Trouble Shaving with the SRP Wedge Razor and Other Wedge Razor

I think I need some help here I own to Wedge Razors one I had made and one that I brought which was one of the SRP limited edition. I am having a bit of trouble shaving with both. Let me explain I own about 20 straight razors and 26 DE razors I use them all which means it takes a bit of time to get round the razors. But when I get round to shaving with my wedge razors I seem to be having a problem which is when I shave with these two razors they do not seem to give a good shave. where all my other Razors are fine. I make sure I strop them every time I when I use these two razors & I also check the edge of the blade and they are very sharp indeed but when I go ahead and use them it does not seem to cut the hair on my face and afterwards I then have use a de razor which then cuts the hair fine. After use I clean the blades and put Revistol on the blade to protect it. The blade I know is sharp when it goes to my face so why is it not cutting my facial right. I must admit when I first got the SRP Razor & the other hand made wedge I had done they where scarey sharp.So what has happened Is there a special angle I have to use ? or is the stropping I am doing is wrong I will also admit I do not use the cloth side of the strop is this wrong ? and now does this mean I have to send them off to be resharpened again.Can someone tell me if it is the angle I am doing is wrong:gaah: or my stropping. Thanks Ps I only use these two razors every Few mths if that helps

I have the SRP wedge and about 15 others wedges/near wedges , and they are very different to shave with compared to hollow grinds. Everyone is different, but I found that I need more of an angle (spine further away from my skin) when I shave with a wedge. I think this is because of the lack of flex maybe? Also, unless I stretch carefully my shaves aren't quite as close, again I credit the lack of flex in the blade.
As for stropping, I only strop my wedges on a bench strop. This is my personal preference because I felt that I couldn't get the full edge (specifically with a smiling blade) on my hanging strop. I strop my wedges on both felt and leather.
When you test the edge with a wedge, the hairs won't "pop" like with a hollow grind. Instead, the hairs just get mowed down:) I think to really get the feel for shaving with wedge, you need to shave with one exclusively for at least a couple of weeks. This will give you the chance to develop a bond with them and figure out what works!

Happy shaving and don't give up:)

I have a theory. It goes like this: If you get a new razor, use it for a fortnight, preferably longer.

Now, this does not comply with the ubiquitous "branch out, get more razors" adage often quoted here.

But it will work. Especially if you are a beginner. Advanced users can adapt to new razors quickly. Beginners cannot. Therefore, "branching out" will make your learning curve both steeper and longer.

Instead, use that wedge. Do use the cotton side, and use it a lot. Razor stropping - Straight Razor Place Library is something you have probably perused, but if not, do that. It is the single most helpful source of information on stropping on the internet.

Additionally, do not expect miracles from the razor. Any razor. Stropping, and proper preparation play a far more important role than a "scary sharp" razor. If I had the choice between a "professionally honed" razor and a mediocre soap, and a so-so razor and a very good soap, I would choose the latter. If in doubt, make a pasted strop for under a quid, and see if that helps.

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Originally Posted by ECD

I think I need some help here I own to Wedge Razors one I had made and one that I brought which was one of the SRP limited edition. I am having a bit of trouble shaving with both. Let me explain I own about 20 straight razors and 26 DE razors I use them all which means it takes a bit of time to get round the razors.

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Well owning 20 straight razors and using them all indicates to me that you know how to shave. I'd also assume you know a shave ready razor when you feel one. Ordinarily I would attribute the source of the difficulty to stem from a poor shaving edge. Since it is the two wedges, and since you know what a shave ready razor feels like, it might be the difference in the grind.

I've got two of those SRP limiteds and both are stellar shavers so far. I've also got other wedges, vintage Sheffield, and some custom pieces. All of them shave well if they're shave ready. It has been so long ago that I dealt with my introduction to shaving with wedges that I cannot recall any difficulty just because of the grind. I stretch the skin and shave the whiskers.

Honing wedges can be more work than honing hollow grinds. There is more metal to remove. If you hone your own maybe give them a touchup, or if not, send them out to Steve Dempster at the Invisible Edge. There may be other honers in UK you can send them to. Now that Neil is passed on Steve is the only one whose work I've personal experience with. At least that would eliminate the possibility that they are not ready for prime time. :gl:

It took me a while to adjust to the first wedge I used. There is a very slight variance in technique, and it is not much. When I started switching razors around to different grinds as I rotate through the ones I have, I will shave with my razor of choice for around a week. Sometimes I do not get the best shave attainable on the first shave with a blade I have not used for some time. No worries. They can be like that. If you are sure the blade is properly prepared for the task the remainder lies with you.

