Thread: Another Question on "Sanitation" and/or "Sterilization"

As far as new gear from an antique store etc., I figure the Flitz polishing will clear the blade of anything hiding on its surface. I de-crud between the scales if necessary, with ivory soap and a toothbrush or floss. I'll do a full unpin if I really want to clean the pivot, then can hit every surface with Flitz and soapy water.

For the blade, I've never gone hotter than a boiling water rinse. I hope that's hot enough to do the necessary biological damage without incurring weird metallurgical consequences.

Originally Posted by earcutter

What kind of temps are you thinking Ken?

250-300F should kill any infectious bacteria/virus. Not hot enough to affect the temper/hardening, but hot enough you'd want to bring it up & back down gradually, especially if you intend to repeat the process multiple times.

I believe that's how they do/did surgical equipment.

Edit: Excerpt from an article on sterilizing with dry heat as opposed to pressurized steam;

Dry heat can be used to sterilize items, but as the heat takes much longer to be transferred to the organism, both the time and the temperature must usually be increased, unless forced ventilation of the hot air is used. The standard setting for a hot air oven is at least two hours at 160 °C (320 °F). A rapid method heats air to 190 °C (374 °F) for 6 minutes for unwrapped objects and 12 minutes for wrapped objects. Dry heat has the advantage that it can be used on powders and other heat-stable items that are adversely affected by steam (for instance, it does not cause rusting of steel objects).

To protect the edge however, you'd want to slow the heating/cooling times to about 20-30 minutes each with the 2-hr hold in between. Once it's below 200F it'd be safe to let them cool in open air.


On boiling;

Boiling in water for fifteen minutes will kill most vegetative bacteria and inactivate viruses, but boiling is ineffective against prions and many bacterial and fungal spores; therefore boiling is unsuitable for sterilization. However, since boiling does kill most vegetative microbes and viruses, it is useful for reducing viable levels if no better method is available.

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

Being a pro tattooer for a couple of decades, and having recently been required to take the blood borne pathogen course to get licensed, ( something new in FL ..... they need money) I know a little about this topic. Barbicide is something I routinely used when I used to ..... for over 10 years.... shave customers with a removable blade straight razor. The stuff solidifies on whatever you put in it and will leave crystals on your beloved razor if you leave it in the mix for days and don't take it out and rinse and wipe it down. I forget what the jug says but it should be changed like every day or every other day. Like a teaspoon to a quart or so. Like I say, been years since I used it. I consider it a waste of money unless you're a pro barber and want to impress your customers and have something to stick your combs in. YMMV.

The new formulation of Barbicide is supposed to be better for corrosion resistance on metals. The only instruments I have left in Barbicide for more than a day were Barber shears with no ill effects. I only leave the razors in for no more than an hour and rinse, wipe then oil down blade. So far so good.

Also, not being professional barber and only doing some family members hair and shaves, the solution is stable when mixed and will last much longer than it will if using it in professionaly which should be changed daily. I have a jar with solution in it all the times and only change it occasionaly since it is not used every day. IMO it is not a waste of money to prevent passing on a potential problem even if the chances of doing so are small.

A side note, the word barbicide literally means to kill the beard. What were they thinking?

EDIT: Here is a link to MSDS that shows that shelf life is not an issue for keeping the solution mixed for extended periods.

http://www.king-research.com/pdf/msd...icide_MSDS.pdf

Man this thread is freaking me out LOL - As i am weak of mind, I think I might just be best off to un-subscribe LOL!

Originally Posted by earcutter

Man this thread is freaking me out LOL - As i am weak of mind, I think I might just be best off to un-subscribe LOL!

It's good stuff to know though. I'd want to be able to sterilize my razors any time I noticed they'd been handled while I was out. Anybody could be carrying anything these days & even a compartment in your suitcase or rolled up in a pair of dirty underwear isn't safe if a curious hotel housekeeper sees a fancy brush/mug on the counter and a strop hanging from the towel rack. He/She may want to check out this razor because lets face it, straight razors are really cool & pop-culture has firmly engraved a half old-school & half morbid/psycho stamp on them. They may check the edge with their thumb. They may be carrying hep c or hiv. You may get a herpe when you nick the corner of your mouth. Explain that one to the wife!

Without knowing you have to assume it could happen.

Originally Posted by KenWeir

It's good stuff to know though. I'd want to be able to sterilize my razors any time I noticed they'd been handled while I was out. Anybody could be carrying anything these days & even a compartment in your suitcase or rolled up in a pair of dirty underwear isn't safe if a curious hotel housekeeper sees a fancy brush/mug on the counter and a strop hanging from the towel rack. He/She may want to check out this razor because lets face it, straight razors are really cool & pop-culture has firmly engraved a half old-school & half morbid/psycho stamp on them. They may check the edge with their thumb. They may be carrying hep c or hiv. You may get a herpe when you nick the corner of your mouth. Explain that one to the wife!

Without knowing you have to assume it could happen.

I always leave my razor on the side when in a hotel and this never crossed my noggin. Now im freaked.

Geek

Originally Posted by TheGeek

I always leave my razor on the side when in a hotel and this never crossed my noggin. Now im freaked.

