Cartridge shaver looking for more

Hello, My name is Christoph.

Anyways I want to give a brief history on my shaving so I can be helped better. My father always shaved with a electric razor and he also bought me one too. I used it up until I was somewhere in college and I moved to shaving with cartridges by the sink.The electric razor would sometimes catch some of my beard hairs and my father always had me use some post-shaving alcohol Later on I moved to shaving in the shower with cartridges, with no post-shaving alcohol. I shave every 3 days or so in the shower with a schick quattro and whatever cheapest cream I could find and smear it on with my hands. This is where I am at today.

So while i was searching for tweets on twitter about the recent startup www.dollarshaveclub.com I saw someone tweet about safety razor, badger brush, and soap. I was like badger brush what the heck is a badger brush. So i started to google it and this article came up How to get the perfect shave So i learned a little more about a badger brush. But boy are they expensive and not sure how long they really last. Then I started looking at safety razors and people saying which blade goes best with this razor. Which is new for me and kinda confusing. Then the article goes on how smearing on shaving cream with your hands isn't as great as getting a high end european tub of shaving cream with a badger brush.

I hear just adding a badger brush to your cartridge and shaving cream can will help your shaving
Then if you add a high end tub of shaving cream on top of that you will improve your shaving more
and then if you add a safety razor on top of that you will get a much better shave than you could possibly imagine.

Anyways So I looked up on amazon and I believe i found a few good items.

UPDATED FROM COMMENTS -------

Badger Brush: best badger edwin jagger light horn brush [Health and Beauty]

Tub of shaving cream: Proraso Shaving Cream With Eucalyptus Oil & Menthol (5.2 oz.)

Razor: Merkur Heavy Duty Double Edge Razor #34C + 5 Free DE Razor Blades

Razor Blades: 35 FEATHER 7 O'clock SHARK ASTRA BLUEBIRD DERBY Blade Sampler

After I buy all this stuff basically all I will need to buy is the razor blades every so often right? Besides obviously replenishing the tub of shaving cream.

Maybe I am on my way to a better and closer shave than what the commercials say?

Heyy! Welcome first of all!


For shaving cream, you should try Proraso, Cella, or Arko. They are very nice and easy to lather up quickly! Very short learning curve with those. I would suggest starting with something that lathers super easy.

For a razor, I would say get something from the BST section of the fourms! They always have great deals there. I would also recommend a Merkur 34 HD. (If you can specify what kind of hair you have? Course? thick? Makes a difference in razors for this)

For blades, I would honestly go with a sampler pack or so. Just so you can have a feel of different blades. The feathers are very unforgiving and starting with those will be brutal. For me feathers don't work at all, although how much people love them. They just make my face hurt very bad after I'm done. Other good brands are Sharks and Astras. They are very good and affordable, you can buy a 100 for about 10 dollars on Amazon!

Specify what kind of facial hair you have to give a better item selection though.

Christoph - head over to YouTube and check out the videos from Mantic59, or check out his blog at Sharpologist, this has been a great source of information for many starting out.

Welcoem aboard! Lots of information and nice people here!

I'd add an aftershave to top it up. And definitely would get a blade sample pack and let the Feathers until you've improved your technique. I like Feathers, I shave every day and use them every day, but they are sharp and perhaps you've got to gain some confidence....

As for razors, you might want to have a look at an Edwin Jagger DE89L or the new Barley. They are gorgeous and very "forgiving".

Apart from that, you'll get tons of info here. Map your beard, patience, practice, good lather, right angle, absolutely NO pressure at all. Enjoy your shaves!

Thank you everybody for your time and replying. I shall definitely check out the videos and also the razors that were mentioned. Also I'm not too entirely sure what kind of hair that I have. I would say thick though. What really grows is my goatee and the sides of my face just come in patches. Other than that I'm really not to sure.

Welcome to B&B!

polardude1983 said:

Thank you everybody for your time and replying. I shall definitely check out the videos and also the razors that were mentioned. Also I'm not too entirely sure what kind of hair that I have. I would say thick though. What really grows is my goatee and the sides of my face just come in patches. Other than that I'm really not to sure.