I have tried different angles with the blade and different directions as well to see if that was the problem but it is still not cutting the hair. but rather pulling the I will try re stropping again with the above instructions. Maybe it is different with the wege razors . I have tried cutting body hair that does it no problem. If all else fails will send it to " Invisible edge to be honed and ask him to look at the blade and ask him if my stropping was ok before he does it:hmmm: I must be doing something wrong but what:thinking::banghead::cry:

It sounds to me like a sharpness issue. Once you are competent with a straight the differences from size to size and grind to grind are not that different. it's just like driving a car. When you go from one to another even if it's going from a compact to an SUV you quickly get used to it just by driving.

I have a WB wedge and I find it to be a fine shaver, and I'm not particularly experienced. Perhaps the edges aren't as sharp as they once were.

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Originally Posted by ECD

I have tried different angles with the blade and different directions as well to see if that was the problem but it is still not cutting the hair. but rather pulling the I will try re stropping again with the above instructions. Maybe it is different with the wege razors . I have tried cutting body hair that does it no problem. If all else fails will send it to " Invisible edge to be honed and ask him to look at the blade and ask him if my stropping was ok before he does it:hmmm: I must be doing something wrong but what:thinking::banghead::cry:

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I'm in the same boat. I've honed my share of razors and only have trouble with wedges and 1/4 grinds. I have one that i've managed to get to a level I'm happy with, but the other two, I've checked the bevel, reset the bevel, tried dropping back down to 8000# for twenty strokes then re-polish, then drop down to 8000# and re-polish testing each time to see if there's any improvement. I've tried slurry, pasted strops, less stropping pressure, more stropping pressure, you name it. I always seem to end up at the same place: a sharp razor with what in my experience is a well developed and polished edge that just doesn't shave as well as hollow razors

Does everybody Strop on the leather & the felt after each shave and then again before you use the razor again or do you just strop the once or do you leave it for a few shaves then strop. The reason I ask this is I Recently brought a "THIERS-ISSARD" Spartacus Straight razor and in the instructions it gives with the Razor says there is no need to strop until after 7 shaves later am i stropping to much ???? Like I said at the beginning once I stroped these wedges I use they are sharp but just do not take the hair on my face it is just like shaving with a very blunt blade or no blade at all. It looks like I have to send it to Steve to find out where I am going wrong

As stated previously, the collective wisdom about stropping can be found here: Razor stropping - Straight Razor Place Library

If it was actually Thiers Issard who wrote these instructions, they ought to be ashamed of themselves. Personally, I do 10 passes on linen after the shave to remove residual water from the edge, then 30 on linen and leather before the shave. I use a Straight Razor Designs English bridle extra long. When I use a shorter strop, I do five or ten passes more.

What hone's are you using?
I ask this because my Wedge razors have given me great results after honing on my coticule & then finishing on my Chinese 12k.
But I do feel the Sheffield wedges are a lot softer steel than my vintage American blades.
Once you get them sharp enough &adjust your technique to them your shaves will improve.
I have got a fair bit of time on my hands at the moment so if you feel you would like some mentoring with anything please feel free to pm me .
I'm in Basingstoke.
Cheers Paul

Pretty amazed that instructions accompanying a SR would say stropping is only necessary after 7 shaves. I think all here strop before every shave and also after every shave. The number of strokes and on what material may vary though. Personally I do 20 linen and 60 leather before and 10 on felt after to dry the edge/bevel after I have wiped down the blade.

Shaving with a near wedge is a different experience from shaving with a Solingen full hollow. I have a few near wedges in rotation and find I like to have a slight bit more of a gap between spine and face with them. It's not much of a difference but it is there. I hone mine on Naniwa stones and they shave smoothly enough for me. A good lather really helps with any shave too.

Bob

This advice seems rather counter intuitive, considering when I was a young man getting a haircut at my local barber all I heard was the hiss and crack of strops going before each customer and sometimes for the same customer. Barbers used to strop like crazy.

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Originally Posted by ECD

Does everybody Strop on the leather & the felt after each shave and then again before you use the razor again or do you just strop the once or do you leave it for a few shaves then strop.

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I've played around with this to some extent. I always strop on linen/leather before a shave if I've used the razor previously. Now, having read in a very old shaving book, that there is no need to strop before the shave if you've stropped after your last shave, I tried that for a few weeks. Seemed to work fine. In essence you've stropped before the next shave, if you stropped immediately after the last one.

Probably more than you wanted to know, but yes, always strop before the shave. I strop on leather only after the shave to remove any micro gunk and/or moisture that maybe in the striations of the edge. I note that Robin strops on linen after the shave. Whatever works. I think stropping after is a good thing, as is stropping before the shave.

