Tatara Muramasa Adjustable DE Passaround Review – Adjustability Without Bulk

I had my firat shave with the muramasa and BM soap today. As far as my initial observations.

The razor oozes quality. I love razors with cool/unique factors and the Tatara is an incredibly engineered item. One of a kind aesthetics and clearly engineered by shave enthusiasts.

BM soaps need no convincing from me.  Top of my den in performance and scents. I sniffed Terror and Bay Tum for the first time and I can’t wait to try them in the coming days. Seville has been a staple of my den since I started wetshaving. The first soap I ever owned, and the only soap I hope to never live without.

First shave was at level 4 using the Seville. No adjustment was needed.  A perfect amount of efficiency for day’s growth of a thick, dense scruff. I needed no adjustment or touch up after 2 passes.

A phenomenal combination. Thanks to the artisans for the passaround. Ill be picking up the muramasa when it’s back in stock in March.  I also tried vespers and taiga in omnibu during my trip to pasteurs.  Phenomenal scents.

Nice razor collection. Great review

No activity here for the past month...

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A participant forgot to include the key which has caused the pause further aggravated by a 2 week USPS delivery delay.  The key, as well as a replacement shipped separately, both arrived Saturday 05 March. Expect a new review any day now. Apologies for the inconvenience.

I’m in, will send PM.

Hmmmm, tried to PM you to get on the pass around, but I keep getting an error message.

I’m in if still available

Good evening gents,
A quick update on the status of the razor. I received it about 3 weeks ago, but the key was mistakenly left out of the package; inner sleeve was loose, and requires the key to tighten. As Dan stated, the key got here less than a week ago.
Stay tuned, will try to get a write-up done this weekend, and get the razor on to the next participant. Sorry for the delays!

Thanks for the update.  Hope you love the razor.

I finished up my time with the Muramasa, so posting some thoughts this evening. Sorry again for the delays, it seems these things are happening more often these days. But the razor has been packed and shipped on to the next participant, so things are moving once again.

First off, I have always loved the design and aesthetics of the Tatara razors. I previously owned a Masamune with a Nodachi top cap, and really loved it. The Muramasa does not disappoint in these areas, either. Coming from a design and engineering background, I appreciate everything about this razor. The simplicity of design, the small number of parts, the slim head design, the adjustment mechanism… all just impeccable.
A couple of minor things that I didn’t like, mostly just personal:

- The handle is WAY too short for my taste
- Agree with everyone who said the indicator needs to be something different. VERY hard to read the number and know exactly which setting you're at

My first shave, I decided to use the number 4 setting, as I thought that anything less would be too mild for me; this turned out to be the case. I used a Wizamet blade that had a couple of shaves on it. If I were comparing, this setting is fairly similar to the Masamune with Nodachi top cap (from what I remember). Very smooth, very nice shave. Got to a DFS in 3 passes, with a bit of buffing. One thing to note is that this razor clamps the blade really well. Something I seem to be pretty sensitive to is blade chatter, and you won’t find any with the Muramasa. I tried one more shave on setting number 4, and got similar results to the first.
Desiring a little bit more efficiency, I moved on to setting number 5. The first thing I noticed was a VERY surprising difference in blade feel from 4 to 5. Amazing how such a small turn of the adjuster can make such a difference. Not too much blade feel mind you, but detectable (for me) for sure. A lot of blade feel is not something I’m fond of with DE’s, but this wasn’t bad at all. I did make the mistake of using that same Wizamet blade (now with about 4 or 5 shaves on it), and it was a bit too dull (also didn’t get a great lather this time). I ended up with a few nicks and weepers due to the less than sharp blade and terrible lather (for clarity, this lather wasn’t from the B&M included, but one of my other soaps).
Undeterred, for my next shave I threw in one of the fresh Astras that was in with the pass around, and whipped up a much better lather and things went a whole lot better for me. Setting 5 was a 3 pass DFS, very little buffing. The remainder of my shaves with the Muramasa were on setting number 5, as I just wanted to get a better feel for performance at that level. That was pretty much the sweet spot for me with this razor, giving nice smooth shaves.

Overall, I’m very impressed with the Muramasa. This is actually the first adjustable that I’ve been able to get a good shave with. (Full disclosure, the only other adjustables that I’ve tired were vintage TTO’s, and they do NOT clamp the blade very well at all compared to other razors.) In my mind, the Muramas is another win for Tatara, an adjustable that would be perfect for a vast number of wet shavers, and especially great for someone just starting out with a DE razor.

If Tatara were to offer a fixed gap razor that was the same as a number 5 setting on the Muramasa, I would probably buy it.

I didn’t want to let too much time go by before posting some thoughts. I will come back in the next few days to give my impressions of the B&M products included int he pass around (spoiler alert, great stuff).

Once again, big thanks to DanLaw for this opportunity.