What are you waiting on to arrive...?

For under $20 shipped, I figured I ought to try it out. Been awhile since I played around with DE stropping devices, and the prices seem to have dropped on some of them over the years.

 

They don't. Not very well, anyways. On modern blades.

In other news, there's a guy over on B&B that just got his 175th shave from a Feather Hi-Stainless blade. ...and you don't get numbers like that without stropping from time to time.

 

My takeaways from that thread in general.

Shallow angle, super light touch, short strokes. A solid commitment to face prep. A really good lather. A willingness to accept a less than keen edge. After about shave 19-20, the edge becomes 'buttery,' which I take to mean that it feels about like the edge of a straight razor or other wedge type blade. Most of them start with very mild razors and gradually increase the aggressiveness of the razor as the weeks and months progress.

The key factor here is face prep. Soften the hairs. The second factor is the blade edge. They keep it off the skin. No nicks, no weepers. Skin contact dulls a blade pretty fast.

I can see how they do it, but I'm not sure why they do it. I know they say they find the shaves more comfortable, and more power to them. I get about 14ish shaves per blade, so I see where they think people have been conditioned to think that blades only last "X" number of shaves. It's a mental game as much as anything, and a willingness to push past that first 'tug.'

Edit: I have a Shake Sharp, I got (I think, been awhile) 24 shaves from one edge of the blade. The other edge was unused. I binned the blade out of boredom and a desire to use a different razor. At that point, the Excalibur club becomes a "so what? I can do that too," sort of thing. Zero incentive to push the limits.

Edit 2: I know I sound a bit disparaging of these guys, but I do want to say taking a modern DE blade past 100 shaves is very much a test of shaving skill, and mad props to them for doing it.