Thread: can this blade be salvaged?

I bought a blade off ebay a few weeks ago and it just arrived today.

The razor is cracked on the tip and doesn't even show up on the better picture sent. (and he sent a decent one)



click here for a larger image

You can't see the crack, it's about 3/16" from the crown or tip of the blade and runs slightly less than 1/16" into the blade.

The head of the blade is wider than the heel of the blade. The head measures a smidge more than 13/16" and the heel measures 3/4". This seems to be the design of the blade. There's virtually zero hone marks.

If I wanted to take 1/16" off I could probably get rid of the crack as long as I don't worsen it during honing. Is there a viable way to leave the heel at 3/4" and hone it so that the blade ends up being 3/4" wide all the way down the length of the blade? This would entail honing a triangular piece off the edge of the blade. Is this possible or feasible?

Getting a refund is pretty much out of the question. the fellow became a real jerk after I won the auction.

Wrt the 'jerk', if it says very good or excellent condition or something like that, it's clear misrepresentation. Dunno if you wanna risk a bad feedback over this.

I could imagine you could take a 220 stone and run the edge perpendicular to it, almosit like skating. it should take away material pretty quickly, though if you're using a waterstone, it could leave deep gashes.
Then after that, build up the edge again.
Whether or not this is a smart idea, I don't know, never done this, and I'm quite new at this, but this is what popped into my head right away

ETA: Or like Bill says in his video clip, instead of scr*wing around, you could just regrind the edge in a few seconds on his burr king

Redwoood

It could be done, but I'd probably take off the length of the blade past the crack. You won't lose width, and you'll get rid of the crack. Some folks like shorter blades anyway. I have a couple travel razors with short blades (although they were made that way). If you took out the crack from the edge (losing width), it's going to screw up your honing geometry big time. I could probably do it in about 10 minutes. You'd probably want new handles afterwards, since the shorter blade's gonna look funny inside the full-size handles, but I believe very few razors can't be salvaged (and I think I bought all those ), if you're willing to modify them a bit.

I will agree with Joe on this one. Just grind the toe of the blade shorter. Don't worry about the difference in width of the blade. If you have no experience with this type of work I would suggest asking Joe to do it for you.

Joe,
how exactly do you shorten a blade?

I've got a Dubl Duck Satinedge that has been cut back to a 2 1/2" length. I'm looking forward to trying it out. Lots of resto to do and so little time.

X

I've got a blade that's been shortened, though it had a very nice etching on the blade prior to the damage. It now says "NITED STATES OF AMERICA" across the banner. If it wasn't for that disruption, I'd have that baby mint by now. As it stands, even if I get the rest perfect, it'll still be an obviously shortened blade, even with new scales.

Originally Posted by Redwoood

Joe,
how exactly do you shorten a blade?

Belt grinder. I'll use a new 60 grit ceramic or Norton SG belt (they cut very cool and fast) to hog off the main portion of the metal. It helps to take a magic marker and draw out the the outline of the point to give you a point to grind to. Then you just move to finer belts to get the shine. Keeping the same profile is a bit of a trick, and takes practice, but it's not hard to do if you have the right equipment.

Originally Posted by FUD

I bought a blade off ebay a few weeks ago and it just arrived today.

The razor is cracked on the tip and doesn't even show up on the better picture sent.

I have one that is cracked 2" past the tip of the blade on an 8/8 blade. THe photo had a chip and I couldn't tell if there was a crack behind it or a shadow, so I asked the seller about it before I bid and he said there was no crack, so I placed a snipe. Later someone else asked the same question and he said there was, and the exchange was posted, but too late for me to see. So, I ended up with a cracked blade. SInce it was a huge blade, I thought I could fix it.

The problem is, as I take down the edge, the crack keeps traveling, no matter how gently I hone. I might try sending it to be reground. In any case, it was a beautiful Filly and I wanted to use it, so I honed it to perfection (as John Crowley says) and made sure the sides of the blade were smooth to a fingernail tip (that way I know the blade has to surprising points). It shaves great, but I keep testing it constantly.

In your case, the best solution is to turn the blade into a round point or partially rounded point by taking it down past the crack. You can do it carefully with diamond hones or a fine file and finish the point smooth with 2000 sandpaper. Once you hone it up you'll never know the difference.