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From what I have heard/read/been told, DE baldes are certainly sharper. I guess that a straight can be made as sharp, probably with an ultra-fine hone, diamond pastes, etc, but most straight users do not like shaving with such sharp blades. For instance, a blade honed and then refined on a pasted strop with 0.25 micon diamond spray is very sharp indeed, but the shave it gives is often harsh, irritates the skin and gives rise to 'weepers' - not a comfortable experience. Most people who use the 0.25 micron diamond spray then use chrome oxide - coarser than diamond at 0.5 micron - to smooth the edge of the blade prior to shaving. Seems a retrograde step, doesn't it?!
Getting the blade very sharp ultimately means that the bevel profile is very attenuated - thin - and thin steel is dented, torn and pushed aside by harsh bristles. Photos taken with an electron microscope of a straight honed and stroped show a pretty regular edge. Photos of the same blade post shaving show a deformed, bent and rolled-over profile - the strop corrects this ready for the next shave. You can extrapolate a number of things from this such as: fine bristles will not deform the edge as much, a more robust edge will not suffer as much deformation and that with harsh bristles stropping mid-shave may be necessary. To further complicate matters, straights are made with a number of steels, all with different characteristics. The old sheffield steels for example are softer than modern steels - they are said to give a very smoothe shave (they do, in my case) but being a softer formulation they must be adversely affected by harsh bristles. So - meet the wedge - a razor with no hollow grinding at all, triangular in section and offering a very robust edge - ideal for harsh bristles. At the other end of the spectrum are the hollowest grinds possible - the extra-hollow ground or "singing" blades. The metal is tough and resilient and can literally be plucked to make a musical note - and bounce right back to where it was.
No one solution exists. Happily, most folk are catered for by the normal blades, others may have to do a bit of experimenting, some may never take to straights at all. I guess its a case of "horses for courses" and a lot of straight shavers will resort to DEs, etc, when pressed for time or travelling or after a heavy night on the razzle. The one thing straights do offer, which is hard to quantify, is a link to the past. Using something that our fathers used, and their fathers before them and so on has a feeling of "rightness" about it for many. They were proper men then, after all. It's a lot like the japanese tea ritual - the ritual can absorb you and over-ride everything else, but there is nothing wrong with that. Man is an animal of habit, and ritual motions like lathering, stropping and honing are strangely satisfying for a lot of us. But straights did fall out of favour. Even the people who were brought up to use them abandoned them, mostly, otherwise the disposable razor would never have got off the ground. Saying that one is better than the other is pointless - some people love old cameras others proclaim digicams, some love classic cars others want a plug-in electric one, some people love antiques, others want Ikea. You just have to find what feels right for you, is what I'm trying to say.
To get back to your last post, Zig-Zag, I don't think it is sharpness, although you have a good chance of getting the sharpness you want/need within certain parameters, something that other forms of shaving do not offer or aren't so adaptable at doing. Finding the right angle, learning which way your bristles grow and stretching the skin accordingly, pre-shave prep, proper stropping technique and determination play the main part. It is not something learned at once, except by a happy few. For many it comes after months, some take considerably longer, some never find it. It's a learning process, and there is always something to be learned (or re-learned: people don't seem to have obsessed over things in the past like we do today - they should have written more manuals and books!).
All the Best,
Neil
Getting the blade very sharp ultimately means that the bevel profile is very attenuated - thin - and thin steel is dented, torn and pushed aside by harsh bristles. Photos taken with an electron microscope of a straight honed and stroped show a pretty regular edge. Photos of the same blade post shaving show a deformed, bent and rolled-over profile - the strop corrects this ready for the next shave. You can extrapolate a number of things from this such as: fine bristles will not deform the edge as much, a more robust edge will not suffer as much deformation and that with harsh bristles stropping mid-shave may be necessary. To further complicate matters, straights are made with a number of steels, all with different characteristics. The old sheffield steels for example are softer than modern steels - they are said to give a very smoothe shave (they do, in my case) but being a softer formulation they must be adversely affected by harsh bristles. So - meet the wedge - a razor with no hollow grinding at all, triangular in section and offering a very robust edge - ideal for harsh bristles. At the other end of the spectrum are the hollowest grinds possible - the extra-hollow ground or "singing" blades. The metal is tough and resilient and can literally be plucked to make a musical note - and bounce right back to where it was.
No one solution exists. Happily, most folk are catered for by the normal blades, others may have to do a bit of experimenting, some may never take to straights at all. I guess its a case of "horses for courses" and a lot of straight shavers will resort to DEs, etc, when pressed for time or travelling or after a heavy night on the razzle. The one thing straights do offer, which is hard to quantify, is a link to the past. Using something that our fathers used, and their fathers before them and so on has a feeling of "rightness" about it for many. They were proper men then, after all. It's a lot like the japanese tea ritual - the ritual can absorb you and over-ride everything else, but there is nothing wrong with that. Man is an animal of habit, and ritual motions like lathering, stropping and honing are strangely satisfying for a lot of us. But straights did fall out of favour. Even the people who were brought up to use them abandoned them, mostly, otherwise the disposable razor would never have got off the ground. Saying that one is better than the other is pointless - some people love old cameras others proclaim digicams, some love classic cars others want a plug-in electric one, some people love antiques, others want Ikea. You just have to find what feels right for you, is what I'm trying to say.
To get back to your last post, Zig-Zag, I don't think it is sharpness, although you have a good chance of getting the sharpness you want/need within certain parameters, something that other forms of shaving do not offer or aren't so adaptable at doing. Finding the right angle, learning which way your bristles grow and stretching the skin accordingly, pre-shave prep, proper stropping technique and determination play the main part. It is not something learned at once, except by a happy few. For many it comes after months, some take considerably longer, some never find it. It's a learning process, and there is always something to be learned (or re-learned: people don't seem to have obsessed over things in the past like we do today - they should have written more manuals and books!).
All the Best,
Neil