Thread: Minimal set-up for a "full" restore

A friend of mine was lucky enough to have his fiancée offer him a straight razor. Unfortunately, she offered him something found at a yard sale, on eBay, or something alike. Thus it would need some restoration work before being usable and used. He asked me advices, because he knew I was into straight shaving. But I just use and hone straights, I don't restore (so far ).

So my question would be: "What would you advice as a starting beginner set-up to restore straight razors?" (excluding honing, as I already have this covered)

Few remarks or constraints for the answer:
1) sorry, I don't have pics (but this is totally salvageable).
2) the point is less to have the straight restored (as I know people offer this in the services section of the SRP classifieds) and more to learn and "do it yourself" (so to acquire the tools and materials).
3) he lives in France, I live in Canada. Thus, availability of some products or brands may vary a lot. Feel free to suggest generic rather than specific (i.e. metal polish rather than maas).
4) I'm on a budget and am space limited, he's not (or much less). So feel free to explore the range of equipment, from minimal to dispensable-but-very-useful.
5) I'm looking into this as a realistically one-time-fun-activity for him and a one-time-but-potentially-start-of-a-long-lasting-activity/hobby for me ...
6) I'm interested both in your opinions, suggestions, etc.... and in links to other posts or places to buy/know more.
7) right now, we're not interested in making the scales.

I already know that, at the very least, I will need to unpin it, clean it from (rather light) dead and active rust, clean the scales or buy new ones, and re-scale it.

Thank you all.
Cheers.

I'm still a newbie, but I managed a decent restore on an old ebay razor using just the following items.

1. Sandpaper. Lots of it. I had everything from 60grit up to 2000grit. Wet&Dry is what I used at the higher grits to remove rust from the razor itself. Lower grits were for finishing the scales.
2. Wood. I grabbed some thin sheets of white pine from hobby lobby and it worked pretty good for my first pair of scales.
3. Coping saw. Used this to rough cut the wood to scale shape.
4. CA/superglue to finish the scales and protect them.
5. 1/16 brass rod and washers to fit it. I got the rod from hobby lobby around the model train section and the washers from microfasteners.
6. Ball peen hammer. I used a tack hammer I had laying around and it worked well enough for me to pin the new scales but a ball peen would work better.
7. Small drill for drilling holes in the new scales. I used a hand drill I got from a local hardware store.

That's everything I used I think, and my first restore came out pretty good. At least in my opinion.

I've personally had decent success with the follow stuff:

Rhodes American Steel Wool (#0 to #0000)
Micro-Mesh polishing pads -- these finishing pads go from 1,500 to an awesome 12,000 grit

For the handles I've been accustomed to hand rubbing shellac onto anything wood material. There are a lot of options out there whether you'd like to brush it on or spray it on.

Most of what otalicus you'll need most definitely like brass rods (I'm sure you can also find a few on ebay, you can also go to most of the knife making websites out there), ball peen hammer, coping saw and a small drill. I've just used a small Dremel setup with the multitool itself, some drill bits and their drill press with a few spring clamps and went at it. You can always go old school and just use a hand drill like this one and its way cheaper if you can find one used:


As for the wood, its all up to what grade you'd prefer. I've always bought my wood related things here @ Woodcraft
For the finishing supplies, I've always bought my things here: Stewart-MacDonald
I don't really have any experience buying anything from them but here are some washers: MicroFasteners

Alternative Method (the harder way): Buy a section of a brass rod relatively larger than what you need, cut a section off about 1/8" or so (depending on the diameter of the brass rod, you might need to cut a longer section), hammer it down on a silversmith anvil or a hard surface (the surface has to be harder than brass), drill a hole through it, round it out and you're good to go.

A few knife making websites to look through:
Jantz Supply
USA KnifeMaker Supply


These are just my suggestions and I'm sure I've missed a few things but I mostly repair and restore antique guns but I'm sure it'll work out nicely. Everyone has their own process and I'm sure in time you'll develop one too. Have fun!