How Many Passes Do You Take?

"How many passes do you take?"

Usually one. And sometimes the wife doesn't even have to make one.

What are we talking about again?

On my head, two passes. On my face and neck, four passes. the beard on my face and neck grows in various directions. I find that to get a good, close shave four passes works best for me. With four passes I do not need any touchups.

I use to do 4.5 (4 and a quick clean up pass), but I incorporated the cleanup pass in the 2 pass (buffing under the jawline) so a solid 4.

After reading all of the posts on this thread I decided to reduce my passes to 3 to see if I notice any difference. Today I lathered with T+S / Chatillon Lux Yuzu Rose Patchouli and then loaded my Above The Tie Atlas M2 open comb razor with a fresh Feather blade. Even though the M2 is the "mildest" of the 3 ATT baseplates I still find it to be wickedly aggressive. The R2 baseplate that I originally acquired with the razor sits alone and unloved and I hate to think what the H2 plate would be like. In any case I did the 3 passes, WTG, XTG and ATG and finished with Chatillon Lux YRP aftershave. My face feels as wonderfully smooth as when I do 5 passes without the additional exfoliation/irritation the 2 extra passes invariably adds. We'll see how the beard feels as the day progresses. I'm assuming it will grow in sooner but that remains to be seen. I think I'll likely stick to 3 passes for the time being. Its quicker and there's less wear and tear on the gear and my face as well. If I was getting 6 5-pass shaves from a single Feather blade, trimming off 2 passes per day should give me 4 more 3-pass shaves for a total of 10 3-pass shaves from a Feather blade. In theory. We'll see how it plays out in the lab.

2-1/2 with a straight razor. WTG, ATG, amd a 'cleanup' on dry skin in the problem areas.

Cheers, Steve

Depends on a lot of variables; BUT, usually two with a little touch up on certain areas.

So its been a week now that I've been using the 3 pass shave rather than the 5 pass that I'd been doing for a while and I have to say, 3 pass is enough for me. I'm getting just as close a shave as I did with 5 passes and much less irritation. It feels much more comfortable in the first hour or two post shave. I ramped up to 5 a while back for a few reasons I suppose, first I made the mistake of trying to get every last possible bit of stubble - I know that even when you can feel some stubble on the warm wet skin it will not be noticeable after I'm finished but, you know..... anyway I'm past that. Second, I think the cheapskate in me just didn't want to waste any lather. If there was still some left I wanted to use it. So I guess I'll just try to load less and deal with it. I'm really happy I started this thread and got feedback from so many members because it caused me to re-evaluate my routine and change it for the better and to prove to myself that no matter how long you've been doing something you can always learn more when you listen to other people's experience. Thank you.
Marko

2 WTG
1 ATG
Then any cleanup around the beard line as I usually wear a thin beard.

Face a modified 2, half my neck grows every darn direction

Head 2 passes

I take what is needed; no set number, no real standard; when I feel I'm done I stop.