Send one of both blades out to Steve. See if he will assess the current state of them before he hones them. You'll be able to compare when you get them back, but I'd be curious to what he thinks of them as they are now.

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Originally Posted by Razorfaust

This advice seems rather counter intuitive, considering when I was a young man getting a haircut at my local barber all I heard was the hiss and crack of strops going before each customer and sometimes for the same customer. Barbers used to strop like crazy.

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+1 on that. When I was a kid, talking 50 + years ago, I used to watch the old barbers strop with great interest. Have you noticed that not all of them stropped exactly the same way ? Essentially the same, but they seemed to have a different style of going about it. Some long strokes, others short and quick. I've seen more than one strop a razor in between passes on a customer.

This is a thing that has puzzled me for quite some time. On the one hand there are the advocates of dainty slow controlled stropping or hey your gonna roll the edge. And then there's these characters my childhood barbers who beat the blade with subtlety of a stone mason. Some fast and loud moves on the strop before a shave . It was all quite entertaining.

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Originally Posted by puketui41

I'm in the same boat. I've honed my share of razors and only have trouble with wedges and 1/4 grinds. I have one that i've managed to get to a level I'm happy with, but the other two, I've checked the bevel, reset the bevel, tried dropping back down to 8000# for twenty strokes then re-polish, then drop down to 8000# and re-polish testing each time to see if there's any improvement. I've tried slurry, pasted strops, less stropping pressure, more stropping pressure, you name it. I always seem to end up at the same place: a sharp razor with what in my experience is a well developed and polished edge that just doesn't shave as well as hollow razors

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Humble retraction. I started thinking about what I posted here(probably should have thought before I posted), if one near wedge gives a good shave, why not the others? So I pulled out one of my old nemeses today and had another crack. Turns out it was the bevel after all, just not quite set. Learning every day.

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Originally Posted by puketui41

Turns out it was the bevel after all, just not quite set. Learning every day.

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It is always the bevel. People shaved with edges off 8k Nortons for a long time. Yes, a bit of polishing after that adds either keenness or comfort, sometimes both. But that is just fluff. A properly set bevel is something whose importance many people underestimate.

Be bold, take on the challenge, go for itAttachment 212293Attachment 212294

I too had a problem with my SRP razor soon after I got it. When I first got it I shaved without stropping and got a fine shave. I stropped the razor before the next shave and also got a fine shave. The next time not so good, pulling. Not happy. Some observations I had was that the strop was showing some unusual wear on the edges near and far on the side I was stropping from. I believe I was getting that from the spine of the razor. I do have another wedge razor which is a W and B Sheffield and I have no problems stropping that razor. My SRP razor is the heaviest of all my 20 plus razors though and it definitely is harder to strop. I probably dulled that razor stropping it. I put it up for a couple months. I eventually picked it up again and I was going to hone it and decided to just run it on my CrOx felt strop. I cleaned it off, stropped it, slowly......and then shaved with it. Great shave! Happy again although I do believe that the spine still has some sharp edges that catches the edge of my strop. I may have to run some very fine sandpaper over it to smooth it out a bit. Stropping a heavy razor is still not as easy as my other razors.


Mike

Well here is a update sharp & shiny got in touch with me and he came over to see me and was a great help he gave me a lot of advice plus he showed me how to honne but that is going to take some time to learn but wanted to look at my stropping he says that was ok but wants to check up on my shaving so he is coming over again this friday to sort some more things out. The other things he informed me there are a lot of good dealers on e bay that are good suppliers of honing stones and other bits etc When he came over on sunday he showed me a lovely Damascus Razor made in italy it was for sale but no way could I afford it . but he did give me a load of free bits which I am very grateful for. I spoke to him about the Wedge I had made for me ( Not the SRP razor that is a work of art) This one was made by a guy who used be on here one of his razors was shown on here and in the design in had holes in the blade I think his wnnt under the name on e bay as whittle1077 & he was also on here quite a bit then he went quite when I contacted him he said he does not make razors no more saying he was to busy ( Any way I am going of course here ) I had brought two very nice razors off him before and asked him did he make razors he said he did so he went ahead and made me this lovely razor it was great to shave at first then it seemed not want to shave me no more even after putting it on the chrome paste and stropping it felt sharp but it did not shave. So I sent it to inviable edge after talking to This guy called Adam I thought I would be talking to Steve but Adam told me he had retired Here is the reply I got from him "( Eric

Hi, I have received your razor in the post. You are right that it is not sharp. We have tried stropping it up through 4 grades of diamond paste, then chromium paste then bare leather and that is still not sufficient. So the only answer is honing but unfortunately we don’t undertake honing on this kind of unlabelled razor. Experience tells us that we will be at it for hours and that such razors will still not take a good or lasting edge. Consequently I will have to return it to you as it is. I’m sorry I can’t be of more help.

