Thread: Pre-Shave Oils

I use AOS pre shave oil, sandalwood scent. It does make a difference in the comfort of the shave. It's expensive and I was told at the AOS store that the main ingredient is castor oil. I'll try making some of my own. Castor oil is not expensive.

I also use AOS pre shave oil and I honestly think its not expensive about 22 dollers for 2FOZ.
I use about a nickel sized amount and shave every day . I have had the bottle for almost 2 months
and only used about 1/4 of the bottle.I think its atleast 6 months maybe more worth
but its always nice to experiment with your own potion...
keep us informed on how you make out.

I use Proraso Pre/Post with my Proraso shaves, and it
seems to do a nice job. I don't use it all the time, but
maybe my Proraso shaves are some of the best for a
reason...

- Scott

Hi I'm new here and new to this community as a whole, but I do have a wide variety of experience with shave oils as my prep to my shaving routine with cartridges. I used to prep my cartridge shaves similar to how most straight/DE users prep: shower/conditioner on beard, lather in bowl with brush, oil on face, brush lather over oil, etc.. all in the shower. I can't speak directly for oil with straight/DE shaves (yet!), but these are my experiences with cartridges.

IMHO

I started out with Art of Shaving oil. The AOS oil is relatively thick, smells nice, and gave me perfect cartridge shaves without any burn or ingrowns. Most of my girlfriends tell me I had the best shaved face of anyone they've ever met, and I attributed this to the oil. I swore I'd never go back, but decided to try out some other mainstays.

The Trufitt & Hill oil is thin and runny. It tended to get in my brush and gunk it up. Also I started getting razorburn again while using T&H oil. I don't think I even finished the whole bottle of this stuff. It was also the most expensive stuff I've tried.

Next I tried a sampler of the Lab Series for Men shave oil. This struck a balance between the AOS and T&H oil, but had no scent. The shaves were decent, with only minor burn; unfortunately I only got about 3 shaves out of the sampler, so I can't talk to longevity.

A sampler of KingofShaves oil gave me about the same results.

Most recently I had a bottle of Anthony Logistics pre-shave oil. This was my favorite by far, and I used every single drop. It was amazingly thick and had a mild mint/menthol smell which lingered a bit and mixed with my aftershave for a nice effect. Ant's was thick enough not to get in my brush, and required just a little work to spread sufficiently. I never had a burn or a bump with this oil, even with lazy-5-10-shave-old cartridges.

I was considering order another bottle of Anthony's, but I decided I would try making my own with plain castor oil, olive oil, and a few drops of eucalyptus essential oil. I have yet to use this prep, but I can report back with my findings!

It's been about 2 months since my Ant's ran out, and my shaves once again consistently give me burn and give me bumps too if I've used the cartridge more than 3x. I'm sold on oil. Also for the record I don't think the oil does anything for the softness of whiskers. I think primarily it provides a smoother working surface. The oil provides a little "give" for your blade to bite into rather than into your skin, especially with the ATG motion. Just think about oil works on the surface of a lathe.

i make mine with sweet almond oiland put what ever e.o. that i like , and it does make a difference in the shave.i warshed my face with hot water then put on the oil and let it soak in while i mix my shave soap. i make about 8 oz. of this for about 10.00 us. so not bad.

Do you think neat olive oil would work?#

been thinking of using peanut oit(use it for massages). what does the castor oil do for you?

I'v been using AOS lemon scent for about 3 months now and the bottle is still 85% full , I use it every shave it took about a week of use to notice a difference . For me it truly does work , it makes a shave much more enjoyable
and the scent is quite nice and stays fragrant all day .
when I don't use it I can feel a little stubble
I get a sever case of face-terbation after using, hahaha

i have used both poraso and l'occitane and would recommend both. if you are reapplying it in between passes it also gives you a good indication on the areas that you missed.

I was going to pick up some castor oil and tea tree oil from asda yesterday to make my own shave oil. I Walked down the shave aisle and found some nuage shave oil for £1, thought i`ll give it a try for a quid and its brilliant. lovely menthol kind of smell and best shave i`ve ever had....