What Straight Razor Have You Honed Lately????

I'll give this one a 'JWeld' treatment to see if the blade is indeed redeemable. My main concern is evening out the edge (no crevice) to allow for a smooth, keen edge and no kink. A bond will minimize the risk of the supposed 'flex' as well as resolve the issue of things being caught in the gap.
We'll see....

 

Yesterday I honed a 96 Utica Knife & Razor Co.. I picked up this razor some time ago in an antique store and just never got around to cleaning it up and honing the blade. It is a lovely looking razor. This distortion on the toe is just a reflection (looks like a stain). This razor honed very easily -- good geometry. As with all my blade work, I applied one layer of electrical tape on the spine. I use 1, 3/8, 12k Naniwa stones. I will shave with it this morning.

 

Nice looking razor, Rusty. I like the bolsters. We're looking forward to hearing how it shaves.

 

First shave this morning with the 96 Utica went well. A nice keen edge. Very smooth shave. I can see I will use this SR frequently.

 

Nice looking razor! Glad to read the performance matched the slick appearance!

 

Nice Looking razor! Is that a German or American made razor?

 

German blade. Razor is from Utica, NY

 

It shows Utica NY on the tang. Could be German steel on the other side. I Googled The company and most were stamped saying they were made in Germany.
Never mind, @Rusty blade beat me too it. I took too long looking it up.

 

From what I have read, most of the ones marked Utica Knife and Razor were made in Germany, the company changed to PAL when the production was moved to the USA, but there are a few marked Utica Knife and Razor Co. that were made in Utica. I have been looking for one of those because it is an odd-ball American steel.

 

This J.A.Henckels was one "Ugly Razor". It was so Ugly that I got it for $13.50. It took a lot of work, but I think it paid off.
It was a major pain to get the rust out, without damaging the blade more than it was. After the razor was prettified a lot, I could see some real issues.
There were two chips in the edge. One large one that went past the original bevel, and a smaller one. The edge, towards the heel was dented in a few places, but not bad. . I took my time and worked at it with the 1K Kings stone, to get the large chip out. A long time. I didn't worry about the other issues, because I figured that when the large chip was massaged out, the others would be gone.
One concern I had was the thinness of the blade. It looks like an Extra Hollow grind. Very Very thin. So little to no pressure was used in honing, because I didn't want the chip to develope into a crack.
It worked. After the chip was gone on the 1K, I progress quickly through the 3k/8k, then 8k 12k 15k Welsh Slate stones. The Strop brought the blade to a wickedly sharp edge. I will be shaving with it tonight. I was on the fence about not even trying to work on this one. I will be looking into some New scales, if it shaves well. I cannot decide what would look nice. Perhaps some modern Acrylic??

J.A.Henckels 74??

Before


After

 

Nice job of "prettifying"

 

Second Hone of the day. This one came from France. It was $6.43 + $10 Shipping. I was informed it was a surgical razor. It has very Beefy Stainless Steel scales. This razor doesn't look like it has been honed more than once. I polished it up a little, but not too much. It took a Very quick and sharp edge, with my usual progression of stones. After stropping, it tree topped every hair it touched.

Razor- "H.G." Surgical Straight w/Stainless Scales.

Before


After

 

Just thought about it.the worst thing when i start getting those butter smooth edges its that i have to re hone them all

 

Och Aye the Noo..That's the Price of a "Break Through" in Ones Honing Skills I Reckon..You Realize the Edges You Done before Can be Improved Upon with You're New Found Skills..Its All Part of this Wonderful Journey..I Call these..Moments of Enlightenment..My Martial Arts Teacher Always Said..Enlightenment isn't All Happy Bunnies..

Billy..

 

thats so true

 

Billy..

 

before

after

did a clean up on this union cuttlery. some pitting left on the toe that i was not able to remove.the gold wash had to go since the blade was in not so good shape. also honed after.
test shave tomorrow.

 

Hey, I don't know if this counts, but I heard somewhere you're a pretty tolerant bunch
I took my pocket microscope home.


It's 30X and does a pretty fair job. The blade on the black jack showed a little rough on the edge and the bevel. A certain Scottish"gentleman" got me thinking about his comments about noobies sometime blunting the edge. I decided that I should at least touch up the edge. I used diamond lapping film on a piece of granite I picked up. I did about a dozen laps on 3 micron and about a dozen on the 1 micron. I placed a piece of paper under the film and completed another 10. I took it to the diamond pasted strop for 10 laps and finished it off on the leather with 50. A definite improvement visually. Very smooth and the edge was straight. I could tell the blade was sharper and smoother, but nothing drastic. So I'm thinking that I haven't damaged the edge beyond normal wear. At least it appears that I didn't do any damage on the dlf.

 

Last of this batch…
This lovely collection I picked up from ebay several months ago for cheap and have over the weeks restored most—and honed & shaved with them.


The four i restored and honed all turned into really good shavers. Sure, the "Johannes Jebens Sum Extra" is 4/4 and a mite small for my personal tastes— but overall, every razor delivered a top-flight shaving experience.



The last on was the Chinese-made 'Double-Arrow' 66— one that need some rust removal and new scales. I didn't have high expectations for it as I read nothing but low praise for the make.
First, I removed the blade from the broken black plastic scales. The blade had considerable rust on the tang and some makes on the blade, but overall nothing that looked too serious. Some time on the buffers with greaseless compounds removed all the rust and any residual light pitting. Clean blade. I had an old pair of unused acrylic scales I made some time ago and the blade fit them well. Salvaged and old Sheffield lead wedge to fit and new brass hardware to pin up the razor.

HONING: Single layer of 3m tape; bevel set on the Chosera Pro 1k. Next, Naniwa 3k & 5k, arm-hairs popping off with ease. JNat prefinisher and finisher. Linen /leather strop. HHT-4-5 from heel to toe.
The Shave: Razor feels well-balanced in hand, love the shape and having upper and lower jimps. Smoooooth evening shave!

 

WOW!!! these came out really nice.