Thread: Call me Scarface

For what it's worth, I was doing just fine in trying to learn straight shaving. Then I did the big mistake, I ordered a shave-ready razor from a honemiester! I cut myself a few times, but I'll never lose track of where the tip of the razor is anymore!
I've found that there is a learning curve with sharpening that parallels the learning curve with shaving. Bad things happen when those curves are not the same.
-Fred

I'm not convinced my Dovo is honed to shave readiness .. I honed it myself on a little barber hone , it shaves but until my shave ready dovo arrives ( uk postal / customs service is a complete joke this time of year ) It's all I have .. I'll keep shaving / honeing it until them ... think the SR fever is hitting me tho .. Im bidding like crazy on ebay ( and getting outbid ) on some nice razors .

Originally Posted by Garry

Bach , for what it's worth I'm now sporting a 3/4 inch slice above my moustache line - caused by taking my eye off the ball for a second , I was manouvering my round tip Dovo to have another pass at my moustache and presto !! I placed the blade straight on to my face .... styptic to the rescue . This morning it looks like a fine red line - hopefully no scar .

I've done something similar, right near the left side of my mouth, and had a red line that looked like a cat scratch for a few days. Then there was the time I cut the top of my lip shaving my moustache... that bled like a bastard.

But, unless you really, really, really cut yourself up, I don't think there's any worry of a scar. I mean, a bad shaving nick is what, some minute fraction of an inch deep?

I note, too, that like the schmiss I mentioned, my cuts seem to accumulate on the left side of my face. I guess this means I'll have a good right profile. The only question is whether women still dig scars.

Originally Posted by Garry

Bach , for what it's worth I'm now sporting a 3/4 inch slice above my moustache line - caused by taking my eye off the ball for a second , I was manouvering my round tip Dovo to have another pass at my moustache and presto !! I placed the blade straight on to my face .... styptic to the rescue . This morning it looks like a fine red line - hopefully no scar .

I took a hunk out of my right cheek with a really sharp 7/8 wedge by not paying enough attention as to the location of my razor. I look at it every day before soaping up it reminds me to be careful :O

Garry, cudahogs and the rest of the newest shavers. I'd like to recommend that you read my musings on Creative Visualisation on my In The Deep End blog linked in my signature. Bad things needn't happen at all if we're properly prepared. I think you're right about the parallels with the hone and shave learning curves, cudahogs, but your conclusion that 'bad things happen' is more an indicator of your not being aware enough of the change which occurred for you with the sharper blade.

I can't remember where exactly, but on another thread someone was mentioning that upon newly honing a blade, one is prone to cut oneself being used to the pressure( ) applied with the formerly dullish razor being FAR too much for a properly honed, *YOWZA! sharp blade.

X

* Official term for a razor as sharp as one gets from Lynn.

I can't remember where exactly, but on another thread someone was mentioning that upon newly honing a blade, one is prone to cut oneself being used to the pressure( ) applied with the formerly dullish razor being FAR too much for a properly honed, *YOWZA! sharp blade.

You are exactly right. I did apply too much pressure to a blade that was very sharp because I was used the honing job that I had done on my razors. During some recent experiments with a DE, I did not make the same mistake because you can see a large, sharp instrument in your hand, whereas, the straight edge razor's (honemeister honed and honed by me) looked the same.
-Fred

Bach, sorry to hear about your little mishap, hopefully it won't happen again. I've never shaved with anything but round points because frankly, I'm a little leery of a chisel point. I wear a Van Dyke and trim around it by making a pass where I run the razor edge towards the beard, making a clean line where the razor stops at the beard's edge. I do this all around it. I also shave a space below my lower lip and I work the razor around this by using two hands on the blade to carefully guide it. This is the hardest part of the operation and is where I'll generally get nicks, if they happen. I hope you have better luck in the future with whatever razor you are using.