Birthday Shave

I decided to go ahead and give myself a "Birthday Shave"; today ofcourse. I figured that I know enough about the process at this point to get a near perfect shave and decided that today, with nothing else to do, would be a good day to perfect my technique and step outside of the box a little. My intentions were to get a perfect BBS shave with 2 passes and acquire what I know must be an easy edge to shave with based on my assumptions that barbers must have done it at one point.

I achieved my goal after an hour and got the shave of a lifetime. Actually, I ended up with an edge that was too sharp by just a touch. It felt like a DE blade (which I have to admit was kinda my objective) and I ended up with one small nick, which I consider a good thing since this is the typical shave I get with a DE blade (a nick or two).

If your a purist or anal about technique stop reading here because I'm going to discuss what I did to achieve the edge.

I'm going to skip the 40 minutes I spent thinking and experimenting, just assume thats already in here.

First I grabbed a razor that had passed all the sharpness tests that I could muster but was still below par for my B'day shave. Oh, sure it shaved well but that wasn't the point.

Then I broke out my Norton 4/8K and wetted the 8K side. I did lots of passes on the 8K side to resmooth the edge. Lots, like 40 maybe 50. For some reason the edge did not seem to get overhoned. I had left it at a setting deep in the 4K realm with a few passes (like 8) on 8K to give you an idea of where it started. I did not soak the 8K merely wetted it (although I don't see why it would matter). The last 20 strokes were done with a light touch and the first 20 with a tad of pressure, but not much.

I then slap stropped the edge about 40 passes on leather. Yes, I slapped the razor against a pretty taught strop and worked the edge until it had a wicked draw. When I could not acquire more draw I went to linen and stroked it on the linen and then back to slap stropping on leather with a pretty taught strop. I slapped it maybe 50-60 times.

The edge was wicked sharp and wicked smooth, approaching a Feather blade feel and BBS within two passes was easy, although as usual I didn't go against the grain. Not my usual interest.

So now I have the smoothest shave of my life on my 44th B'Day. I'll call it my gift to myself. Sorry if I broke tradition, but hell, it worked great!

Nothing makes you feel as good as a great shave does it...its such a wonderful thing!

Happy Birthday.... A good slow shave is a gift to yourself. Wish you many more.

Yes three of the greatest things in life are a great straight shave, a new pair of cowboy boots and I can't think of the third right now!

Congrats and happy birthday!
-Fred

Happy birthday!

Sounds like you've earned your honemeister stripe! (Again!)