How to get the day 4 feeling day 1?

**Alacrity59** · 03-06-2010, 03:22 PM

The day I dreaded arrived. After a couple of months of shaving my razor was getting dull to the point of being uncomfortable. I decided to use my Norton 4K/8K combo and 12K Chinese to bring back the edge. I stropped the razor a good 200 full strokes on the linen and 200 on the horsehide.

The shave was so bad I thought I must have done something wrong on the honing. I decided to hone again and went right back to the 1K and included 10 strokes on a balsa strop with CrO. Did the same stropping routine. I shaved again for the second time that day. A bit better.

Today, the forth shave with that razor, I had the best straight razor shave I've ever had. The blade is working smooooooothly.

Is there a shortcut to getting to this smoothness day 1?

**holli4pirating** · 03-06-2010, 03:28 PM

What did you do over the course of those three days, aside from stropping and shaving?

Gotta know all the variables to be able to take a guess.

**Alacrity59** · 03-06-2010, 04:20 PM

Are you thinking it was the chicken vindaloo I had last night?

Nothing special.

**holli4pirating** · 03-06-2010, 04:26 PM

Well, if you didn't do anything to the blade, I would guess it's just the extra stropping. Could be that your edge was just a little rough right off the hones.

**treydampier** · 03-10-2010, 07:16 PM

I imagine its the stropping that helped. Also, focus on an extremely light touch when using the Norton and chinese stones. I was getting harsh shaves off the chinese and I bought a slurry stone for it and started using a slurry with a 50 lap-test-50 lap method. I would also recommend getting a pasted hanging strop with CrOx because I find it works better than my home made pasted paddle strop with latigo leather.
Just an opinion though.

**Alacrity59** · 03-11-2010, 02:52 PM

Thanks treydampier and holli4pirating. I think I'm going to have to attribute at least a part of the problem to using a sharp razor when I'd gotten used to a dull one. I was once again pressing too hard. But yes stropping a whole heap did help smooth things out for the razor I was using and the second I honed that same day.

**Alacrity59** · 04-10-2010, 09:46 AM

Well just about one month later and it was time to give my razor a bit of a touch-up. The razor was in better shape that the last time I honed so I decided to start on a Chinese 12K very lightly 100 passes. Perhaps this was overkill but I was sitting in front of the kitchen window and enjoying a cup of coffee. I had picked up some chromium oxide lapping film (about $2.50 per 8.5" x 11" sheet) so cut out a piece the same size as the 12K stone with a little water this stuck down to the stone very nicely. I lapped about 20 strokes on the chromium. After stropping about 100 laps each on linen and leather and being careful to lower my blade angle . . . I got a very very comfortable shave. If I only do this once a month the one piece of chromium oxide will last for years.