Chester
03-05-2012, 02:35 PM
Well, in the spirit of open-comb March, I have a new selection from the back-of-the-rack that is perhaps the MOST open-comb of all open-comb razors: the Konvex Open-Comb.
The most remarkable aspect of the Konvex is that it has combs on the -=sides=- of the razor, too. It's open-comb all the way around: three hundred sixty degrees of open-comb. The pictures speak for themselves. Never mind that the sides of most razor blades are not sharpened, by the way, but perhaps there was such a blade at one time. My set did come with a Konvex blade, but I have yet to take a look at it. I can only imagine that it's sharp all the way around.
UPDATE (3-6-12): Checked out the blade last night, and it is, indeed, sharp all the way around. It has an oval shape, and reminds me of a smaller old-style gillette blade. This may also account for the wicked blade exposure, as the Konvex blade appears to be narrower than a regular DE blade. I'll have to measure to be sure. -- Chet
Back to the razor ...
It's a simple 3-piece affair, similar to an old type single ring. The bottom knob screws onto a shaft that runs from the cap, though the handle. The baseplate and handle are fastened together. No surprises there. One really nice feature to the handle is that it has flat sides, and this was very helpful in switching sides as I went through my passes. There's not much flex put to the blade -- it's held fairly flat, and requires a pretty shallow angle. The cap should remain pretty flat on your face, wherever you go with it.
So how does it shave?
I figured that I'd start with a blade I like, and a nice sharp one; I selected a vintage Gillette Platinum Plus. I lathered with the usual T&H 1805 and jumped into probably the single greatest bloodbath I've had since starting DE shaving. (To address the term "bloodbath", I mean it as having one's face bleed enough to run down one's neck and chest.) The handle's pretty smooth, but it wasn't hard to hold and didn't slip in my hands. At the same time, I've never bled so much, before, while shaving. It reminded me of that guy in the bloody R41 video.
(Well, okay, to be fair, I have bled a lot once before -- there was the time when I was shaving my head with a superspeed and sliced off a mole on the back of my melon, but I don't count that because it wasn't my face, and I couldn't see what I was doing, nor could I really tell I was bleeding until the waistband on my boxers started to get soggy red, but I digress.)
The shave was remarkably close, though, and even though I shaved at roughly this time yesterday, I'm still looking pretty good. I chalk the very red experience up to 2 things:
1) the angle is very shallow -- much more shallow than I'm used to -- and I don't have muscle memory for that kind of angle, especially on the jawline where I got most of the cuts
2) The exposure of the blade, on the pretty widely-spaced teeth, is significant -- there's just not that much room for error. The Konvex is anything but forgiving.
My girlfriend asked me if I'm going to return the Konvex to the back-of-the-rack, and I said no. I must master this thing. I will have to avoid shaving for the rest of the week, to allow everything to heal, but I will take up the Konvex again, and I will treat it much more carefully.
So, with that, some pics for your edification.
Enjoy!
-- Chet
The most remarkable aspect of the Konvex is that it has combs on the -=sides=- of the razor, too. It's open-comb all the way around: three hundred sixty degrees of open-comb. The pictures speak for themselves. Never mind that the sides of most razor blades are not sharpened, by the way, but perhaps there was such a blade at one time. My set did come with a Konvex blade, but I have yet to take a look at it. I can only imagine that it's sharp all the way around.
UPDATE (3-6-12): Checked out the blade last night, and it is, indeed, sharp all the way around. It has an oval shape, and reminds me of a smaller old-style gillette blade. This may also account for the wicked blade exposure, as the Konvex blade appears to be narrower than a regular DE blade. I'll have to measure to be sure. -- Chet
Back to the razor ...
It's a simple 3-piece affair, similar to an old type single ring. The bottom knob screws onto a shaft that runs from the cap, though the handle. The baseplate and handle are fastened together. No surprises there. One really nice feature to the handle is that it has flat sides, and this was very helpful in switching sides as I went through my passes. There's not much flex put to the blade -- it's held fairly flat, and requires a pretty shallow angle. The cap should remain pretty flat on your face, wherever you go with it.
So how does it shave?
I figured that I'd start with a blade I like, and a nice sharp one; I selected a vintage Gillette Platinum Plus. I lathered with the usual T&H 1805 and jumped into probably the single greatest bloodbath I've had since starting DE shaving. (To address the term "bloodbath", I mean it as having one's face bleed enough to run down one's neck and chest.) The handle's pretty smooth, but it wasn't hard to hold and didn't slip in my hands. At the same time, I've never bled so much, before, while shaving. It reminded me of that guy in the bloody R41 video.
(Well, okay, to be fair, I have bled a lot once before -- there was the time when I was shaving my head with a superspeed and sliced off a mole on the back of my melon, but I don't count that because it wasn't my face, and I couldn't see what I was doing, nor could I really tell I was bleeding until the waistband on my boxers started to get soggy red, but I digress.)
The shave was remarkably close, though, and even though I shaved at roughly this time yesterday, I'm still looking pretty good. I chalk the very red experience up to 2 things:
1) the angle is very shallow -- much more shallow than I'm used to -- and I don't have muscle memory for that kind of angle, especially on the jawline where I got most of the cuts
2) The exposure of the blade, on the pretty widely-spaced teeth, is significant -- there's just not that much room for error. The Konvex is anything but forgiving.
My girlfriend asked me if I'm going to return the Konvex to the back-of-the-rack, and I said no. I must master this thing. I will have to avoid shaving for the rest of the week, to allow everything to heal, but I will take up the Konvex again, and I will treat it much more carefully.
So, with that, some pics for your edification.
Enjoy!
-- Chet