I've had the razor below lying around for over a year now; it will finally get used tomorrow. It cost me $18.03 shipped from eBay, not a bad price. So I opened it up . . . . . . and looked at what was in the package. There are several things I find interesting. There's a very faint "4Z" on the back of the head. I take that this is the date code, 1979, although the codes on most of my Gillettes have the letter on the left. My Atra handles also have the code reversed like this. "Made in England" on the other side of the guard, and a very faint "2" on the inside of the cap. No other markings. If this hadn't come in a sealed Gillette package, I'd have no evidence that it was even a Gillette razor. You can see from the writing on the card that the head was made in the U.K., but it was assembled in the US, and the packaging is American. I'm looking forward to trying the vintage Gillette Platinum-Plus blade, and may rotate it to a couple of other razors too. Anyway, it's nice to know that after 32 years, this will finally get used. Whether it stays in the rotation depends on how it does. I don't use DEs very often, but a Tech can be a good shaver with the right blade.
Nice. Have you weighed it? The one I had was very light. The signs of the times and things to come with Gillette going to all aluminum.
My 1957 Ball End Tech is 58g, a gold-plated undated Ball End 55g. This 1979 model is 28g, so yes, considerably lighter. Don't trust my kitchen scale for absolute accuracy, but the difference in weights is clear. In addition to the aluminum handle, I suspect that the head is some sort of pot metal. Decent shaver, though. It took me four passes rather than my usual 2 and a fraction to get a DFS, but it got there.
