After a few weeks of waiting for the new Shavemaster V200, I finally brought mine home this past weekend. The brush is very well made and well worth the $145 price tag. For a size comparison here it is next to my Simpson H6 in Best. The H6 is quite a large brush with a slightly larger knot diameter than the Shavemaster however, the Shavemaster's unique fan shape and handle makes the H6 look a little small... Soaking the Hydrolast cube and brush for a test run. This brush is packed so dense it practically stands on it's own in the sink. The cube I'm using is a bit small just about ready to be replaced... Check out the volume generated with only about 15 sec of lathering on the cube! Adding a bit of Hydrolast peppermint paste to the breech... Back to the cube for a few more sec to get a nice wet mix going. There's a bit of air bubbles in the mix here, I would generally lather in the palm of my hand a bit more to get it more consistant. The point here is, check out the volume of wet mix created in less than 1 min. Pretty impressive lathering capability I think... Bloomed out shot... All in all, makes a nice addition to my humble little den
Not yet. I'll give that a shot sometime here soon. I'm curious how well this will work for traditional creams as this brush holds a crap load of water.
If its anything like the pre-production model I've used, you'll be astonished how quickly it'll make a traditional lather. --Mark
Mike - great pics :happy088. The brush looks pretty interesting, would you happen to know the actual knot size on that puppy? And also - how the bristles are formed into that extreme "fan" shape...meaning hand formed -or- machine trimmed? Thanks
Good Show Mike :signs107 It just sounds too much work for me to do and putting the cube into the water still hurts me everytime I see it even though its supposed to be a hard soap. The Den looks neat and organised if only I had that but then again Id need 5-6 of those racks you have there to stash my addictions.... anyways enjoy your new brush it looks interesting...
The rack just houses my most commonly used stuff. Believe me, there's quite a bit more stashed away that you don't see in this pic If you look at the fresh cube on the rack and the one I'm using on the tray, that's the size difference after well over a month of regular use... so putting it in the water isn't wasting much product at all, especially at $10 a cube. As for the knot size, I think I recall Charles saying it was 1 inch diameter = roughly 25-26 mm if my conversion is correct.
The first few shaves it dropped a few here and there. Charles told me up front to expect this due to the way the knots are packed. No problems since.
Charles Roberts is the Method shave. QED Is mostly Savile Row and Omega brushes (just got my SR from him, A+ service).
Ok, Thanks Doc...I was curiuos because I think I heard that these brushes were once referred to as the Shedmasters, I could be wrong though... Regardless, it is a beautiful brush and I hope it gives you many years of trouble free service
Mike since you've had this Shavemaster V200 brush for a while, what do you think? Does it past muster? I see that you haven't used it for anything but method shaving. has that changed?
Given my growing Simpsons collection, I have chosen to only use this brush for what's truely designed for. As for performance, this thing definately passes, no questions asked. It's intended to hold a large volume of water and lather quickly, it does so perfectly. While the brush is in the higher price bracket, you do get what you pay for.
Let me echo Mike's comments. Although my brush is a pre-production sample, this thing is fast and holds bucks-full of water (rivaled only by my VLB). I've used it for both traditional shaves and Method shaves and it works well for both, though it really shines in Method shaves. --Mark
I got this brush yesterday. This brush holds more water than the Hoover Dam!!! I used it with C&E shaving soap. The lather was nice creamy and slick. The brush performance was excellent. Not one hair came off the brush. Raf