Regards

Adam
The Invisible Edge Ltd.)
I felt a bit peed off after paying £200 and I have only used it a couple of times I spoke to Sharp & shiny he said he would look at it on Friday but it might take some time. he also told me that stropping wedges especially full wege razors is different from normal straight razors stropping. he has told me to go onto lynns video pages and have a good look and you will learn something. I just want to end to say a big UK thank you to all you guys who have come on here to help me especially Sharp and Shiny on top of given up his free time he had travelled from Basingstoke which is over a hour from Where I live which I could not believe that someone would travel that far to help me ( I know you our Colonial Cousins think a hour for a trip is nothing it is just like going down the shops for you guys :rock::rofl2::bow I will give a udate sometime soon Have a good week Eric

Here is a update Sharp and Shiny came Friday afternoon and showed what and how to get a bevel and what stone I will have to buy everything is a lot clear now. He looked at the Razor that whittle1077 made for me and said this razor had not been honed at all he went on further to explain that others had brought razors from and complained about after the first shave had gone blunt just like mine and when someone tried to help him on here and give him a bit of kindly advice ( I think he said this Guy was called Bruno) who gave the advice then disappeared. Sharp & Shiny then spent a bit of time and managed to get a hone on it and the I can shave with this Razor instead of being a very expensive £200 ($310) paper knife. What I would like now is to change the scales from blue to red Acrylic if possible can anybody do this for me in the UK

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Originally Posted by RobinK

It is always the bevel. People shaved with edges off 8k Nortons for a long time. Yes, a bit of polishing after that adds either keenness or comfort, sometimes both. But that is just fluff. A properly set bevel is something whose importance many people underestimate.

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That should be a flashing banner at the tops of the Honing and Hones sections!

I went from 8K to a CrOx paddle for several years and got perfectly good shaves, the bevel set above all is the key successful honing.

Also as others have said, switching to a wedge after using a hollow takes a bit of use to get the feel again

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Originally Posted by Utopian

That should be a flashing banner at the tops of the Honing and Hones sections!

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Originally Posted by puketui41

I'm in the same boat. I've honed my share of razors and only have trouble with wedges and 1/4 grinds. I have one that i've managed to get to a level I'm happy with, but the other two, I've checked the bevel, reset the bevel, tried dropping back down to 8000# for twenty strokes then re-polish, then drop down to 8000# and re-polish testing each time to see if there's any improvement. I've tried slurry, pasted strops, less stropping pressure, more stropping pressure, you name it. I always seem to end up at the same place: a sharp razor with what in my experience is a well developed and polished edge that just doesn't shave as well as hollow razors

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That is probably the reason, most razors of more modern eras, are hollow grinds instead of wedges. People are looking for a closer, easier, hair pinging shave. The wedge ground blade, if beveled, hone properly, will give you a good shave, but with slightly different end results, with proper technique, actually I prefer a hollow grind, I like to hear, and feel the hairs being snipped off cleanly, as opposed to a lawn mower effect of a none flexing wedge blade, just my opinion though.
When stropping a wedge, at least with my experience, there is no singing blade effect, heard from the blade while moving back and forth, on the leather, with the hollow grind, I can judge my strop, and blade sharpness, by the sound of the blade passing over the strop.

I have a couple wedges and after watching a few videos I tried one of the tips that was mentioned in one of them. That was that sometimes when there is a problem getting a good edge was to try adding another piece of tape or two to the spine. This did the trick for me on one of my wedges that was giving me problems. By the way, I'm no expert, still learning and I still have have problems from time to time. As the pros say, hone hone hone!


Mike


Mike

A properly honed wedge type blade profile should shave as close as a hollow ground blade profile. Wedge type profiles are more time consuming to hone correctly and is one reason they fell out of popularity. A properly honed razor (Wedge, Hollow grind, Frameback, nihonkamisori) can be used at zero angle exerting more pressure on the spine rather than at the edge.

There should be no tugging of the whiskers as you make your WTG, XTG or ATG shave pass. The wedge profile is called a silent shaver for a reason. The first step should be to access the edge under magnification. Then visually monitor the edge before, during and after edge progression weather honing on stones or stropping on mediums IMHO. Good luck sir.

Mike