Nate's "Trust Your Edge" Straight Journal

rockviper said:

Earlobes.... Not as sexy as a Tragus hit, but we'll take it.

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LMAO Yeah that Tragus hit was Nasty, this one seems to be healing up a lot fast as it was not as deep as the Tragus cut was LMAO

imatabor said:

Don't worry Nate no one will notice:

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LMAO Notice What??? I don't see nuthin' LOL

SciTX said:

Ouch!

But hey, nice shave and that coti will come around!

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Yeah it was a bleeder but I guess I got it sharp because I didn't even feel it. Just saw the blood appear LOL. I will be taking the ERN back to that coti today to see what I can come up with for maxing it out. I have several directions I can go at this stone so I will try all of them until I have it figured out as to which combination works best for the bevel, cleanup of the edge, midrange and finishing because looking closely at this stone, the way the grain runs through it I think I can use all of the directions to do different stages of the process

Bummer about the cut. But looking forward to the new coti journey.

cmh737 said:

Bummer about the cut. But looking forward to the new coti journey.

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Thank you Chris, thankfully being such a surgically precise cut it is healing up very quickly. Should be gone in a couple days. This stone is a LOT of fun to mess with. The different angles provide completely different feels and I think I may have gotten the proper combination down for an exceptionally keen edge along with the comfort. The Shave tomorrow will definitely tell the tale but I am getting tree topping easy on the very tips of the arm hair straight off the stone and I haven't even stropped it yet so that is a great sign for keenness.

Okay so I did a little "Lock Picking" today on the new Coticule by using ALL of the available angles of attack that the stone has along all of the straight sides. The pics below show the position of the stone in order from start to finish and all X-strokes were performed From NW to SE and SW to NE towards the right side of the stone in the position it is in in each photo:

I began with a medium to heavy slurry and kept spritzing it every so often until it was pretty much water only before washing the stone and blade and then doing quite few laps under running water.
Start:



Second Set of Laps



3rd Set of Laps



Finishing Laps and Water Only Laps

Nice photos with each progression

cmh737 said:

Nice photos with each progression

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Thank you Chris. The results are definitely bound to be better than yesterday for sure. The close up of the edge even looks better. I pretty much had to hone out some micro chips in the blade that I saw in yesterdays up close shot so I did a fairly heavy slurry to start with in order to correct the edge. Now it looks pretty darned great for a Coticule Edge:

Yesterday's Edge, You can see the small imperfections along the actual cutting edge pretty well in this shot:

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The Obligatory Set Up Shot

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Edge Straight off the stone Tree Tops Hair easily:
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Edge after 50 Laps on the Tony miller Leather Side and Tree Topping Hair without even feeling it catch really. Thought it wasn't cutting until I looked at the blade and it was covered in arm hairs LOL


The Shave in the Morning Will Tell All though because I have had great Test results that ended up being horrible shaves before so we shall see

Getting caught up, nice stuff

Nice looking stone. I'm anxious to hear how these next shaves go.

skypsyd said:

Getting caught up, nice stuff

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A Huge Welcome Back Dave!! Missed you a lot my Friend.

Al_S said:

Nice looking stone. I'm anxious to hear how these next shaves go.

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Thank you Al, The shave was indeed very nice this morning

Straight Shave # 116: "Almost There "

The Weapons Of Choice:

The Strop(S): 2 1/2" Tony Miller Heirloom Old No. 2. 00/80 Cotton/Leather after the Coticule Honing.
The Prep: 10 Minute Shower with some nice hot water running over the mug accompanied by massaging the whiskers.
The Pre: Pantine Pro-V Conditioner rubbed in to set while showering.
The Brush: Rubberset 400 W/27mm Silvertip
The Soap: TAOS NOS Sandalwood Tallow Formula.
The Razor: 5/8 ERN 32 Crown & Sword (1st Shave off the New Select 10 Coticule Round Two!)
The Post: Pinaud V.I.B.R. with a good wipe clean and drying of the blade and I am going to take it back for just a little more water only finishing time to try and get it just a few notches keener tonight.

This Evening's Thought's:

A Far Better Shave this morning versus Saturday's Shave. The extra time and using the different grains of the stone in the order above provided a very excellent 2 pass DFS to BBS Shave everywhere and no cuts this time as well nor irritation of any kind/ Absolute win but I think I can get it a little bit keener with just some more time on the finishing stage with water only. As far as smoothness though, this thing is smooth as silk on every pass right now so that is a great thing. Want to try for that Perfect BBS++ Grail Shave though so until I get it the setup will remain the same and I will keep asking more from this new stone until I wrangle what I want out of it LOL


Wishing everyone a Terrific Night and a Great Week Ahead

This Morning's Hardware/Software Selection:

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Sweet pics of the edge of the razor. A 2 pass shave with no irritation from a razor that treetops arm hair effortlessly is very good. I would not have considered using different edges for different passes - good tip that I will lock away for the future!

