R41 advice please

[Tall_Paul]

I can only think Wil is on a wind up, I can get how people like the R41, (it's beautiful), I can get how people admire it, enjoy it, live with it even, but it's not remotely mild in anyone's book, both the blade gap and the amount of exposed leading edge are massive.
I'm also interested to know what he considers aggressive. Since shaving with an R41 I'm now considering a slant to be pretty mild so I'm trying to picture something more extreme.

I am serious, tho i do like to joke ;-). So far i have not encounterd an aggressive razor.even my favorites i consider mild. Since you want to know:
DE. Fatip and English NEW
SE. English Ever Ready 1912
Injector. Feather AC SS and Kai Captain

Hope to get a shave ready straight from one of the members here (traded it with Dipesh for a foldable AC SS). As soon as i have it (and it proves to be shave ready) i will report on that.

You want to try my Joris or Canadian Gillette Old.

If you didn't find either of those aggressive then I would take off a considerable number of hats to you!

 

[Wil]

I can only think Wil is on a wind up, I can get how people like the R41, (it's beautiful), I can get how people admire it, enjoy it, live with it even, but it's not remotely mild in anyone's book, both the blade gap and the amount of exposed leading edge are massive.
I'm also interested to know what he considers aggressive. Since shaving with an R41 I'm now considering a slant to be pretty mild so I'm trying to picture something more extreme.

I am serious, tho i do like to joke ;-). So far i have not encounterd an aggressive razor.even my favorites i consider mild. Since you want to know:
DE. Fatip and English NEW
SE. English Ever Ready 1912
Injector. Feather AC SS and Kai Captain

Hope to get a shave ready straight from one of the members here (traded it with Dipesh for a foldable AC SS). As soon as i have it (and it proves to be shave ready) i will report on that.

You want to try my Joris or Canadian Gillette Old.

If you didn't find either of those aggressive then I would take off a considerable number of hats to you!

FATIP=Joris-head (at least so they tell me ;-)) Joris just has a better looking handle.

---

So far i have not encounterd an aggressive razor.even my favorites i consider mild.

I'm not sure I get that... it's a bit like driving a lot of different cars from Fords to Ferraris but not considering any of them to be at all fast. Surely there has to be a frame of reference, in other words one of them IS fast, by comparison at least.

Maybe I'm just not understanding this concept of all razors being mild, if so, don't mind me. ;-)

IIUC: the frame of reference is time. I measure the time a razor keeps me clean. If you are on B&B too, you can find posts of me there comparing the R41 to my favorites. And you can see how it "looses". By hours...

 

[49er]

I assume there is a significant difference between an Old and a Canadian Old. Because I have an Old on a very heavy modern handle, and it gives me a very nice shave. But it bears no comparison with an R41 which is in a different league to any other DE I have tried.

 

[IanM]

Okay...

I acquired an R41 from Chris (press) for a mate who fancies a go with one. It arrived yesterday, boxed and in lovely condition.

I couldn't resist.

Not the smoothest shave in the world, but great result, no blood, and certainly not a disaster. I didn't try my original one with the Shark blade. Maybe that's the key.

When I previously owned one back in September, I recall using only Gillette Swedes and Astras in the razor. Both are pretty sharp blades and maybe the more forgiving Shark Super Chrome is a better match for how I use the razor.

Flat angle and light strokes.

I have to pass this on to my mate, but secretly, I'm hoping that he doesn't like it and I can have it back to try more shaves!

Ian

 

[press]

Okay...

I acquired an R41 from Chris (press) for a mate who fancies a go with one. It arrived yesterday, boxed and in lovely condition.

I couldn't resist.

Not the smoothest shave in the world, but great result, no blood, and certainly not a disaster. I didn't try my original one with the Shark blade. Maybe that's the key.

When I previosuly owned one back in September, I recall using only Gillette Swedes and Astras in the razor. Both are pretty sharp blades and maybe the more forgiving Shark Super Chrome is a better match for how I use the razor.

Flat angle and light strokes.

I have to pass this on to my mate, but secretly, I'm hoping that he doesn't like it and I can have it back to try more shaves!

Ian

Tell him its lost in the post Ian:icon_smile:

 

[RobTheWire]

I acquired an R41 from Chris (press) for a mate who fancies a go with one. It arrived yesterday, boxed and in lovely condition.

This razor is certainly getting around is it not :icon_lol:

Tell him its lost in the post Ian :icon_smile:

Man of virtue i see Chris .

 

[Canuck]

It does actually grow on you this razor. I'm on shave 5 now (that's taken me about 5 weeks I think) and I'm finally getting the point of it, kept really flat (or not far from parallel to the skin) it shaves superbly. I'm not sure I like it yet, but I am beginning to understand it better. I like the difference, I like the challenge.

Unfortunately, with this much blade exposure there's no easy way of doing the top lip, today I lined up to do a pass on the moustache area and I took a good nick out of my septum. The R41 gets some blood at last. One cut in 5 ain't bad.

Thanks for contributing everyone, at the very least, this razor is one that encourages some discussion!

 

[IanM]

The R41 has caused quite a stir, and there have been threads on SMF and B&B about it.

Another basic rule that I followed this morning was, if there isn't any lather there, don't shave it! Going over any area more than twice is asking for trouble!

Ian

 

[theranger2000]

The R41 is first DE razor I have ever owned so I had no preconceptions about using a DE , the first couple of shaves drew some blood but 4 weeks on I'm getting smooth blood free shaves my shaving angle is perpendicular to the skin , I have tried a few different blades in it can honestly say I haven't found a blade that works better or worse than the other the only exception to this was a feather blade this did shave very well but left my face feeling a bit tender , as I say I have only been DE shaving for four weeks so in no way consider myself an expert but I really don't find this razor to be some kind of torture tool as some seem to find it .

 

[Bechet]

After all this discussion and my original bloody attempt a while ago, I thought this morning to see if my technique has improved enough to deal with my R41. I am delighted that it has - so I had a close (but not BBS) and bloodless shave. However, I did not have a comfortable shave

I did a partial fourth pass with an BBR (EJ) razor and enjoyed being stroked by it - a gentle blade in a gentle razor. My sort of shaving.

An R 89 head resides again atop the Grande handle, so I could put the R41 head back in the cabinet but instead will offer it as a pass-on PIF to thjose who want to give it a go. That's an R41 head, not a complete razor. Stick it on a barberpole handle and you're about right.

I'll start a second pass-on thread - R41 HEAD ONLY pass-on PIF.