SE terminology

NotTheStig

NotTheStig

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Having recently started trying the Feather Pro Guard and Professional blades I started to think about terminology.
Probably my ignorance but what I think of as SE seems to cover at least three separate and incompatible blade types:
1. the thick, GEM 'window scraper' style blades of the Ever Ready and Gem vintage razors.
2. longer and thinner blades that seem to last longer than most other blade types. Examples would be Feather Pro Guard, Professional, Super, and the Kai Captain blades.
3. standard DE blades snapped in half. Sometimes referred to as saloon blades and used in shavettes, often by barbers.

Are there proper names you use (and I should use) for these three distinct types of SE blades?
 
pjgh said:
... and the quite hateful FAS-10 which is fit for one shave (on a rhino). Right @riverrun?
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Meh. It's quite amazing how Feather make some of the world's best (DE) and worst (SE) blades.

As far as SE blades are concerned one should not forget how it all started:
The original SE safety razor blades were lovely wedge blades. They can still be used today over a hundred years later.
 
riverrun said:
Meh. It's quite amazing how Feather make some of the world's best (DE) and worst (SE) blades.

As far as SE blades are concerned one should not forget how it all started:
The original SE safety razor blades were lovely wedge blades. They can still be used today over a hundred years later.
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True, dat!

Also, even the original spined blades ...

I am very fornunate to have a (still largely) unused box of original Damaskeene blades (from the 1910s? 1920s?) which I pull out for use every now and again. I've lost my notes, but certainly one of them has over 30 shaves and just kept coming back with a simple stropping. Super-smooth and very capable, even by today's exacting standards.

Maybe my Christmas shave ... in my Sun Ray?
 
In terms of those types of blades I've only used the modern GEM ones and nothing has given me more pain than them. They do remove hair but leave a terrible soreness to the skin, seemingly disproportionate to the pressure (or lack of) I use it number of passes. I've used a GEM Featherweight and an Ever Ready 1912. The result feels like sun burn to me regardless.
I hadn't used them since my early days of traditional shaving; came back to them earlier this year and the same!
 
NotTheStig said:
In terms of those types of blades I've only used the modern GEM ones and nothing has given me more pain than them. They do remove hair but leave a terrible soreness to the skin, seemingly disproportionate to the pressure (or lack of) I use it number of passes. I've used a GEM Featherweight and an Ever Ready 1912. The result feels like sun burn to me regardless.
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Strop them!

Some folks recommend corking the blade, which is to drag the edge through a cork (proper cork, not a plastic cork). I don't like this idea because the logic from the straight-edge folks is to align the edge.

I generally don't as fresh GEM blades are what I'd call "bracing" but I had a rough shave not so long back and gave the thing a damn good stropping ... like a different blade altogether on the second run, more like 6 or 7 shaves in.

You'll need to buy in an Ever-Ready set with stropper and strop. Best source is the Streamline sets.
 
Thanks @pjgh. I do have a Rolls Razor strop somewhere in storage, and I have also heard that denim can be used for stropping.
It might be something I give a go in my forthcoming year of (shaving purchase) abstinence.
 
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