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Today was my first shave using only a straight razor, no touching up with my gillete fusion :) i got BBS almost everywhere, except my neck, and only one tiny cut ;D i'm still trying to figure out how to shave my neck properly.. it's quite hard, because most of the hair on my neck grows to the right, and some of it grows to the left, and up. :/ so if anyone has any tips or ideas for shaving my neck please share them :)
Congrats on the shave! :)
I could sit here and write an essay on how to get those extra hairs, but for now, just concentrate on making minor changes to your technique and before you know it, you'll have all your problems figured out. Missing hair is quite normal and comes down to how comfortable you've become with your razor.
haha, i'd love it if you wrote an essay on that xDD today i missed like ALL of my neck hairs ); going to try and do something different tomorrow morning, hope it works.
Alright, here's the scoop. You need to alter your three passes. For me, this is how I do it.
First Pass: This is a normal north to south pass
Second Pass: For the cheeks, I start at the corner of the mouth and go XTG to toward the ears. For the neck, it starts out just below the corner of the chin and proceeds at a 45 degree angle. When I start at the corner of the chin, it's using the heel of the blade. By the end of the stroke, I'm an inch or so below the ear lobe with the toe. I do this a couple times until lots of the hair is gone.
Third Pass: This is another 45 degree stroke but in the opposite direction. I start with the heel at the corner of the adam's apple and proceed until I get to the base of the earlobe. By the end of the stroke, I'm on the toe of the razor.
Fourth Pass (optional): This is a true ATG pass from the adam's apple to the bottom of the ear. This one requires alot of attention or the skin will fold ahead of your blade and you'll end up cutting yourself. Additionally, if you razorburn easily, a fourth pass will irritate you pretty easily. I'm lucky and it doesn't really bother me too much.
read up on both the scything and guillotine move and implement them on your second and third passes as I use them with those passes Shaving passes - Straight Razor Place Wiki
When I said that with practice you'll figure it out, I really meant that you'll be comfortable enough with your blade and moving in a scything motion won't freak you out and make you think you're about two seconds away from having your head roll down the hallway. :)
I seperate my neck into three geological areas, the right and left sides and the area the size of you chin from the direct bottom of the chin to just below the adam's apple. I follow these rules, but do all three passes in each area before moving on the the next area.
The Chin: For the ATG pass on the chin, I lather up just that area since I don't like lather in my stretching areas under the chin. I do a south to north motion during this pass while my head is tilted up and ample stretching under the chin. With the blade on the bottom-most area of the chin I begin going up. The trick for lots of new guys is making sure that you keep your razor angle proper during the stroke, it requires practice. To keep the razor from bouncing off my chin and knocking off the end of my nose, I choke up on the razor. This is done by keeping the standard ATG grip on the razor, but moving the forefinger over the spine where the spine is in the first or second joint...I don't choke up by using the forefinger's fingerpad as the choke-up point.
ok...give that a try and let me know if your shaves aren't better... :)
Thank you, i'll try it on saturday morning :) i'm sure it'll work (: