Rooney 1/2 Finest.... VERY disappointed

[texaninkc]

..........that I have to send it back.

Matt (Gogo) and I are currently temporarily swapping brushes. He had a WTB for a BK8 or BK12 and I offered him mine. I mentioned that as a face-latherer I was getting little use on my BK8. It's a fantastic brush and I hate to let it go but I have so many other brushes that are better on the face than my BK8. He proposed a temporary swap so that he could try out my BK8. I'd never done that before so I thought it'd be fun.

I think I definitely got the better end of this swap as Matt was awesome enough to offer his Rooney Finest 1/2. I have 2-3 weeks with this brush and after it's first use, I'm very disappointed I have to send this beauty back.

I'm going to throw everything I can at this brush and post my experiences with every soap on here. With some lathering porn of course.

Here are a few pics of the brush with its friends. My other Rooneys are jealous already.

 

[texaninkc]

Yesterday I shaved with this bad boy for the first time. I didn't shave on my birthday so my birthday shave was yesterday. My initial plans were to use my new Rooney 3XL with my favorite soap, P160. The mail carrier came before my shave and dropped of this beautiful Finest. With the exception of the Star Wars Saga on blu-ray SWMBO gave me, this was the coolest bday present.

Initial impressions: WOW! Great feeling to this brush. I think if I were to get one, I'd get it in this size knot. Wasn't big on the face. It was unbelievably soft. Matt said the 3XL would have a similar feel. Although I agree with Matt that in terms of size of face feel these feel the same, the Finest lacks that gel feel known to the heritage hair. But it feels way better and the softness is amazing.

I did find a lot of similarities to my 3-band Shavemac D01. Not sure if others that have tried both agree.

Where the Finest really shines and what I think makes this brush worth the price tag is its release of the lather. It lathered up that P160 like nothing I've had before. I had such a great lather on my 4 pass shave. It released that lather perfectly on each pass that I didn't have as much lather left on the brush when I was done. It's my tiny beef with the heritage brushes, they hog the lather more than I'd like. Never a problem as I always have a lot of lather.

Here's the brush after building lather on my face for pass 1.



The Harris tubs are my favorite to look at (besides the AOS) and all my softsoaps are in those jars. I used my President with an Iridium.

 

[beginish]

It's hard to find a better brush security deposit than a Rooney Finest.

 

[texaninkc]

Shaved with AOS sandalwood today. This brush is really fantastic. I only had to dip the brush in water once to get the ratio right but it seems very easy to get the water ratio right for this brush.