(08-31-2016, 02:02 AM)nachum Wrote: i've been de shaving for several years now but have held off on trying straights. but curiosity is getting the better of me and i think i'd like to try. a big reason i haven't tried is that i'm confused by what needs to be done, primarily in terms of prep. any help would be great...
do i need to know how to hone to use a straight?
do i need to buy stones, etc?
do i need to own several straights and rotate their use?
what exactly is the prep involved each time?
what are good straights to buy?
what do the sizes mean i.e. 5/8, 6/8?
do i need to anchor a strop to the wall?
is this really complicated or is it simpler than i think?
I know I'm late to this thread, but I'll give you my answers to your questions, one by one. For reference sake, I am relatively new to straight shaving, having just over 200 straight shaves and just over 50 shavette shaves under my belt.
do I need to know how to hone to use a straight? No.
do I need to buy stones, etc.? No.
do I need to own several straights and rotate their use? Only if you want to shave with a straight all the time, in which case you will need two. That way you can continue shaving while one of the razors it out for honing.
what exactly is the prep involved each time? A blade needs to be stropped before each shave. Most people also strop AFTER each shave, but that step can be omitted if you want. The blade has to be kept completely dry between shaves, so it needs to be dried thoroughly and stored outside the bathroom where there is less humidity
what are good straights to buy? For me, the best deals are on vintage straight razors. New razors and custom razors are quite expensive.
what do the sizes mean? The size is the height of the blade from the edge to the top of the spine. People get caught up in this, but the edge actually does the shaving and the rest is a matter of style/opinion. I have a razor that is really a 4/8 (it may have started off life as a 5/8 for all I know) and it shaves just fine.
do i need to anchor a strop to the wall? No. You don't even need a hanging strop if you don't want one. You can use a paddle strop, which you could store in a drawer in your bedside stand or chest-of-drawers.
is this really complicated or is it simpler than I think? It is both complicated and simple. It is both harder than you think it is and easier than you think it is.
I started with a "sight-unseen" vintage razor from whipped dog. I also bought a paddle strop, which had two leather sides and two pasted balsa sides (one CrOx and the other FeOx). As I acquired razors, I sent them off for professional honing. After a shave I dried thoroughly and did about 20 laps on the leather to make sure the blade was clean, then stored it atop my chest-of-drawers.
In the evening before I went to bed, I would take the razor and strop it about 80-100 laps on the paddle strop in preparation for the next day's shave.
After the blade started to feel dull, I would strop about 10-20 on the CrOx, wipe it thoroughly, than about 10-15 on the FeOx, wipe thoroughly, then strop. I would do all this in the evening. I would then go back to the regular routine. I usually got about 10-25 shaves in between these "touch-ups." After several months, I felt like the touch-up was no longer keeping the edge where I wanted it, so I sent the razors off for honing again.
I got through an entire year of 6 days a week shaving and only had my razors professionally honed twice.
Having said all that, after about 13 months I kind of backed off straight shaving and went back to DE/SE. However, I really missed it, so in August of this year, I started shaving with a Feather SS shavette. I haven't used anything else since. For me, it provides the pros of straight razor shaving without the cons of worrying about the edge all the time.
