Something occured to me while reading the review about the DE razor blades. You get 3-6 (avg) shaves from a blade before they are discarded. But, when you put in a razor blade and leave it in there, you are forcing the micro sharp and THIN edge alway one directions. In straight you use both sides of the blade, and strop after and before shaves to re-align the blade edge. Has anyone ever flipped the blade over after every shave to see how many shaves you get then? If you do not, every shave you do puts the same directional stress on the edge of the blade and instead of being straight out, can develop a curl to the very edge after a bit of time. Which, might be changed if you just flipped the blade over. I have a Kriss-Kross DE razor strop that strops a razor blade, but I've been told that it might take off a coating that would otherwise keep the blade smooth for shaving. Truthfully, I haven't tried it as yet. Sound like an idea though...
Some of the guys around here do strop their DE blades...Usually on the heel of the palm of their hand thats not holding the Blade...There's a video floating around here someplace about that... But thats a very interesting idea...Would kind of be like stropping just to do that...Face stropping... Next week is "Super Speed Love" week...I might have to try stropping and flipping between shaves and see what happens...
Hand Strop Yes I have been hand stroping a Feather now and just got my sixth shave off that blade and it wasn't pulling a bit! Have it in a Fatboy on 7 for my head and 6 for my cheeks and 5 for my neck. I don't consider after I strop as to what side of the blade I just used. On the next change I will monitor that and make a sharpie mark on the blade and let you know what I find for myself!
Here's the video for hand stropping. >click< I always hand strop my DE and SE blades before every shave, even the first shave with a new blade. Easily get seven smooth shaves out of each, but I only use 'em for four or five shaves. On Monday I hand strop and put a fresh DE blade into the razor du jour. After I shave, I take it out, hand strop, flip it, and put it into the next razor. Repeat until after Friday's shave, when I toss the blade. On the first Sunday of the month I hand strop and put a fresh SE blade into my razor. I do the same as above, only I use SEs only on Sundays. After the last Sunday of the month's shave (be it the 4th or 5th), I toss the blade. I follow the above routine for two reasons. 1) I don't have to try and remember how many shaves a blade has on it. 2) I never get to the point that a blade is tugging and pulling - always a smooth shave. As for flipping, yeah, I flip the blade after I hand strop and before I put it in the next razor I'll be using. Does it make a difference? Don't know. For me it's a matter of, "Can't hurt. Might help."
All points already covered, so I'll just summarize: Yes, stropping DE blades is possible, and in most cases beneficial, if nothing more than psychological. Most common nowadays is hand-stropping, although, believe it or not, there were actually devices made to strop DE blades once upon a time. Flipping DE blades is a little less clear of its benefits, but I've tried it, not telling much of a difference, although like Swarden, I try to flip the blade when I hand strop Diet Dr Pepper may indeed taste more like regular Dr Pepper, but I don't like regular Dr Pepper, so I'm not going to try it to see
I have a Twinplex. It definitely can make a difference on ancient but still decent carbon blades, so much so that if you have a stock of them, a cheap Twinplex is worth having. On stainless I've not noticed the Twinplex making any difference, so I'm personally dubious of the practice of hand-stropping modern blades. But I'm more than willing to be in error on that.
I have 2 Kriss-Kross round DE blade stroppers. In the one box, the stropper was a gift from my Uncle Herbert Jenewein to my Grandfather George for Christmas, a signed gift tag from my Uncle, Aunt and his daughters. Other Kriss Kross I have is also in great shape, but does not have the sentimentality of the one from Grandpa. On the left of the device is a small tab sticking out. You can see the reflection below it as a mirror image in the chrome. You push that tab down and when you crank the knob, the razor blade has firm contact to the leather strop. The leather rotates and as you keep cranking it automatically comes up, flips over, and goes back down on the leather. The tab on the left starts to move up giving less and less pressure to the razor blade being held against the leather for stropping. This is before I cleaned it up. In this picture I had an old "don't shave with me" blade in there for illustration. I have heard it works best with carbon steel blades.
Vern, You better get with Gary at Shoebox before all the Carbon Steel Treets are taken if you want to use the stropper with current blades.
I've seen that model SE stropper several places but they always ask more for it than I'd want to pay on a curiosity...I don't have or use enough carbon SEs to pay more than a buck or two for one (I have a ton of old carbon DEs so the $1 that I gave for my Twinplex was well, well worth it).
A local antique store has one for 40.00 but I bought one in nicer condition than the one of my Grandfather's that I posted and only paid about 17 or so dollars for it on eBay. In fact, here is a youtube of one working. Pretty nifty huh? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCeWb51xrEY
Not sure I could say. I've tried hand stropping but can't say I've noticed a diff like I get with the Twinplex. I've also heard - true or not, I dunno - a water glass doesn't help b/c it doesn't hit the bevels right but I've not tried that, either. Twinplexes are plentiful and relatively cheap and the leather rollers are usually in good shape even now. I get good results from it. It can make an antique blade shave-able even when the edge is showing a very slight spot of rust or two, followed by alcohol dip and air-dry. Any more rust than that, pitch it. Have you tried the water glass trick?
Was thinking about the water glass thing today when I came across a rather small diameter cylindrical glass, which I bought and used this evening with a pretty good shape Durham Duplex blade. Put it in my Dorset and, I'll admit freely, the shave was improved from the last time I tried stropping this kind of blade on a leather strop. It was also better than the new Stanley's I used a few months back, which I never bothered stropping. So maybe there's something to the water glass trick after all!
