Thread: Friodur

I can't seem to get a satisfactory edge on a Henckels Friodur 72. I have many other razors that I have good results with. I know this razor is Stainless so I wonder if this is the problem. Any ideas? Thanks

It's probably not the steel.
Stainless steel razors can take an edge just fine.
Just the other day, after a fair amoint of experimenting, I finally got an edge that was phenomenal on my Friodur.
When I started honing, I struggled a bit with stainless myself.
My solution to this problem was to give them a bit more on each level on my progression. It seemed to help me out.

There could be a number of things that is keeping you from reaching the sharpness you are looking for, the pro's, I'm sure, will chime in with there thoughts on this

In general stainless will take a few extra strokes as compared to a typical carbon steel but really not that many more. I have carbon steel razors that are way more challenging to hone than any stainless and I have a bunch of stainless razors.

You might try a different hone if you have one. Also make sure the bevel is in good shape or you'll never get it in tip top shape for shaving.

I have a bunch of SS razors and didn't have any problems with any except one, and it wasn't a Friodur. Good advice to use a different hone if available. If not, send me a PM and I'll see what I can do to help out.

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

In general stainless will take a few extra strokes as compared to a typical carbon steel but really not that many more. I have carbon steel razors that are way more challenging to hone than any stainless and I have a bunch of stainless razors.

You might try a different hone if you have one. Also make sure the bevel is in good shape or you'll never get it in tip top shape for shaving.

+1- I had trouble getting bevel of a Friodur right the first one I did. I did not hone on a 1K stone long enough and had to go back down the ladder. Perhaps, as noted above you are experiencing the same issue. Good luck, keep at it and you will get it.

I have some SS straights that need more laps on the honing stones than other SS straights. When I was learning how to hone them efficiently, they could shave after one honing session, but not to the performance I demanded and I ended up repeating the honing process and modifying the laps to get the shaving performance just right. I was determined to hone everything with the honing stones I had and it just came down to honing more for some razors and taking notes for future reference.

Pabster

I've only honed two stainless steel razors, but I was very happy with the results and consider them among my favorites.

I found it did take more strokes to set the bevel. But once the bevel was set, I used the same number of strokes on subsequent stones that I use on carbon steel.

For reference, I use the Naniwa+Light slurry method that Glen advocates.

Like all honing, so much turns on getting the bevel just right.

I have never had problems with Fridours, the one stainless I did have problems with was a different brand.