Geek

I spend 8-9 months of the year in hotel rooms, absolutely nothing is safe. I've had beer, clothes, cartons of cigarettes, loose change, pens, phone chargers, even my friggin wedding band stolen by housekeepers. Seriously, how low do you have to sink to steal a man's wedding band? I wasn't even fancy, just a plain old 18c gold band, but it meant the world to me, I'd only been married for 2 months, still getting used to wearing one and forgot to put it back on after a shower. I couldn't look my wife in the eye for 3 weeks after that happened. I'll never again be able to see what the love of my life gave me on our wedding day. One of my coworkers had a laptop stolen by a housekeeper. Another about $2k in cash, stuffed in a hidden compartment in his suitcase. I literally searched his suitcase for 15 minutes and couldn't find the compartment until he showed me, but the cash was gone. I believe him because he showed me a second compartment that still had $500 in it. There is no honor system. You claim something is stolen it's your word against theirs & they've worked there for 5 years without a single documented complaint. Now I'm not saying they're all thieves. It's probably a very small percentage, but even if it's only 1%, I spend 200-300 nights in a hotel room every year. Statistically that's 2-3 times a year on average I'll have something stolen from me no matter what precautions I take. Believe me, the possibility of someone messing with your things is very real, especially when it comes to something as curious as a straight razor.

It may be common-place & normal for people who use them all the time but the overwhelming majority of people view them with a sense of awe. The sharpest edge humanly possible, demon barber on Fleet Street, those sorts of things. To be honest I can't blame them for wanting to look at or handle them because they're completely oblivious to how fragile the edge is. Ever get back from a vacation & see a nick in the blade that wasn't there before or it doesn't quite shave like you'd expect? Housekeeping probably opened it up & wanted to see if it'd slice through an old toilet paper roll in their waste can. If they flick their thumb across the blade to see how sharp it is that's a very real & very possible source of infection. They're probably not carrying anything serious or if they are they probably don't know it, but the possibility is there & the golden rule is avoid contact with bodily fluids at all costs. Ever get a cold or flu shortly after taking a trip somewhere? You can get over those in a few days. You can't get over hiv, ever. You'll never have more kids, you'll never kiss your wife again. In a lot of cases you might be lucky if she doesn't leave.

This week is my first week traveling with a straight razor. I've been keeping my razors locked up in the glove box of my truck during the day so they're not even in the room. I have to tell you I'm seriously thinking about adding a small bottle of barbacide to my travel kit so I can have a reliable disinfectant at all times. Some places I'd be kicked out if I tried to enter with a straight in my vehicle, so there will be times that it has to stay in the hotel room.

At home around family I wouldn't worry much at all, because if your wife or kids are carrying something you probably already know. When it comes to hotels though, all bets are off. Anybody strapped for cash will vacuum a room & change the sheets for $10/hr so you never know who's going to be there.

Sorry for the rant, I'll try to keep my posts a little shorter in the future....

Edit: The same curiosity applies to people checking your baggage in airports. It would be a very good idea to disinfect once you've landed & claimed your baggage.

The "gold standard" for sterilization is the autoclave which is essentially a pressure cooker. Steam at 15 psi pressure has a temperature of about 250 F which rapidly transfers heat to objects and penetrates into nooks and crannies. The heat of the autoclave kills viruses, bacteria, bacterial spores, and fungi. Unfortunately many objects needing to be sterilized cannot withstand this heat and sometimes the exposure to the water. Straight razors intended for medical use usually have stainless scales so the they can withstand autoclaving. DE razors may have parts that cannot withstand heat. Objects that cannot withstand the autoclave must be treated with an effective disinfectant.

The risk of infectious diseases from razors is usually related to bloodborne pathogens. Any tool that may come into contact with even minimal amounts of blood may transfer a bloodborne disease from one person to another unless sterilized between clients. Medical authorities teach that all clients should be assumed to be possibly infected and universal precautions taken to protect workers and other clients.

Commonly available disinfectants include 70% ethyl or isopropyl alcohol, chlorine bleach (10% in water), and hydrogen peroxide from the pharmacy. Alcohol is not always effective against certain viruses. Barbicide is mostly isopropyl alcohol and alkyldimethylbenzylammonium chloride. Razors should be disinfected, cleaned, and treated again for at least the minimal time recommended. Clean instruments allow effective contact between instrument surfaces and the disinfectant, dirt may prevent disinfectant/microbial contact.

Some disinfectants could damage razor blades or scales with even brief contact so I reccommend Barbicide, unless you are sure that another disinfectant is safe for your razor. I recommend cleaning disinfectants off the razors immediately after disinfectant use followed by protecting the scales and blade steel in the usual manner. Leaving razors submerged in disinfectant for long periods may damage them.

Originally Posted by sheajohnw

The "gold standard" for sterilization is the autoclave which is essentially a pressure cooker. Steam at 15 psi pressure has a temperature of about 250 F which rapidly transfers heat to objects and penetrates into nooks and crannies. The heat of the autoclave kills viruses, bacteria, bacterial spores, and fungi. Unfortunately many objects needing to be sterilized cannot withstand this heat and sometimes the exposure to the water. Straight razors intended for medical use usually have stainless scales so the they can withstand autoclaving. DE razors may have parts that cannot withstand heat. Objects that cannot withstand the autoclave must be treated with an effective disinfectant.

Autoclave was the comparison in the dry heat vs. pressurized steam quote I posted earlier. It is indeed the most effective way to sterilize/disinfect items, but as you said the steam/heat isn't compatible with many razors. I wouldn't expose lucite to anything over 180F, & most other plastics for that matter. A chemical disinfectant like barbicide is probably the simplest, most cost-effective method for most of us.

Really, all you need is to hone the blade. If you want a little more, give it an alcohol dip. If you're anal about germs, Clorox makes a bleach free antibacterial wipe. Anything more, in my opinion, would be overkill. As far as hepititis, time is the best way to kill it.