Thread: Beard Prep and Edge Retention Experiment

Jimbo,

This will be interesting as I'm an "a" prep guy and hope that the "a" prep will be as effective as "b". My life, while not all that complicated, needs to "b" no further complicated.

I'm into this and look forward to the results. But then again I'm into the whole subjective shaving experience myself. Kudos James!

Originally Posted by Bruce

Jimbo,

This will be interesting as I'm an "a" prep guy and hope that the "a" prep will be as effective as "b". My life, while not all that complicated, needs to "b" no further complicated.

Bruce, I am with you mate! It has been pointed out that, logically, proper and adequate prep. will, ceteris paribus, not be as harsh on your edge as inadequate prep., and I do concede that point (no pun intended, but pretty cool nonetheless )

But what I am interested in is whether the difference is practically significant (as opposed to statistically significant). If we are only talking an extra 10 shaves, I personally am prepared to forgo the extended period of non-honingness to remain comfortably in my current prep rut. But if we are talking a substantial increase in longevity, I myself may rethink what I do prep-wise. I will leave it to each reader to decide whether what comes out of this "observational study" can be construed as a "substantial increase" or not.

James.

Well, I am feeling comfortable with the increased prep routine so far - adds about 5 minutes to each shave so it is not too onerous. I will continue the pilot until Saturday to make sure I am completely on top of it, and commence the actual trial starting Monday next week.

On a side note, the increase in prep has given me a small, yet noticeable, increase in what you might call shaving smoothness - hard to quantify of course, as I am using a variety of razors atm.

Also, I have rethought the razors I will use for the experiment - I do not know why I did not think of this earlier, but I have a seven day set of JR 5/8 wedges with clip-on (single) handle. These appear to be ideal for my current purpose, as they are as uniform as you are likely to get in terms of manufacture, type, and wear. So I am changing the protocol from Bengalls to a randomly selected set of 4 of these JRs.

James.

Very cool, Jimbo! Thanks for doing this.

I too admit that the times I've sat down with several hot towels prior to a shave and really focused on thorough prep the shaves have felt smoother. I'm a prep "a" guy all the way though, I'm afraid.

As a related aside, the most thorough prep I've heard about to date was from an article I read some time ago about Finnish immigrants of Northern Minnesota who kept the sauna tradition alive and well. In the article it talked about the men, after taking a long and hot sauna would find their whiskers so softened from the heat and steam that they would often shave (straight razors undoubtedly at that time) with no lather.

Maybe I should jump from being a prep "a" to prep "c" and install a sauna in my basement!

Chris L

This is awesome! I really like experiments like this and look forward to the results!

I just loves Bengall razors!!!!



Lynn

[in response to the question what would make it... more scientific, or whatever it was]

Alternate shaving protocols each day. Probably goes without saying.

A second person to blindly rate your two razors for sharpness to confirm your findings.

Some objective means of establishing lather lubricity, vicosity, foamicity etc-icity.

Of course, it'd be even better if you were blind to the prep technique, but drugging you and having someone else do it is impractical.

Originally Posted by BrentonC

[in response to the question what would make it... more scientific, or whatever it was]

Alternate shaving protocols each day. Probably goes without saying.

A second person to blindly rate your two razors for sharpness to confirm your findings.

Some objective means of establishing lather lubricity, vicosity, foamicity etc-icity.

Of course, it'd be even better if you were blind to the prep technique, but drugging you and having someone else do it is impractical.

Those are good points. For the first one, I decided to perform each prep. treatment for 6 consecutive days followed by a rest day to minimise any residual effects on my skin from the other prep method - you know, just in case I get some burn or whatever, it would not leach over into the other beard prep treatment - and also to try to assess medium-term effects of the prep routines. But I do see the point of a daily alternation.

The problem with experiments like this is that there is a very constrained population to infer about (me, my beard, my soap, my strop, my brush, my selected razors etc). So your other points, while valid, are unnecessary embellishments in the present case. If this experiment was being replicated over many shavers, in an attempt to expand the inferential sphere, then consistency of all these things would be vital.

But it is just me. And as I have said, my shaving routine is at a point where any variability in the (non-treatment related) ingredients to the shave process (lather, stropping etc) will at least be consistent across treatments, if not minimal compared to the variability due to the treatments. This is my biggest concern here in fact - that any signal might be swamped by noise - but if my edges last long enough, the old sample size thingy will kick in and hopefully I might get some kind of result I can trust.

But in the end, I am doing it for the fun. If it doesn't work, or the results are inconclusive, at least I had fun doing it. And those who come after me can treat what I have done as a pilot and improve from there.

James.

Originally Posted by Lynn

I just loves Bengall razors!!!!



Lynn

I haven't used a huge variety (still in acquisition mode...), but I do have a 13/16 Bengall near wedge and it is my #1 favorite razor...I have such a small rotation that it's hard to resist just using it every time! I LOVE my Bengall - and with really good prep it gives me the greatest shave each time!

Be well!

Julian