Thread: Should I work on this TR Cadman?

Hi Guys

An old friend of mine showed me his fathers TR Cadman & Sons razor. He has only ever used it to remove registration stickers from his car window (cringe). The blade has a bit of sticky junk on it so it looks worse than it is, that said it's not in great condition! The scales and pins are fine.

Should I work on restoring the blade? Or is it too far gone and I am just polishing a turd? (I actually want to use it if I work on it)

I think this is a perfect razor to restore. A little patina on the edge, so it is a bit of a gamble, but I think it will work out after hand sanding. You'll get the sticky stuff off with any type of alcohol.

Have you restored before? Otherwise, start here: http://straightrazorpalace.com/works...wers-here.html.

Good luck!

Thanks Laurens
I actually use a shavette at the moment. Thought I'd learn to shave before maintaining a blade, but when my friend offered this old piece I'm tempted to get into the straights - The more I read on resto's here the more work I see it will be! From what I can read the quality of a TR razor is no problem. It certainly looks like a satisfying job when you see some of the before/after pics here. Some of them come up just amazing, that would be cool.

I'm thinking Laurens has it right but I would first hone the edge to see if it will take a good edge. You never know what is under those dark spots near the edge. If it takes a good edge and the metal is not Swiss cheesed under those dark spots you won't be wasting your time restoring it. I would bet it is just fine but you never know.

Bob

If you go slowly and carefully by hand, you'll get one very fine razor indeed. Bengalls are relatively soft, IIRC, which should make it a little easier to restore.

I'd say unpin carefully, you can keep these nice scales, just wipe them with a little polish and they'll slook superb. Start hand sanding around 200 grit, 300 if you want to be extra careful, so that you'll clean off the surface rust and see what's underneath. Then decide which way to go: keep the last little patina and go up the grits, or clean it entirely and go down the grits (80-120) and then up to 1000 at least. Finish with polish and get it honed or learn to hone your self

That could become a good Bengall shaver. There doesn't appear to be too much hone wear on the spine and edge. Of course it will all depend on the depth of rust on the edge: if you can expose clean metal without any swiss cheese corrosion (AKA devil's spit) it should hone up beautifully. A dozen or so strokes on a 220 should make it clear what the story will be. You could use a 1000 but it'll take longer.

I have done a few of these and I generally start with wet and dry paper (220 -320) to clear the blade of loose corrosion. People who like shiny razors would dismount it from the scales at this point and do a full sequence of abrasive papers up to 1500-2000 or so and then buff with a compound until polished. I am not of this school and prefer a bit of patination but, as always, each to his own Good luck and let us have a look at the results.

I've had second thoughts on this: a 220 grit stone is probably a bit aggressive and might unnecessarily widen the bevel. Just start with a few passes on a 1000 grit hone, that should be enough to discover whether you have clean metal at edge and therefore the ability to set the bevel without corrosion pits ruining it. If you're inexperienced at honing you may wish to then do a clean up of the blade to the point where you're satisfied with the finish and then send it on to an expert to bring the edge up to the shave ready level. There are a few people in Australia who offer honing services, including Oz (Onimaru55) who is very highly regarded.

I would suggest, this being your restore, to not bothering with unpinning. It is not difficult to hand-sand around the scales. A lot can go wrong unpinning where you could crack and ruin the scales. No need to take that risk for this project. Just my two cents.

I say go for it. I have done razors like or worse and they turned out OK. Just may need extra honing if the edge is effected. Good luck.

If you plan on giving this razor back to your friend because of sentimental value then I would instead buy a razor on the bay and restore that.

If you destroy one from the bay your not out much.

If you destroy something that can't be replaced, well you get the idea.

Restore that bad boy after you have a few restorations under your belt.