Thread: Too Sharp

What's with all the Vulcan blood there?

Originally Posted by mapleleafalumnus

What's with all the Vulcan blood there?

Hey!! Don't question my balsa covering ability's! And I wont question that thing growing out of your head! Deal

Originally Posted by earcutter

Hey!! Don't question my balsa covering ability's! And I wont question that thing growing out of your head! Deal

.......

GOOD ONE!

Okay nothing wrong with two razors one shave. I have played with many more during one shave testing edges. I also like to use multiple soaps...mmhv.

I chose this razor cause it has a thin spine very hollow ground small bevel gets develishly sharp as in too sharp and has caused me grief in the past.

I breadknifed it reset the bevel 1k Norton, then 6K King, 8K Norton, then PHIG with Escher slurry, then Escher for about 10 passes just wet. It was cutting hair at 1K.

It was really sharp at 8k and before I stropped it was tossing HHT out the window hair fragments everywhere. Stropped and Shaved left side of face with normal prep and IK for soap.

It was too sharp. No surprise. Not damaging but I could feel the blade on my skin unpleasantly threateningly. Took the razor to 3 passes on balsa crox then 60 licks on the shell strop. Smooth as silk lingerie on her creamy white thigh.

Lesson learned 3 strokes on crox before the strop from now on.

Yeah you know - I have to send out a big thank you to everyone for their help. An especially big thank you to both Lynn and Glen for their input. It really is something when you hit a bump in the road to have gents with as much experience as they do to real you back in!

Just think how long this would have been going on were I to not have asked lol!

Awesome.

Originally Posted by earcutter

Uhhhh, have you thought that threw? Poor people buy cheap cars that aren't the best for the environment - rich people buy little "green cars." Poor people live in beat-up houses that use way more resources than even a larger home that rich people own but who buy energy efficient stoves, washers etc. and quality windows etc.

Heck! You could argue that the rich persons pooh is cleaner than a poor persons if you really wanted to go wild about it! Certainly rich people are reputed to eat at fast food chains much less than the poor and those sir are a planet killer!

Just saying...

Yeah, I did. I think you're talking about green vs. middle class. I'm talking about vs. poor. Around here, the truly poor don't use a/c, they ride the bus and they don't heat their whole house in the winter.

I work with a boss who is green (and it's not like I don't have the money to be green, i'd rather just live on half my income instead, which does lead to lower energy use). My green boss has three houses, but he does have two hybrids. Each of his houses is at least twice the size of my one house. The rest of us get paid well, but we're pretty stingy. that includes a lot of fairly well off folks not using air conditioning because they don't want to pay for it.

I, too, ride the bus. I'm not green. I'm cheap, except when there is something I want. But I had poor relatives. They had one house, they didn't air condition it, they drove to town once per week and they turned their lights off unless they were reading something that second.

I think an examination of power bills would describe what I'm saying pretty well, on average, between the poor and the green. The poor will always win because it's not a matter of conscience dictating discretion in choosing to use or not use energy, it's a lack of funds that prevents it to begin with.

My example of my boss is anecdotal. Here in the city, there are also amazonian type people (i think that's probably not the right word, whatever you call folks who wear old style converse shoes and don't wash their hair). They're very green and they use little, but they are not the types who would get interested in straight razors because of the cost. They're the type who wouldn't shave.

But I stick by my bet that an examination of *average* total power consumption would follow income more than green objective. My green mother has toured china and africa in the last year. If I still shaved with a mach 3 and rode the bus, I think I'd be ahead.

So, back to the straight razor stuff - I don't think they need justification of being green by anyone. Who knows in the end if they really are (how many strops and other things do we go through) compared to my stretching a mach 3 2-3 months apiece before I picked up a straight razor.

Originally Posted by jaswarb

Now back to too sharp. Anyone take their harsh edge down 2 strokes of crox and then shave it again?

Does 2 do it? If I have an edge like that, I'll do one of three things:
* run it across an old japanese barber hone (a natural one)
* give it a brisk session on horse butt leather (which knocks the tooth off of it but doesn't drop sharpness much)
* run 10 laps on chromium oxide to make sure that no wire edge is hanging on it

I got that sticky sharp (one that seems to cut things you don't want it to) edge you're talking about straight off of purple slate. I know that stone isn't super super fine, but it's still very fine if used properly without slurry, and can make a harsh edge. The sticky or too sharp feeling isn't something I get every single time, so I'm always guessing that there's something at the edge that I don't want there from it (bits of sharp wire edge type particles or something) rather than an edge that is super fine and clean and just microscopically toothy.

For those who have used shell and horse butt, what's the functional difference? I could be accused of championing horse butt as being the strop material to have (which probably drives strop makers nuts, because it's stiff after tanning and not easy to find in cosmetically perfect shape). Does shell cordovan have that hard feel that horse butt has, where it sort of wears slick and has no draw?

Originally Posted by DaveW

Does 2 do it? If I have an edge like that, I'll do one of three things:
* run it across an old japanese barber hone (a natural one)
* give it a brisk session on horse butt leather (which knocks the tooth off of it but doesn't drop sharpness much)
* run 10 laps on chromium oxide to make sure that no wire edge is hanging on it

I got that sticky sharp (one that seems to cut things you don't want it to) edge you're talking about straight off of purple slate. I know that stone isn't super super fine, but it's still very fine if used properly without slurry, and can make a harsh edge. The sticky or too sharp feeling isn't something I get every single time, so I'm always guessing that there's something at the edge that I don't want there from it (bits of sharp wire edge type particles or something) rather than an edge that is super fine and clean and just microscopically toothy.

If you suspect that something is amiss at the edge, you can view it quite well with good lighting and a 10X loupe. Any "wire edge" or other defect can usually be visualized at that power and diagnosed.

I use a B & L 45X stereo microscope to check my bevel and then recheck my progress through the hones. Edge defects jump right out visually but they are no indication of what the blade will feel like on my face. Perfect appearing under the scope can easily be harsh on the face.

Shell strops are supple and slick with little or no draw. I also have made some latigo vegtable tanned strops with medium draw which work quite well. There is an old Torrey cushion suede paddle strop on the shelf works a dream and I have recently been testing just using my forearm and the heel of my hand which work as well as anything else but tend to be a b****h when you nick them

The op addressed an issue I think we have all experienced where a razor can easily cut skin while working on whiskers. What is referred to as too sharp (which I hypothesize is really just a toothy edge) can be polished more smoothly to deliver greater comfort. There are several methods which can be employed to tame that harsh perception.

Stropping, very light honing on fine stone, shaving your face, or as Lynn suggested a couple of passes on chromium oxide or some other abrasive which is submicron appears to add smoothness to the razor.

The simplest of these in IMO is 2 or 3 passes on a balsa strop treated with your favorite abrasive. It is quick and unlikely to damage all the good work spent developing the too sharp edge.

An edge which has become fragile and is feathered out to a "wire" is quite visible at 45X and most frequently I move down one grit level and make a single pass with no pressure. I haven't observed this issue at 8k or above. The edge above 8k is so fine as to affected by the friction of stropping on leather and is best evaluated by passing it against your face under lather.

I have seen Glen refer more than once to the Verhoeven paper. This should be required reading for anyone seeking the ultimate edge. Google it.