Thread: The Grand Experiment

For those that haven't been following this I will be shaving with two alternating razors for the next 30 days or so, one stropping before shaving and the other after as well as before to see if there is any difference in how stropping affects the razors and shaving.

Well here's the particulars. I will be using two TI SRP razors #38 and 39. 38 has had light use and 39 is out of the box. I spent this afternoon honing both razors to perfection and they appear to equally pass all tests and under magnification appear similar. I start Monday morning with 38 getting the before and after honing and 39 getting just the before honing. They will both be stropped on a DD #50 Horsehide strop with 6 passes on the linen and 30 passes on the leather. Each razor will get one days rest between shaves. Shave prep, brush, cream etc will be the same with both razors as will be the time I shave each day.

I'll post weekly updates here and initially give it 30 days with possibly extending it as I go depending on what happens.I understand someone else is doing a similar experiment with a couple of TIs. If anyone has any comments or suggestions feel free to point them out.

I just have one comment. You need to keep the total amount of stropping the same for your experiment to be valid.

For example, If you were doing 20 round trips before and 20 after shaving on one razor, you would need to do 40 on the before only razor. Otherwise you would be ignoring the effect of extra stropping trips.

now why didn't I think of that? Thanks

Since the purpose of this test is to discover the best method for stropping a razor, or the longer shaving one, the stroping passes number should remain as is for both methods. For example, when I strop before/after shaving the total passes are 40, but when I strop before only, I dont compensate with 20+ passes. That's real life use of the razor, so this test should reflect that. We are not trying to discover just the sharpest razor at the end of the test, but the best strop method affecting the razor sharpnes.

So, keep your stropping routine before/after total=60, and before only - 30 passes


Nenad

Originally Posted by superfly

Since the purpose of this test is to discover the best method for stropping a razor, or the longer shaving one, the stroping passes number should remain as is for both methods. For example, when I strop before/after shaving the total passes are 40, but when I strop before only, I dont compensate with 20+ passes. That's real life use of the razor, so this test should reflect that. We are not trying to discover just the sharpest razor at the end of the test, but the best strop method affecting the razor sharpnes.

So, keep your stropping routine before/after total=60, and before only - 30 passes


Nenad

I disagree. The purpose is to see if after stropping does anything, not if more stropping does anything. We know the answer to that.

Basically it should show if you need more pre-shave-stropping without post-shave-stropping than you need pre-shave-stropping with post-shave-stropping right?

you could run the experiment twice, using the two different methods. however, joe, i am thinking that part of the experiment is the variable of rest of the razor's edge - that is, if you strop it 30 times after you shave, what effect does resting it have versus stropping it 30 times after you shave and then stropping it again. im thinking that once the edge is polished up by stropping, more stropping aint gonna help it much. but the experiment originally proposed would test the affect of the resting of the blade's edge, and also test the theory that you need to alternate razors even.

sam

Originally Posted by finsfan

you could run the experiment twice, using the two different methods. however, joe, i am thinking that part of the experiment is the variable of rest of the razor's edge - that is, if you strop it 30 times after you shave, what effect does resting it have versus stropping it 30 times after you shave and then stropping it again. im thinking that once the edge is polished up by stropping, more stropping aint gonna help it much. but the experiment originally proposed would test the affect of the resting of the blade's edge, and also test the theory that you need to alternate razors even.

sam

That's exactly what I was proposing when I suggested the experiment, but yes you could keep it running with different variables each time. We'd definitely want more people to participate then or bigspender will go nuts!

X

Originally Posted by xman

That's exactly what I was proposing when I suggested the experiment, but yes you could keep it running with different variables each time. We'd definitely want more people to participate then or bigspender will go nuts!

X

You can test everything that you wanted to test while keeping th total amount of stropping the same. If you don't yu're introducing a factor that can make a difference and it makes the entire experiment suspect. If you have two differences, you can't prove which one accounts for the differenece or they might interract to make the difference greater. That's not the way you design an experiment. If you want to test one effect then you make that the only difference.

Waving your hand and saying that extra stropping won't make a difference doesn't make it so. You would have to prove that first before you could just go ahead and do it.

Joe: here is what i am thinking. i would guess most of us strop right before we shave. 30 trips seems right. so, what is being proposed is how would it differ if we stropped after we shaved, and then, still the next time, we stropped before we shaved. most of us are not gonna strop 60 trips just right before we shave. doing it as i suggest (and i dont think that it is the way or the only way) would seem to test the theory that razor edges need to rest and reallign themselves. so, does stropping twice like this help any or not. i guess that is what was being tested.

sam