Originally Posted by
Joed
There are really only two possible causes for an edge to dull quickly, a wire edge or the metal was annealed and lost it temper. If a blade looks like it was restored I will not buy it unless I know the person's capabilities w/ restoration. It is very easy to heat the metal to it's annealing temperature which will turn the metal blue and soften the steel. The blue can be polished off but the metal has already been softened. I've walked away from many a razors in local shops that were worked on and had blue metal. Steels can be re-heat treated to regain their hardness but that also causes stress in the metal. The extremely thin hollow ground blades have a high probability of cracking during this process.