A Blade Safari - 15 enter how many leave?

As with jpb437, I will be going on a blade safari thanks to the generosity of Bobcat. Of the 15 blades I will be testing out, 14 are new to me and I'm looking forward to each shave. I have not decided which DE I will be using, but it will remain consistent through out this process. Soaps, creams pre and post prep on the other hand might change over the course of the evaluation. I will try to keep the setup the same but am making no promises. I will be recording all my results and opinions on each shave in a spreadsheet, and will update this thread as I go along. I have not yet decided how much detail I will post here initially, but will supply a full review at the end of the safari.

I will be starting my blade safari on February. jpb437 has already started his safari, and you can follow it here.

1. Personna Med Prep
2. Personna Blue Lab
3. Israeli Red Personna
4. Israeli Personna/Crystal
5. Israeli Viking Sword
6. Gillette 7 O’Clock Green Super Stainless
7. Gillette 7 O’Clock Black Super Platinum
8. Gillette 7 O’Clock Yellow Sharp Edge
9. Gillette Silver Blue
10. Gillette Platinum
11. Polsilver Super Iridium
12. Perma-Sharp Super
13. Voskhod
14. Rapira Swedish Supersteel
15. Astra Superior Platinum

 

I look forward to your impressions!

 

It's February, so I have started my blade safari. First impressions of the Personna Med Prep, where can I get some more?!

DFS after two very smooth passes. I am rating the smoothness and sharpness a 4 of a scale of 1 - 5; not sure if I've ever come across a 5 in a DE blade, making a 4 the top of the curve.

 

Day two of the safari... I dropped the Proraso pre-shave but kept everything else the same, and so were the results! It is early on, but I'm still impressed with this blade

 

I'm hoping it was technique, but the Personna Med Prep might be showing signs of wear. The save was good, no nicks, irritation or tugging, but beard reduction was lacking. Some ATG touch ups helped, but my face and neck are not huge ATG fans. We will see what tomorrows shave brings and hopefully it is not confirmation of a short life span for this blade.

 

I got a closer shave today, so it looks techniques was a part of yesterday's rough shave. It still wasn't a great shave though. I didn't have as much touch ups, but there was some sting with the AS balm after words.

The Med Prep started out great, but didn't seem to last with my beard. I won't say I'll never use a Med Prep again, but I probably won't buy them on their own...

 

I loaded up a Personna Blue Lab for today's shave... and it wasn't a good start. Right from the get go there was tugging, and not much beard reduction, the second pass (XTG) was a lot smoother. I did some ATG touch ups, mostly on my neck and jaw line and thought I ended up with an OK shave. As expected, the Nivea AS Balm reminded me everywhere I shaved ATG.

One shave in my initial impression of the Personna Blue Lab, It's no where near as smooth/sharp as the Med Prep, and does not belong in my WW2 Gillette Tech. I not sure if I'll switch out the razor or not yet.

 

Second shave with the Personna Blue Lab was better then the first, thanks to the addition of Proraso pre-shave. I'm still toying with loading this blade in a different handle to see if it is a better match...

 

I've still got one shave left with the blue lab, but the verdict is not looking good... This blade is not for me.

I've been using Nivea Men Cool Kick AS Balm as it is an alcohol base after shave, and lets me know when a shave goes past the comfort level. Every shave with the blue lab has gone past that comfort level in order to get anything close to smooth.

 

I loaded the Blue Lab in my Weishi for Saturdays shave, and got some better results. Not sure if the performance in the Weishi was enough of an improvement to try the Blue Lab's again, at least not for the short term.

So far the Israel Red is better blade for me. I was able to get just as close a shave (2 WTG, XTG passes) as the Blue Lab, but zero irritation. That was also with two days of growth. I don't consider my beard to be thick, wirey or otherwise hard on blades, but I'm looking forward to what this blade can do with less hair to mow down.

 

The Israel Red didn't seem as sharp or smooth as the first two days. Ended up adding a (half) ATG pass to finish the shave off. I probably didn't need to, and the added irritation was not bad. This was still a good shave. hopefully I can get the same results tomorrow to finish this blade off.

 

Well, the Israel Red has completed it's round in the Blade Safari. For me it's a blend of the Med Prep and Blue Lab... Not as sharp or smother as the Med Prep, but more so then the Blue Lab. The Israel Red seems last just as long as the Blue Lab. Give a choice I would probably take the Israel Red over the Blue Lab...

 

This Israel Personna/Crystal might take some getting used to... I got a weird feeling from this blade. My face almost felt raw when using this blade. I was concerned that I'd be left with weepers and or major irritation, thankfully I was not. I'll push the crystal blade a little harder tomorrow to see what it can actually do.

 

I love your reviews TSimons! It is great to hear your comments on the different blades. Do you plan to try or have you tried Feathers? They're my personal favorite at the moment.

 

Yes I've used feathers before, but haven't really evaluated them the same way as these particular blades, at least not yet. There are a shape blade, but didn't perform that great in my current DE razors if I remember correctly...

Right now my preferred DE blade is Sheffield Special, a vintage blade made by Jewel.

 

Day two with the Crystal...

Well, I wanted to push this blade today. I'd say it went pretty well. Three passes (2 WTG, ATG) did leave me with one nick and some post shave irritation, but also a nice smooth face.

I've been asked not to use the Nivea Men cool kick AS balm on the weekends, due to its scent. I've been using this AS balm because it contains alcohol and would provide feedback on my shaves. I switched to alum, which also provides feedback on my shaves. Unfortunately I cannot compare the alum results to the Cool kick so I don't know where this shave stacks up to the rest. I do know that it did sting...

I'm still calling this a good shave.

 

Ended up almost DFS, but it came at the cost of razor burn on my neck and more then enough bite from the alum. The Crystal is more then able to provide a close shave, but not comfortably.

 

And the Israel Personna/Crystal has finished it's run...

Four blades into my blade safari and with the exception of one shave, I've kept the razor contestant so as to remove it as a variable. I'm starting to question if that is "fair". I'm using my WW2 Gillette Khaki Tech, which is my "go to" razor, but not my only razor. I still have over a month to go on this blade safari, and although I think I've found some failing blades, I may have to repeat this process with my other razors down the road...

One thing is certain, the Israel Personna/Crystal will not be used in this Tech again. When put against my face, it is a losing combo.

 

Two days of growth for the Israel Viking Sword to cut through on its shaving début...

I didn't get to BBS, but it was a good shave! Two passes and the pre-shave brought me a comfortable shave a little shy of DFS results. I wouldn't call it tugging, but I could feel the blade working, almost like the hairs were popping off my face.

If I can get consistence and 3-4 shaves from this blade it will be a contender!

 

not sure about this shave.... I ended up getting carried away with my touch up so basically has a three pass shave, WTG, XTG, ATG.

Mt face doesn't get along with AGT so it not something I typically do. I was pleasantly surprised with this ATG pass though - zero irritation, I would do it again.

I'm not too pleased about needing to add the ATG pass though, especially considering this was the second shave with this blade.