Thread: Average Restoration Cost?

I won a W&B 6/8 today on Ebay. It appears to be restorable but I'm sure its above my current skill level. Can any of you guys who do restores that I see on here give me an idea of what it would cost to get cleaned up? I actually like the original horn scales that are on it. Any help would be huge. Thanks guys.
Kurt

The link below is to the razor:

eBay - New & used electronics, cars, apparel, collectibles, sporting goods & more at low prices

Hey kurtlav1
I think you should look at the classifieds and contact some of the guys directly as i dont believe $$$ talk is allowed in open forum but take a look at some of the restorations here with sanding ... not really that hard geve it a go yourself!
Regards,
Mike

Hi Kurt,

To be honest I'm not sure it will be worth it, if even possible.
It will under any circumstance need a lot of work.

It got quite a bit (uneven) honewear, making the toe a lot narrower than the heel, it also have a bit of chipping in the edge that will need to be taken out, both of these will require work that will interfere with the shoulder.

Looks like it also might be attacked by the notorious devils spit, not very fun to deal with

Personally I would not go on and restore it, but I'm still quite a newbie to restoring, some of the more experienced guys might have some solutions and a different view

Originally Posted by Mcbladescar

Hey kurtlav1
I think you should look at the classifieds and contact some of the guys directly as i dont believe $$$ talk is allowed in open forum but take a look at some of the restorations here with sanding ... not really that hard geve it a go yourself!
Regards,
Mike

+1 on this post. PM some members who offer restoration services for some quotes and then decide what you want to do. You don't have to get it restored right away if you have other shave ready razors, take some time and do some research.

From the pictures, it looks possible. I'd grab some 3m wet dry sandpaper and give it a go yourself. Then if you don't like what you've done, contact someone who does restorations. At the very basic level, you could sand the blade a bit and polish it up before honing it.

I'm not sure those scales are horn though....I think they might be bakelite. I didn't see any grain in them, rather just a consistent lustre that's usually apparent on acrylics and plastic. I could be wrong though.

As advised above, valuations are not permitted on SRP forums.

You can only expect speculation from pics. Pick a restorer from the classifieds here: Member Services - Straight Razor Place Classifieds
Send them the razor & ask their opinion.
The critical thing that's hard to tell from pics is how bad the rust is at the edge & how crumbly the steel is as a result. If you can hone you can assess this yourself by setting a bevel & partially honing.

Thanks for the advice everyone. My apologies for a price related question. I'll give her a go at first with the wet/dry sandpaper then contact someone if necessary

Unless you (all readers of this thread) do the restorations yourself I would not purchase a razor with the intent of getting it restored unless you are talking about cleaning, rescaling, honing and/or just polishing up. Polishing up does not include removing rust, pits or devils spit.

I do restorations and I can tell you that the price of restorations can get expensive when metal needs to be removed. Even before metal can be removed the razor has to have enough metal on it before restoration so that when the metal is removed it is still stable enough not to crack, burn or break during or after the restoration. Hollow ground razors such as the one the OP pictured is not a good candidate for restoration due to the level of hollow and what looks to be devil's spit on the spine, in the hollow and on or near the bevel. You may find someone that likes you money that is willing to take this razor on for restoration but I can assure you that it will not be me or any other reputable vendor that has done a bunch of restorations. This razor is a good candidate for the 'Ebay 101' thread. I leave it to the OP to decide if he wants to help others with this example. Sorry if being honest here isn't what you were looking for.

just take some polish to it to shine it up and have it honed. No matter how it looks, it should be a good shaver...

Enjoy.
Jeff.

I've polished her up, and by that I mean cleaned off most of the stains. The chips came out of the edge pretty quickly, and it honed nicely. I'm going to use it for a shave tomorrow. Hopefully all goes well.
Kurt
As soon as I can I'll post some pics