Well, I broke down and got this for my birthday. Wife wanted me to get something for me for my birthday, so went with this Wacker... photo courtesy of John Crowley and Heribert Wacker.... It came fresh, unhoned by John and I needed to touch up a bit on the 12K in shaving. When I got it dialed in it gave a smooth comfortable shave. Before that it was a bit 'wanting' in sharp and smooth. Even the finest are only as fine as the hone makes them, right Glen? For a newbie at shaving and honing razors I give it my best shot. no nicks on the shave (face) and once honed up it shaved as well as the Imperial "Extra Hollow Ground" I have that I honed. The "Imperial" is kind of a basis for comparison. sometimes you run across a really special razor and it hones and shaves like none other, and that Imperial is such. By shaving same side of my face with the Wacker and the Imperial I got a first hand feel on how I needed to get the Wacker more dialed in. They are beautiful razors, and a great investment. Heribert Wacker has been making razors some 54 years and is now in his mid 80s. Started out working at such well known names as Dorko, Grah & Plumacher, and DOVO. One of the last of his kind in Solingen making "hand made" razors. This one says "Made of Finest Silver Steel" on the reverse side of the tang.
Great day! Red Velvet birthday cake with cream cheese frosting and a nice shave afterwards! No skin off my chin( or other places) LOL
Thank you JoAnna and other! I've since re-honed it going back to the basic 1K and setting a bevel. Kind of close shave, but I felt the Wacker was capable of better. Here is what I did: I actually started way back at the bevel setting stage, at around the 1K level. When I got to the 8K and 12K Chinese, I had to be careful not to put too much downward pressure on the edge or I'd end up with a small VERY small fine wire hair on the hone I could feel. I started all over back at 1000 grit level as one side had a nice sized bevel width on it and the other side barely had any bevel size at all. Probably was attributed to the amount of honing done on just the one side. So... I honed the dickens out of the one side that had nearly no bevel (I used no tape) as I wanted to increase the size of the bevel and decrease the amount of thickness of the spine on that side. Kind of counter of what people use tape for, to protect the spine, but, there was an unevenness there, as there was on a GOTTA 120 I have, that I corrected in the same fashion. My bevel setter is actually the green DMT Extra Fine diamond hone, an 8 micron diamond hone that cuts pretty fast. Once I got the bevels more evened out, I went to 1K to polish the bevel and spine where the diamond DMT had been and then a lot of time on the 4K white hone I have for the same reason... to polish out the bevel/spine. I even found a wire "whisker" at that point on the razor edge and removed it and continued. Last 2 hones were a Franz Swaty with water and soap and the Chinese 12K, same with water and dish soap. Many strokes on the 12K, starting out with circular motion going from one end of the hone to the other. It is the LARGER of the the 2 sizes of Chinese 12K hones. I count the circles and at 20, I reverse sides and go in circles back the other way to the count of 20. Then it's 15 for a couples of up-down, then 10 circles for up-down and finally 5 circles on both sides before moving to straight up and down strokes on the hone..... very very lightly. Stropped it and it pops hairs same as the GOTTA 120 and Imperial that are the sharpest razors I have. Now this may not have been "kosher" or as many honemeisters do it, but it was what I did and do, and that is just me. Just throwing this out for the interest of techniques and the variances between razor honers.
Vern.....Vern........Vern.......... Did you show that razor to make me loose sleep? Or just to brag that even though your another year older your still younger, a lot younger than me...JR
Thanks JR! If you're older than me you probably remember that long boat that Noah was working on. We left before that was done and heard their crops got flooded out shortly after that..... My first razor with a Spanish Point and I haven't had "too" much problem with nicked earlobe. I figured I could always turn it into a round point if that became an issues. I was really hoping for a round point, but Heribert sent me an email and said he didn't have any round point 5/8 at the moment. Has anyone heard if he is using old blanks still or gone to the newer metals. I think some of the old stuf... if it was good... was a lot better than the newer stuff. I get this from actually using and hearing on forum posts here and there, but I'm always interested in hearing anything to the contrary.
Many thanks DLB. I finally got the edge on it I was looking for toninght, and it was just trying something different. I have some green Chromium Oxide on a piece of balsa wood and I stroked it like one would strop with the cutting edge trailing and did a few passes with it, not many. Wiped it across my arm to remove any residue and took a look under 20X loupe to see what an edge looked like and man was it smooth all the way. Since my shirt was off, I tried it on a few hairs on my stomach that most of the time resist being cut. They dropped off almost witout being felt. Where there was a longer hair, fine hair, is now a shorter fine hair left behind. I did it on some other just to confirm. Same thing. This razor will pop the hair, any hair, without so much as barely a feel that it caught it. Heck of a shave.... smooth and luxurant. Now I have to wait for Father's day for the "brush" that I know is in the bag.... MMMMMmmmmmmmm !
Beautiful razor and belated happy birthday! I'm glad you got it dialed in the way you want it. It seems like there's so much involved in honing when you hear about it. The videos all make it look so easy, of course they make straight shaving look easy too and I'm having a heckuva time with that too!
