Thread: confessions of a blade...

Originally Posted by Nervin

...snip...
Ok for the Stones: Norton 4000/8000 combo stone
....
Unfortunately I can't say the magnification though.. this is my super macro set up on my canon 5D in combination with digital zoom in lightroom...
.....

With a setup like this you might be able to rest the edge
on a snip/ lock of hair. Grab a lock next time you are at the
barber. By using hair you will have a constant for reference.
Too often I see images where it the bevel is in focus but
not the cutting edge. A lock of hair at the cutting edge
might make focusing more purposeful. You can also use an artists
brush, camels hair is squirrel. Much finer than whiskers but
it works as a constant.

To keep the magnification constant keep the distance
constant. Then crop so a screen and and the image have
a 1:1 pixel match. Easy to say hard to do....

Good stuff!


Also add "shave test" notes.

The new light rings are cool as heck.

Great polishing, Nervin!

Originally Posted by Nervin

Soooo I warmed the blade in hot water then warmed the strop with a hair dryer, I did keep the dryer on the strop to a minimum because I worried about drying it out. Didn't really know how leather would react to prolonged hair dying.... This is the result..

I think a hairdryer is overkill & may well dry your leather out in time. A simple rub with the wrist or hand is all that's needed. I use my wrist as my hands are not guaranteed slurry free after honing

Very interesting and helpful stuff. Keep it up!

This thread is just going to become more and more interesting. Thanks & keep it up!

Sorry for the delay. I contracted a computer virus and am in the process of zeroing the hard-drive and recovering via time machine. I will have some new images and info up later this evening. Wished I could do it via itouch but alas it's pretty limited.

Here it is now 0dark thirty and I have finally gotten everything straightened out. I think all in all I have discovered quite a few things since my last picture post... So I will start by post some pictures and such..

First I thought I would start with a magnified image of a dulled blade... Now I am not talking ugly dulled with chips and what not, but has not been stropped since it was honed and shave with quite a few times until it just didn't seem to cut hair anymore.. once you see it you will understand why I have come to my conclusion which I will post at the end... Also as requested I put a dime in the pictures...

Dull Blade...


(notice the absence of teeth also I tried to get an overhead of the blade but failed... but on this blade you can see where the very edge is tweaked to one side or another almost like a wire edge)

This one is another of the blade warmed and the strop warmed with my palm...



Now I want to point out the teeth again.. there is very little to no teeth.. although the edge is polished nicely I will personally state that unless you start with an ATG swipe it will leave the hairs angle cut.

Here is the blade after 50 passes on the felt then another 50 on the strop with no heating at all...



and again after my shave and 100 passes on the strop with only warming with my palm..



(notice the formation of micro teeth.. although the sides are polished if you look closely the teeth are back but very fine..)

This one is of the texture of the leather



Now so far what I have learned from all of this is the the teeth are very important.. Lynn has a honing PDF on here and it even says that the teeth and the direction of the teeth play an important role. When i smoothed out the blade about as much as it can go, it seemed almost impossible to get a close shave going WTG. Normally when my facial hair is long I can do a one pass WTG and get BBS (unfortunately after this experiment even my prized chin badger no longer exists) Now with that said a polished and sharp blade WILL do a great number on ATG. I shaved half with the polished blade, then the other half after I ran it on the felt then strop again to get the teeth back and there was a substantial difference.. Now with all that said and the talk about the teeth, they grab the hair then cut.. No teeth equals quite literally a pass that just cuts what ever is in its path.

From what I gather the "Sweet Spot" is the point where the sides are nicely polished and yet the micro teeth remain on the edge. I have read where people use pastes and sprays when an edge doesn't seem to be as god any more and I think that they just reform the teeth. I haven't gone to either, but I do use a plain piece of felt and it does seem to bring them back. Even if I polished the edge before. I would almost want to compare a scalpel and a straight blade. I have an Xacto, but you can even see that there are micro teeth without magnification.

So Stropping IS king with out a doubt, but the teeth ARE keen.. If you look at the Dull blade there are no directional teeth.

I have another post in the beginners section about the affects of different stages of a blades edge on the hair itself. and will be putting up some new stuff tomorrow that is related to this thread.

All suggestions and input is very welcome in this too..

Thanks for the posts and the breakdown.

I'd be interested to see the edges of razors some of the more experienced guys have shaved with and think are top notch (maybe not holy grail, but DFSers), to see how they compare on the teeth issue.

I'm also now interested to investigate the teeth of my razors and see how mine compare to yours. As soon as Uncle Sam gets his act together I should have a new hdd for my desktop and be able to get some good pics for comparison's sake.

Thanks again!

Peace,

I definitely agree... Just like i stated before the uniformly directional teeth seems to be what SHave ready Sharp is... I mean yes you have them after you hone, but stropping them down to a smoother side makes a difference too. But once those teeth are gone, then it definitely doesn't shave right. Then just getting it to the felt and then strop again and it's back to a nice clean shaver... And I definitely agree that others should put up their own images too. Especially once they have reached their "sweet spot"

There are some very high mag pics here.
http://straightrazorpalace.com/honin...er-why-10.html
It may be just perception but I wouldn't say there are teeth so much as a "wavy line" as described in the Modern Mechanix article of 1931
WONDER PHOTOS REVEAL UNSUSPECTED FACTS ABOUT Razor Blades and Shaving (Oct, 1931)