Wednesday evening May 8 - Merely Shaving May - Simplicity Rule / Blade Focus
Prep: Hot shower with Aleppo olive oil soap with 20% bay laurel oil
Razor: Supply 2.0 matte black stainless steel injector with "SE" open comb plate; vintage US-made Schick Plus Platinum blade (5)
Soap: Arko stick
Brush: Supply Silvertip Synthetic 24mm
Lather Bowl: None
Post: rinse, alum, rinse - and nothing else
Last shave: Saturday May 4 - 4.5 days ago
The stuff:
View attachment 294080
I repeated my last shave setup exactly. It was the quintessential "no frills" basic wetshave - water, commercial soap stick, synthetic brush, razor and alum block.
Today's shave was two passes. The first was WTG on my face and ATG on my neck. The second was XTG on my face and WTG on my neck. The result was a DFS. Alum was slightly warm along my jawline but nothing major. No nicks, cuts or razorburn.
My discussion last week with Joe aka Trigger about the Ted Pella injector blades got me thinking about the accuracy of my current impressions of the various injector blade brands. I have therefore decided to do a Focus on injector blades this month ... and probably through June and maybe even into July. I am going to stick with the same soap, brush and razor throughout. The only thing I am going to change -- as they wear out -- is the brand of injector blades. I will compare the sharpness, smoothness and durability of my vintage US-made Schicks, the Japanese-made Supply Black Label and the American Personna-made Supply White Label and actual Personna-branded white plastic cartridge blades (identical blades in different packaging).
My present belief is that the American vintage Schicks are the smoothest, nearly the sharpest and overall the longest-lasting of my blades. They are typically good for at least 12 and maybe as many as 15 shaves. The Japanese Supply Black Label are slightly sharper and about as smooth, but don't last as long -- typically 8 shaves. The Personna-made blades are slightly less sharp than either, less smooth (although still good) and have medium durability of about 10 shaves.
I will now try them head-to-head and see if the actual results match my perceptions.
Tonight I finished my 5th shave with my favourite injector blade, the vintage US-made Schick Platinum Plus, and it still seems fine. However, I will bin it and use a fresh one tomorrow. The next shave after that will be with a fresh Supply Black Label, followed by a fresh Supply White Label or Personna white plastic box cartridge (as far as I know, they are identical blades in different cartridges). I will do a direct head-to-head comparison of sharpness and smoothness.
I will then continue using the Personna until it starts to tug and count the number of shaves, then do the same with the other two brands and compare durability.
I don't have any Chicks or Ted Pellas to try, so the tests will end there.
All told, this will take 30 to 40 shaves. To complete them in a reasonable time - and to try to maintain consistent whisker length and toughness - I will also start daily shaving now. And do identical two-pass shaves henceforth.
Should be interesting.
Hope the week is treating everyone well.
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