point source exaggerates the lighting effect further.

People teaching novices to use grinders and buffers in machine shops often use the example of 'smearing' to point out mistakes - details such as lettering, etc, become smeared and blurry-edged if the buffing is done incorrectly - it can even look like the surface has melted and reset in extreme examples.

If anyone was to go to the extremes of plating to restore a razor, they would have unpinned the blade and coated with a softer metal first to fill in the pock marks, then sanded back, then replated with nickel or chrome - a lot of time and hassle to perform. And expensive.

Regards,
Neil

even the bevel was the same shiny color. you could see a multitude of pits underneath whatever was covering this blade. every bit of the blade and shank that i could see was the same. anyway, it went back to the guy today. how in the world did this silver covering flow into the letters?

Well, I tried. This was probably a very good shaver that simply was not restored to perfection. I have shaved for years with a set of razors that are flat out ugly. Even though I've improved with restorations, I'm leaving my original set of 7 that I had in my gym locker for 8 years in their original condition. They have areas of rust, they have pitting, one of them has a slight bend in the edge, and one is cracked. You know what? Even though they've been maintained with nothing but a barber hone for 8 years they all shave just fine.

That Boker was not restored very well, but it was still made by Boker. I have never used a Boker that was not a great shaver.

well, since i'm the only one who has seen this thing up close, i'm saying it's been plated. the plating ran into the lettering leaving spots where you can see to the original steel. it's just a mess. if i'm going to acquire one of the marquee names in the razor pantheon, i'm not going to settle for a pos like this. maybe it will be re-posted on ebay and someone can grab it, but trust me, this razor is so ugly i wonder who can it's momma be.

so i just bought this for a little less money. no fake shine here.


http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...K%3AMEWNX%3AIT

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Originally Posted by Noisykids

so i just bought this for a little less money. no fake shine here.


http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rt=nc&nma=true&item=4001665 51903&si=%252FfCYazCCDFxoi907l37nHtRPp68%253D&view item=&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWNX%3AIT

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This seller has posted about 30 Boker's in the last 2 weeks. Where the hell is he getting them all? My brother inlaw bought 3 from him last week under 7 bucks each.

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Originally Posted by TrilliumLT

This seller has posted about 30 Boker's in the last 2 weeks. Where the hell is he getting them all? My brother inlaw bought 3 from him last week under 7 bucks each.

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HHHHHMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?

My guess is he must be cleaning out a old barber college or something.

it was reposted and sold for 37 dollars. i bid on and won a Boker King Cutter which arrived today, the scales are broken, which i can finesse, but the edge is munched.

I saw this razor (the original post) yesterday or the day before, guess he relisted it...It sure looked plated to me. Actually mentioned it to someone in the chat room. Glad you didnt get stuck with it.
I have bought about 20 razors off the bay, only got stuck with a bad one once, (seller described as shiny and excellent, was far from it. I only spent a few bucks for it, would have cost more to send it back) had 3 others that I wish I had'nt purchased. I also have had a couple that were much better than I expected, for a good price too. I'm shaving with 6 of them so far...