I had the opposite experience. When I was having some trouble honing a blade, I decided to try my shavette with a new feather. And was contemplating packing it in. Im really glad the shave was uncomfortable as it reminded me why I was trying something new. I used a shavette for 6 years. Never got bbs on the neck and couldn't handle daily shaves from it. It took me three months of daily shaving to get the bbs on the neck every day! I like the fact that you can customize the blade to your comfort. I learned to hone from Lynns video and the great folks on this site who are very generous with good advice. I believe anybody can learn to hone a razor. If you start out with a bunch of ebay specials like I did, then you have your hands full! But I also had 2 new straights that I bought that were very easy to maintain and that was my benchmark. Im a happy man now, I shave daily, bbs every day. And many thanks to the forum here for making it all possible.