DE sharpener..pretty nifty http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6b2cs-pzJJE hand stropping http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ogq4wfpT7hc
How well would one of those work. I would thing that it would be a matter of how good the leather or whatever is inside is. Fuzzy
there are quite a few Twinplex stroppers on ebay. i wonder if the leather is dry rotted and can be replaced easily if needed. would be a neat little addition to a shave collection.
it would probably work really well on carbon blades. modern blades would most likely kill it. best bet is to ask the seller about the leather.
I have used a Twinplex stropper on n.o.s Segal and Blue Gillette carbon steel blades.The resulting shaves were less than spectacular.I think we are spoiled for choice these days as far as quality d/e blades are concerned.
Twinplex Stropper... A couple of weeks back I purchased a Twinplex from an antique store in a town 20 min from where I live. Came with the box and instructions, put a blade in, went wild stropping it I don't know how many times, next day shaved with the blade, made about 1 to 2 passes, felt what I imagine to be shaving in Hell would be like, didn't use it again until today. Put another blade into the Twinplex that was used 3 times, each time being palm-stropped before each use, stropped the blade slowly and carefully one time only on each blade, each side, and noticed a very significant difference from the last time I shaved. 4th time with this blade which was a Dollar General Blade. I think the trick is to strop the blade very gingerly once or twice, maybe more when it is new, and no more. This is how I myself learn, go crazy with something, you know oooohh, something new! (new to me that is); hate it, then use a little or a lot of restraint, and it turns out ok. Next time, with the same blade, I will strop it 2 times each side, each blade and see if it works even better. If it does not I will strop it only once all around whether new or not, if I notice another difference, I may try more strops, but only by an increment of one. I say if you have one, start out small, and then increase by a small increment until you feel that you have felt the blade will no longer improve, and then decrease by one increment. Of course, with different blades out there, what works for me may not work for you, or in the parlance of this forum, YMMV.
Update On Twinplex Stropper... Update: I still use the Twinplex and follow the instructions saying to strop the blade (however many times to your preference) after shaving, and then store the blade in the stropper until your next shave. What I didn't notice until it was too late was it said on the instructions not to oil the stropper because it may damage it. OOPS!!! I have put loads of Olive and Neatsfoot oil on it to revive and moisten up the leather or whatever material it is. Only trouble I have so far is that the mechanism doesn't "catch" at first when I start to strop. However, so far, that is solved by shaking the stropper a little bit and it will eventually catch, at which time I put the blade in and strop each blade, each side, only once, very very slowly, at a near 90 degree angle. The instructions say to do this to maximixe the stropping. Also, since I inundated it with oil, I find the edges of the razor coated in oil after I have stropped it thus keeping it from rusting and oxidization until next time. The oil comes off after shaking it in the hot sinkwater before I make my first pass. Blade last 5-6 shaves using two passes each shave, plus buffing, gliding, and sometimes j-hooking in problem areas.