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Welcome, sir! As you will see, the key concept is "YMMV". You have a very nice set-up plan, and I suspect you'll be happy with anything suggested so far.

I maintain a fairly long (vertical) moustache, and I have found that the classic single-edges(SE) allow a cleaner edge, at the desired hairline. The one warning would be that they can be fairly aggressive, until you have some practice. On the bright side, if you want to try one down the road, a Gem/Star/Ever Ready 1912 or 1924 can be had for $8-12 on-line, as little as $1 if you really shop your local thrift and "junk" shops.

Useless shaver said:

As for razors, you might want to have a look at an Edwin Jagger DE89L or the new Barley. They are gorgeous and very "forgiving".

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+1...this is what I started with and am still using.

Also agree on blade sampler suggestion. You'll definitely see the differences and find one you like.

Welcome to B&B. You should get a better more comfortable shave using a DE and good cream/soaps with a brush. If you don't want to jump right into a brush you can use some of the better brushless creams like Kiss My Face (which should be available locally to you)

Steer clear of drug and grocery store blades. Get a good quality blade. Each one should last you as long as your cart did and they will run you 10-20¢ each if you buy in bulk (little more if you get them by the 5 or 10 count tuck as shipping will be double the cost of the 5 blades)

Welcome to B&B!
Your Merkur 180 razor is fine. Light, agile and responsive razor. I would recommended getting some blades from vendors on this forum such as Razor Blades and more, West Coast shaving , Italian Barber, Royal shave and Bullgoose. All have little five pack sample packs that you can order. All these vendors are top notch. Good luck on your journey. Let us know if we can be of help.

+1 on sampling different blades. that will help you find the best blades for you. one thing that helps is if you keep a small log as you go through the brands. logging has helped me narrow down what blades are cheap and work well for me. my shaves are now tons better than when I used a cartridge.

regarding soaps, mama bear's shaving soaps are pretty affordable and I've found they lather really easily. http://mamabearssoaps.com/

Oh, one other thing, the Merkur is indeed a great razor, but if you're wanting to get into DE shaving more cheaply, the Lord L6 would be a great way to go. It's half the cost of the Merkur and will give you arguably just as good of a shave. It's definitely not as pretty though...

Welcome!

I didn't see anything on your post about pre shave or post shave balm. If your skin type can handle it, post shave balms are awesome and is the finishing touch to make your face feel SMOOTH. I've bought and have several types of high end creams (Proraso, bigelo, aqua di parma, panheligans (sp?), castle forbes, L'occitane) but theres one shaving cream that i continually go back to over and over....art of shaving. There cream/soap is reasonably an competitively priced. If you havent tried art of shaving cream or post balm DO IT.

Looking back i cant believe that my shave routine was:

THEN
1) Wet face
2) Can goo
3) Shave
4) Rinse and walk away.

NOW
1) Soak brush and put face in hot towel
2) Saturate face with warm water and preshave oil
3) Lather face and first pass
4) Rinse face, and preshave oil again (i find this to be key imo)
5) Lather and second pass
6) Rinse face, and preshave oil again
7) Lather and third pass
8) Rinse face with cold water and dry
9) Apply witch hazel and or alum block
10) Dry and after shave balm .....ftw!

+1 on all the suggestions here. As for your statement regarding adding a brush and better cream, my shaves with a Fusion got significantly better once I incorporated a brush and cream (fyi TOBS Sandlewood). And yes, moving from cartridges to DE shaving did improve the situation quite a bit also.

As for the cream, I'd recommend putting together a sampler (lots of vendors here offer them) of different brands and scents.

Welcome and good luck!

