Tried my hand at honing for the first time tonight. Didn't go quite as expected but ended with a decent, if not the smoothest shave.
I had a king combo and a thuringian soaking. Took out my Mappin razor which is pretty much a wedge with an uneven bevel, I bought it shave ready but have never really been happy with the edge. After a few minutes it became apparent that I was going to do little more than wreck the razor at this stage, I think that one will be visiting Neil soon.
Next up I got a out a razor I had bought from Neil, a little 4/8 German number with an Alexadria stamp, I'd put a chip in the bevel a month or two ago but aside from that everything was looking fairly simple. Took a while on the 1000 grit to get rid of the chip but I got there and it was shaving armhair. Went to the 6k side with a slurry and things went smoothly, the edge was looking far more polished. Thinned out the slurry, then just water, then went to move to the thuringian. As I picked it up I realised I'd forgotten to lap it, doh! It was far to late to head to the patio with sandpaper. The edge seemed quite nice though. I gave it a few strops on 1.5 micron diamond paste, a few on <1 micron diamond paste and a few on cro ox, it cut a hanging hair in two places.
Stropped and shaved.
Not the smoothest shave ever but it done the job.
I'm rather pleased.
I've got four razors, three of which I reckon will be fairly straight forward to play with as they all have straight edges and nice even bevels and have been recently sharpened by people who know what they are doing. Hopefully the Mappin wedge will be easier to hone once it's been to visit Neil.
The thuringian will be lapped asap and I can try shaving straight from there without the pastes - I get the feeling the pastes may have made up for poor technique in the honing department.
After the first few minutes I found my arms doing very little with my legs, hips and trunk doing the bulk of the movement and I found myself sunk into a kung fu stance without even thinking about it.
Sorry for the monologue but surprisingly my wife seemed bored stiff about thirty seconds into my tale, so you guys are getting it.
I have used a Chinese 12k for touch up's before but now I know what people mean when they use the term feedback - the Chinese 12k has almost none.
Thanks to npinn001 for selling me a whole lotta stone at a great price.
I had a king combo and a thuringian soaking. Took out my Mappin razor which is pretty much a wedge with an uneven bevel, I bought it shave ready but have never really been happy with the edge. After a few minutes it became apparent that I was going to do little more than wreck the razor at this stage, I think that one will be visiting Neil soon.
Next up I got a out a razor I had bought from Neil, a little 4/8 German number with an Alexadria stamp, I'd put a chip in the bevel a month or two ago but aside from that everything was looking fairly simple. Took a while on the 1000 grit to get rid of the chip but I got there and it was shaving armhair. Went to the 6k side with a slurry and things went smoothly, the edge was looking far more polished. Thinned out the slurry, then just water, then went to move to the thuringian. As I picked it up I realised I'd forgotten to lap it, doh! It was far to late to head to the patio with sandpaper. The edge seemed quite nice though. I gave it a few strops on 1.5 micron diamond paste, a few on <1 micron diamond paste and a few on cro ox, it cut a hanging hair in two places.
Stropped and shaved.
Not the smoothest shave ever but it done the job.
I'm rather pleased.
I've got four razors, three of which I reckon will be fairly straight forward to play with as they all have straight edges and nice even bevels and have been recently sharpened by people who know what they are doing. Hopefully the Mappin wedge will be easier to hone once it's been to visit Neil.
The thuringian will be lapped asap and I can try shaving straight from there without the pastes - I get the feeling the pastes may have made up for poor technique in the honing department.
After the first few minutes I found my arms doing very little with my legs, hips and trunk doing the bulk of the movement and I found myself sunk into a kung fu stance without even thinking about it.
Sorry for the monologue but surprisingly my wife seemed bored stiff about thirty seconds into my tale, so you guys are getting it.
I have used a Chinese 12k for touch up's before but now I know what people mean when they use the term feedback - the Chinese 12k has almost none.
Thanks to npinn001 for selling me a whole lotta stone at a great price.
