Thread: Small chip/dent in razor, seeking advice

Hi everyone,

so here goes. While trying to strop my 5/8 razor, I've noticed it made a tiny scratch in the leather. After looking closely, I've found this:



It's a very small chip, but it's only on this side of the razor; the other side is smooth. You can see from the size of the razor that it's a very small indentation of sorts. I really have no idea how I've managed to get it there, since I've been very careful with the razor.

In any case, it needs fixing. I see two options here:
1) I currently don't own a hone yet. I'm considering buying a hone that would allow me to fix this and will serve as a regular hone in the future. I'm thinking one of those double-sided 4k/8k hones. Which one would you recommend for this kind of job?

2) I have a big assortment of sandpapers; 80, 160, 200, 400, 600, 1000, 1500 and 2000. Do you think I could fix the blade using something like this?

What do you guys think?

Send it here Razor Honing

You don't want to practise honing on a chipped razor that is also your main razor

Originally Posted by detra83

Hi everyone,

so here goes. While trying to strop my 5/8 razor, I've noticed it made a tiny scratch in the leather. After looking closely, I've found this:



It's a very small chip, but it's only on this side of the razor; the other side is smooth. You can see from the size of the razor that it's a very small indentation of sorts. I really have no idea how I've managed to get it there, since I've been very careful with the razor.

In any case, it needs fixing. I see two options here:
1) I currently don't own a hone yet. I'm considering buying a hone that would allow me to fix this and will serve as a regular hone in the future. I'm thinking one of those double-sided 4k/8k hones. Which one would you recommend for this kind of job?

2) I have a big assortment of sandpapers; 80, 160, 200, 400, 600, 1000, 1500 and 2000. Do you think I could fix the blade using something like this?

What do you guys think?

I'm thinking that your face will feel it if you attempt to shave as is. I haven't worked with sandpaper so I hesitate to advise you on its use, but for me personally I would get the chip out with a 1000 grit hone. Once that's done, I would use 4000, 8000, and put a finish on it with a 12000 or 16000 grit hone.

In this case, without any honing equipment, I'd get someone to take care of this problem for you. In the Classifieds under Services are honemeisters who really know what they're doing. Once you get your own stones you can take care of this yourself.

+1 on honing.

+1 on sending it to a professional honemeister from the Classifieds who lives close to you.

Originally Posted by jhenry

+1 on honing.

+1 on sending it to a professional honemeister from the Classifieds who lives close to you.

And +1 on buying the 4K/8K Norton hone, but do buy a practice razor to learn honing while you keep this one for shaving.

i also have a question and doubt from you so please read it carefully and reply me any suggestion .

I recently picked up a sight unseen straight an upgrade from a really cheap Golden Dollar straight, and noticed after the second or so shave that the blade feels "loose" at the pin or pivot point. Kind of hard to explain, but it doesn't have any sort of tension where it holds itself open at all. Is this normal? Or are the blades generally supposed to keep themselves semi-rigid as my cheap razor did?
Thanks for any advice!

This is a common enough problem, solved by tightening the pins. There's a lot of info on that subject to be found, but basically you hammer (gently, start out with a spoon) the pin on both sides until it is tight enough. Use a solid metal surface to work on (anvil, another hammer or tool, etc) and take care to have only the pin and not the scales resting on that surface.


Edit: oh, it's spam. I have edited my post to include the question and exclude the links, in case joyson1988's message is removed.

Ok, a little update on my success and a bit more information.

I forgot to mention that the razor in question was professionally honed and stropped last week and I just had one shave with it before I've noticed the chip. I really didn't feel like sending it away. Also, I live in Europe and the price for having it shipped to the UK and back and having it honed there is just too close to the price of a brand new razor and I really wanted to avoid having to do this.

Anyway, the nick/chip was really tiny and barely visible to the eye and, as I've written before, only seen from one side of the blade while the other side was perfectly flat. So I've decided to give it a try with sandpaper.

I've used a brand new 1200 grit paper. Placing just the toe of the razor (where the nick was) on the paper and making sure it was flat with the spine, I made about ten very gentle and short passes. I'm happy to say the nick went away. I then tried stropping it and it no longer made any kind of marks at all on the leather, so I think it should be good enough for my face. In any case, it was just a tiny spot near the tip of the blade, so I can't see how this could have any effect on the shave, as the rest of the blade is perfectly sharp.

I will let you know if I will have any problems with shaving, but I think this problem is solved now. I was very lucky for having just a tiny nick at the very end of the razor and I'm sure it wouldn't have been so easy in any other case.

Welcome to SRP. Where in Europe do you live ? There may be a member near you who could help out if you need more attention paid to that razor now, or in the future.

I'm from a tiny chicken-shaped country called Slovenia, right between Italy and Austria. I haven't noticed anyone from those two places (or from Germany which is reasonably close enough as well) that would offer honing services. The closest thing I found was UK.