What you will find is that everything you mentioned gives an incremental improvement.
1) Using a brush can work the canned foam into your whiskers better than a hand application. I have recently been squirting some into a bowl sitting in a sink of hot water, kind of a poor mans shaving scuttle.
2) Warming the can of foam in a warm (NOT HOT) water bath makes for a more pleasant experience.
3) Moving up to any shaving soap is an improvement. They tend to be more slick than the canned goo and have ingredients that are good for your skin. Lots of neet fragrances to choose from.
4) The techniques of using multiple passes for beard reduction and touch ups will get you a closer, more comfortable shave than trying to whack your whiskers all in one pass. Beware that multiple passes with multi-blad cartridge razors may irritate your skin more than with the single DE blade.
5) Multiple passes with a DE razor will get you a closer shave than you will have ever gotten from a cartridge razor.
6) Aftershave is da balm. Pre-shave and post-shave skin treatment is key to a good shave.
7) The money you save by buying blades instead of cartridges can be used to fund your ADs. You will learn MUCH MORE about them shortly.

So I was been doing some research and was trying to map my beard as much as possible. But it not as easy to map it it seems. So here are my best efforts. I've tried to map it out as best as I can.

bladebuff said:

Christoph - head over to YouTube and check out the videos from Mantic59, or check out his blog at Sharpologist, this has been a great source of information for many starting out.

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Strongly agree. Mantic 59's shaving videos are invaluable, even to old hands, and I highly recommend you spend an hour or so on You Tube to pick up some handy hints.

It may even save you some inadvertent blood loss!

Welcome
Im also in the stages of ditching cartridge razors also.The prices of these fancy quad blade Fusion replacement cartridges are ridiculous($20 or so for a pack) compared to $1-$2 for a decent pack of 5 DE replacement razors.Im also looking to take it further by investing in a straight razor ad strop later on.

So since I had pretty much mapped out my face. Still using a cartridge razor with canned gel. Yes I will be buying a badger brush and safety razor. But until then I needed to shave.

So I tried shaving WTG on my face and it went beautifully. I also heard about doing three passes. But I couldn't remember if it was WTG, ATG, XTG or WTG, XTG, ATG.

So I tried shaving WTG, ATG, XTG. While ATG was definitely an interesting sound my face is red and it does burn a bit. If I did WTG, XTG, then ATG. Would it of really made a difference?

Welcome! You will definitely get closer shaves more cheaply with traditional DE shaving, but you will be sacrificing a bit of time. Before I went to the DE razor just over two years ago, I was shaving in under 5 mins with a brush, a cheap glycerin soap (later GFT Coconut), and a two bladed cartridge razor in one pass. Now I get very close shaves with a Merkur 34C and an Astra SP blade and a soap/cream lather in 2 passes with touchups most days. Takes 10 minutes or less. I go WTG, XTG, and touchup or full pass ATG (rarely ATG in the mustache area). There is no doubt that my face was a bit irritated early on going from one pass to three, but it seems to have toughened up a bit. Improved technique probably accounts for some of the decrease in irritation, but you are definitely exposing your skin to more blade time with DE shaving.

Might have been a touch better if you went across before against.

You did go high end with your choice of cream. There are other great and cheaper soap and cream options available, but if you go for the GFT you'll enjoy it.

I'm guessing the Omega pure badger will have some scritch or prickliness that some cheaper boars or more expensive badgers do not have. Just something to think about as you explore all of your brush options. I have a couple of pure badgers, but use them much less frequently than my boars and higher end badgers.

Any reason you chose the long handled Merkur? I have a 34C and it is large enough for me. I'm nearly 6'1" and I have no troubles with the standard handle. I also have ordered another popular razor, already suggested, the Edwin Jagger DE89L. The head on the long handled Merkur is essentially the same as the 34C, and it works well. I believe it is a three piece while the 34C (HD) is a two piece.

Looking forward to hear how you make out. It is a different shave, for sure, but worth taking the time to perfect!

Just to be totally redundant; The key to making your first few DE shaves a good experience as opposed to a frustration...let the razor do the work, DON"T press down!

When I re-entered the DE shaving world a few months ago (used one in my youth, then went over to the dark side for a few decades) the biggest problem I had was remembering to go light, the habit of pressing down as you do with a sprung blade cartridge razor was very difficult to kick, but once I did I started getting shaves that were closer than an M3 and with less irritation as well!