Well done!

labrax said:

Sweet pics of the edge of the razor. A 2 pass shave with no irritation from a razor that treetops arm hair effortlessly is very good. I would not have considered using different edges for different passes - good tip that I will lock away for the future!

Well done!

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Thank you Pete;

The edges of this stone definitely provide different results depending on which direction the stroke crosses the stone. I Love that about this Coticule.

After A Very Stressful Afternoon of phone calls from the office, (Long Story, but anyone who has been military Knows "That Superior").

I Decided to relax with a Lovely and Very Tiny Little Swede that hitched a Ride with that HUGE Wade and Butcher from [MENTION=75490]imatabor[/MENTION] and I am really looking forward to finishing this Tiny Titan. A 4/8 F.W. Soderen with a killer natural smile and spine to match.


For once I actually remembered to get a Before Shot of the edge this time. Quite Rough but I have seen far worse for sure:
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After the first round with the King 1K, (Still some chipping in the edge but much better:
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Second Round smoothed things out and tomorrow I will join the edge again and give it one more round, reassess and see if it is ready for the Coticule Bout in the Background.
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The Tools and a nice shot of the Tiny Swede:
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I will only be using the Redish 1K King and the Coticule on this one as I want to take as little steel as is possible to get a shave ready edge on this beauty since it is already so small.

Looks like she is in good hands and I appreciate you preserving as much steel as possible. Do you find the steel as hard as the MK series?

If you get a chance post a picture of the two razors together. It is a great study in contrast.

imatabor said:

Looks like she is in good hands and I appreciate you preserving as much steel as possible. Do you find the steel as hard as the MK series?

If you get a chance post a picture of the two razors together. It is a great study in contrast.

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Absolutely my Friend and you are very welcome, this one is a real Gem for sure. She has some pretty hard steel thankfully, pretty close to the MK and the EAB so maintaining a good amount of steel shouldn't be a problem, just takes patience and time on the stones with an ultra light stroke to very slowly hone those chips out and get a very even and comfortable shaving edge restored. A Very Much needed challenge tonight to be sure as I really needed a good while of honing therapy after today's events LOL

And This is the Epitome of Extreme Contrast for Sure LMAO I Love this shot:

Straight Shave # 117: "Third Time's a Charm"

The Weapons Of Choice:

The Strop(S): 2 1/2" Tony Miller Heirloom Old No. 2. 00/80 Cotton/Leather after the Coticule Honing.
The Prep: 10 Minute Shower with some nice hot water running over the mug accompanied by massaging the whiskers.
The Pre: Pantine Pro-V Conditioner rubbed in to set while showering.
The Brush: Rubberset 400 W/27mm Silvertip
The Soap: TAOS NOS Sandalwood Tallow Formula.
The Razor: 5/8 ERN 32 Crown & Sword (1st Shave off the New Select 10 Coticule Round Three!)
The Post: Pinaud V.I.B.R. with a good wipe clean and drying of the blade and 40/80 Cotton/Leather on the strop.

This Afternoon's Thought's:

DING! DING!! DING!!! We Have a Winner! LMAO A perfect exceptional grail shave this morning with the third try on the Tiger Striped Coti using my standard 2 pass shave and zero damage to the mug. So now I can finally move on to a new set up instead of looking like a broken record LMAO

LMAO Three times to get it right and to think I am hunting yet ANOTHER Coticule which means I will have to start once again from square one LMAO


Wishing everyone a Terrific Night and a Great Week Ahead

This Morning's Hardware/Software Selection:

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Way to go Nate! The fact that you were able to get that quality shave after only 3 attempts on the new stone is something to be proud of.

labrax said:

Way to go Nate! The fact that you were able to get that quality shave after only 3 attempts on the new stone is something to be proud of.

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+1

And in search of another one? I love it!

cmh737 said:

+1

And in search of another one? I love it!

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CAD - coticule aquisition disorder a particularly insidious form of HAD

labrax said:

Way to go Nate! The fact that you were able to get that quality shave after only 3 attempts on the new stone is something to be proud of.

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cmh737 said:

+1

And in search of another one? I love it!

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labrax said:

CAD - coticule aquisition disorder a particularly insidious form of HAD

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+1 Million to the above Gentlemen and Thank you both very much for the congrats. I really do have the CAD something fierce, these stones are a wonderful combination of efficiency and smoothness. I do not know much about Veins or specifics on which stone looks like what, but they are all amazing to look at and exceptional to hone on for sure.