Kappler Stubtail

Quite a strange razor this one. On first glance i had assumed some work had been done because of the grind marks on the blade and its shape.
Probably the grind marks were original though and the scales could only house a blade of this geometry. The horn scale were in neatsfoot for some months until today .I gave them a sanding, heated them and clamped them between steel plates . I will show them soon..The wedge is made of bone..

The razor had a light trip on the grinder with 400 & 800 grits to remove staining and the original grind marks...

The maker is a bit of a mystery to me U Kappler with accents . There is an Frank Kappler (Barber supplies Pennsylvania) but i think this razor might be from the Czech Republic..

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Looks like it will turn out well. Those accent marks, umlaut, are very familiar to me from written German.

Bob

Quote:

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Originally Posted by BobH

Looks like it will turn out well. Those accent marks, umlaut, are very familiar to me from written German.

Bob

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Hi Bob,
Yes those accents are synonymous with German grammar but the razor being a wedge and in horn lead me away from Germany and onto Czechoslovakia.

I like it. Interesting shape and jimping.

A substantial German speaking ethnic minority used to live in Czechoslovakia before WW II.A couple of years ago when on holiday in the Czech Republic we met an elderly German who had come back to his native village. He told us how he and his family were forced to leave after WW II being considered traitors.

Yes, I had forgotten that there were areas of Czechoslovakia that were predominately German speaking after the map of Europe was redrawn post WWI. That was known as the Sudentland to the Germans.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudetenland

Bob

Just needs honing now..
Sometimes when i have trouble finding a maker it is because i am reading the stamp wrong..Food for thought..
What is that between the U and the surname? double dots/ Colon, that could be a miss stamped letter ? maybe..
Yes those are sweets in the background and no you cannot have one :)

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Thar's nice, I'd be happy with that.

Bob

Tragedy is the ending to this tale :/
I just took it to the 800k and established a lovely bevel. Then onto the 1k... Everything was going well, i was thinking about the smooth shave i would get from this cast steel when i noticed an anomaly .. The blade cracked rite through .. You cannot see in the photos but the crack curves up and around ..
Millions of ppl are dying left right n center so i suppose it's not such a big deal..
Cheers

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Oh crap, I should not have said anything till it was totally done. :(

Bob

Yes you totally jinxed it :gaah:

I’m sure many of us share your pain. I have a lovely W & B that became an extreme shorty at the 4K grit on my Norton.

Was it already cracked or did it happen during the honing process?

It occured on the 1k honing..Out of the blue.

Oh wow. Odd that it would wait all these years to do that. Makes me think of a heat treat issue. Polishing it up may have removed just a little too much material for the internal stresses?

I have never had a Sheffield do that to me.. Something wasn't rite there..

man. That sucks.! But your not alone.

Ouch! That really sucks wet dog fur. I had a beautiful Crown and Sword that I had restored to damn near NOS condition. I had matching box and everything and during pinning it developed a crack just like that. I feel your pain. That's a swift thump to the gonads.

Wet dog fur :/
No worries, this razor had some bad joo joo from the off... Pain is the NOS FBU Celebrated razor A. Sambrook that i re scaled and then honed only to find it was a joke grind. You could take it to a grinder or Dr.matt the life out of it and it was still a no go .

The Kappler was in a batch of 4 restorations and thank God it was the kappler that failed and non of the others

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It happens to all of us at one time or another. I had to trash what I thought was a great little W&B Celebrated when I discovered a similar crack. Heartbreaking.