Gillette Platinum Plus (made in France)

Anyone know anything about these blades? I took a chance on these hoping that they were similar to Swedes or vintage Gillette Super Silver. The packaging has a 1987 trademark and they are made in France.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/20-Gillette...arnUgg/av/4TO9w7b61CYes=&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc

I bought a bunch of those blades a few years ago and they are great blades. For me they are a very smooth shaving blade.
They are as good as vintage Super Silver blades. I believe that Annecy "Swedes" , ten pack Gillette Platinum blades,
were made in the same factory in France. Please let us know what you think when you've had a shave with them.



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I've got a pack of those, deoxy4. They're long-lasting and very sharp, calling for a light touch.

man00ver said:

I've got a pack of those, deoxy4. They're long-lasting and very sharp, calling for a light touch.

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man00ver i have to ask .. if you have a French GPP in your razor and you move a German merkur blade close does the GPP surrender?

sorry in advance

RobC said:

man00ver i have to ask .. if you have a French GPP in your razor and you move a German merkur blade close does the GPP surrender?

sorry in advance

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I can't really say. All my Merkur blades got moved to "the camp" a looong time ago....
I can say that these French blades are damm good warriors. I'd take them into battle anytime.

man00ver said:

I can't really say. All my Merkur blades got moved to "the camp" a looong time ago....
I can say that these French blades are damm good warriors. I'd take them into battle anytime.

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are these napoleans made these days? or is it just ventage shopping?

No longer made. I think that they stopped making Gillette blades in France in the mid 1990's.

RobC said:

are these napoleans made these days? or is it just ventage shopping?

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Mine are vintage, gotten in a shaving lot from eBay. They're discontinued, as deoxy4 says.

I used this blade Monday morning on a two day growth in shimmed Gillette NEW long comb. There may be sharper blades out there but not many. This is the smoothest blade that I have ever shaved with. This blade is very efficient yet very, very smooth. Feathers are efficient but somewhat irritating for me under the jaw area. Gillette Silver Blue are very efficient and only irritate me if my lather is not right or I rush with poor technique. These blades are sharp, efficient and incredibly smooth. If these were available today they would be my blade of choice. I have been using Gillette Swedes for a few years and I think they are top notch blades. These Gillette Platinum-Plus are better. IMHO, vintage Gillette Super Silver are in the same class. Too bad these blades are no longer made and not readily available.

I remember having the same good impression! Let us know how they hold up for you over distance. I'm pretty rigid about changing a blade after six shaves at the outside, but I remember a little feeling of waste when I pitched this one; it didn't feel like it was ready to give up!

I'm on a little Personna 74 injector kick right now for weekday shaving, but my DE weekend kit has an English Super Silver loaded, currently. I think I'll thumb-out one of these Frenchies to follow it up. It's been a while (probably more than a year). Thanks for bringing it up.

When I shave with a blade that I have not shaved with before I push it to the limit before it goes in the bin. Some of the vintage blades have impressive longevity. It will be interesting to find out how long this blade will last.

It is interesting that you mention Personna 74 injector blades. Sometimes I grow a full beard and keep it year round and sometimes I keep it only for the winter. I always sport a beard in the winter. It is pretty cold in Boston in the winter. It helps. I start growing around this time. Last week I pulled out my Schick type G razor which is perfect for shaving my cheeks, neck, trimming beard lines and the like. Last year out of curiousity I bought a supply of Personna Super Platinum Chrome blades which have a Vydax coating and are the cousins of the Personna 74 blade. Pretty impressive blade. I get 5-6 weeks out of a blade, doing "half shaves" in the winter. So in a week or so I will be moving on to this combination after finishing up with the Gillette Platinum-Plus. I guess we travel in somewhat the same circles.

Well, we certainly intersect on our interest in vintage stainless blades! I'll replace the P74 injector after 24 three-pass full-face shaves (six weeks of M-Th), though I'm certain it would go longer than that if pushed. I just had the beautiful #8 shave last night (which I consider the "break-in" point for these blades). Injector shaving probably saves me 5-10 minutes (I'm using my I2 Hydromagic).

You've convinced me to run the French GPP until it fails, next time. I'll post about it in a month or so!

I will continue to shave the French GPP to failure and report back. Great shave today, BBS-day 5, very impressive. Absolutely a great blade. Look forward to your experience.

I wonder how much difference there is in the Personna 74 injector blades and the Personna Super Platinum Chrome blades which were coated with Vydax. I also notice that there is a lengthly breakin before the blade "shave in". You really need to be carefully before the breakin point. The first shave I attempted with these blades I got some ATG neck weepers, which I rarely get. After the blades "shave in" you can really zip around without concern.

I believe the Tungsten is actually in the blade itself. The other key feature of the 74 for longevity was the Titanium coating on the blade. When they stopped making the 74 (when their was a leveraged buyout away from Phillip Morris), many 74 blades were put in the new packaging (which was adopted right away, I think, because Phillip Morris did not their name on it any more). They eventually changed the coating to Platinum, but kept some Tungsten in the blades, possibly into the 90's, best we can tell.

Thanks very much for the clarification. I don't want to pass along bad information.

The blades I am using are Personna Super Platinum Chrome Injector Blades. The description on the back of the package describes the blades is as follows:

"These Super Platinum Chrome Personna Blades are manufactured from the highest quality material. We start with the finest stainless steel obtainable. Our high speed machines hone each blade edge to an unsurpassed sharpness. We alloy this with high-grade platinum, tungsten, and chrome to give the cutting edges unsurpassed strength and durability. Finally, we coat each blade with a miracle polymer Vydax to give it a smoothness that approaches perfection".

The blades have no dating information but have a US patent Nos. 3,848,770. These blades have ASR Company Staunton, Va. 24401 designation.

They mention a Vydax coating (which is a DuPont PTFE dry coating agent) but nothing about a titanium coating is mentioned . Are these the same blades as the early 70's Personna 74 or a later variation?

Lots of people have postulated that the Super Platinum Chrome was the same blade as the *74, and it's probably true. I've seen DE blades with the Personna *74 logo in a Super Platinum Chrome dispenser. Here's a '70s ad introducing the P74, and you can see they describe its manufacture as a tungsten steel blade with a titanium coating:



P.S. Later, the package said "Tungsten Plus," and I wonder if that's when they added the Vydax coating.

Vydex was used as far back as the early 60's by Personna, but it is inconclusive what was done to get a Tungsten Plus: http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showthread.php/134614-Personna-74-Tungsten-vs-74-Tungsten-Plus/page2

Thanks guys for the info. I guess at this time we will never know the variations if any. I tried looking up the US Patent Nos. 3,848,770 without any luck. Not the gold standard for the smoothest shave but surely the gold standard for longevity.

I ended up using the Gillette Platinum Plus blade to failure. I am growing a beard, so I am doing half shaves. I am shaving my cheeks and neck area to the jaw line. This is an incredible blade. I used this blade for 22 half shaves and stored in alcohol between shaves. For two weeks I got BBS shaves with absolutely no irritation. The remaining shaves were DFS. The last 4 required a four pass shave without irritation. I think this is the best blade I have used.

I started a fresh French GPP this morning, deoxy4, and it's just as good as I remembered. From a 1.5-day growth to full-face BBS in 3 easy passes. Very sweet, and reminiscent of the old Super Silver I ditched last weekend (after the standard six shaves). I'll get this one up to six over the next 2 weekends, and if it's still feeling good I'll plan to push it up to ten on the subsequent M-Th. Then we'll see!