This Made-Rite #12 arrived today. I have been wanting a green brush, and I saw this on eBay. I jumped on in right away. It has some battle scars on it. I went outside to start the transformation. First off, I trimmed the hairs. I removed the knot with my Dremmel. After some cleaning, I opened up the hole a bit so the boar knot would fit. Edit: The knot is a 21mm Virginia Sheng boar. I still need to polish the handle, but it is getting there. I will also fill the inside and add some weight to it. First attempt at polishing the handle.
When I first polished a handle, it wasn't an even finish until I did a very light sanding on it to make the color more uniform.
Awesome. I have a similar brush somewhere. You inspired me to dig it out. If I can find it. That is a beautiful restore.
I am going to be using the Made-Rite 12 next week, so today, I gave it its first lathering to get it ready. I used Soap Commander Renewal for this first lathering. I did not soak the brush, but I wet it and loaded it for about 30 seconds. I did a lot of whipping and pumping and only got this thin lather. I tried more, but did not get much better. It just was not doing as well as I expected it to do. I rinsed it out and loaded it again. This time I made some great lather. I think I should have soaked the brush before lathering it the first time. I lost probably 10-15 hairs during the process. I gave it a good workout. Here it is rinsed out and towel dried. I am looking forward to putting it to work starting on Monday with my new Gillette Super 84 Black Beauty.
Thanks. I have used VS knots for a number of restores.....high quality knots at very reasonable prices.