Thread: Rolls Vs a Straight.

They're good sheffield steel and shave just as a good sheffield edge. The problem is usually the condition. The hone it comes with is basically a barber's hone, so it can produce a reasonably good edge, but you can definitely do much better if you know how to hone razors and have other hones that you can use it (natural hones work best on that steel I think).
The strop isn't very good in my opinion, but that could be fixed by replacing it with leather from a nice strop for straights. For a redneck version a piece of newspaper on top of the strop works much better than the strop itself.

If you want to hone the blade outside of the case, the little protector bar simply unclips from the blade. Makes it much easier to hone when you don't have to keep moving it.

It will only go on one way round though so check before using force to replace it!

I have three Rolls razor sets. At a local car boot a year or so ago, I found a brand new replacement hone and strop for £1 all in so now one set is almost as new. Great shaves.

Gareth

Hard to beat a shave from a good one. I don't like the handle, Though. Going to make a bit heftier one soon.

I know of one gentleman who has spent quite a bit of time with these. One thing he said is that occasionally he would come across a well worn blade that would not hold an edge. All we could assume is that some were not fully hardened. Other than that he really liked them and he modified quite a few to have something more attuned to a standard straight.

I have quite a few Rolls, and I love them, but I will never give up my straights!!! just use the rolls when i have very little time and want a better shave than a DE.

I have three, but only one good hone and two handles. All the strops have been ruined by misuse. I managed to get a piece of 9 oz (I think) leather to fit after sanding the back down, but I think 7 oz is the proper size.

I often use a Rolls and get wonderful shaves. In fact, I used a rolls practically daily for 35 years until the blade became pretty much unusable. After all those years and sharpenings the blade receded away from the guard so far that the geometry got seriously out of whack. Luckily I had another blade and I still love my rolls, although I often use a straight. One tip - strop a lot before shaving.

I hope you all have as good luck with your Rollies.

jascas