Honing Principles and What's the Deal with Stainless Steel

In this video I do an edge refresh of a stainless steel razor and discuss how the design of a straight razor makes it easy to sharpen.

[@HDShaves]

Thanks a lot for the great video! I have never been more clear about bevel and sharpening angles :)

[@greggallant5058]

Ha! Yes, I'm a bit pedantic ;-)

[@jpo31]

I have one Dovo razor in stainless steel. I am not sure if/how this is different from the old forgings. This particular razor is quite picky with respect to how it hones up on different stones. It worked well with my Shapton glass HR. I was not happy with the result i got off my jnat's. I have four other razors made from RWL-34, and RLW-34 combined with PMC-27. This is a steel made by Damasteel in Sweeden. These are in a totally different league. If you hone these using jnat's you can actually see that the carbides are not cut by the jnat. However, since the grain structure is so fine, this actually enhances the cutting performance, while also creating a smooth shave. These also work really well with the shapton stones. These razors are first cooled between two I-beams, then cooled in liquid nitrogen, and tempered.

[@greggallant5058]

That's great info! I am very familiar with Damasteel on knives but have yet to hone a razor made with it. What you say about grain structure, and the effect of tear-out when the grain is very small, makes complete sense to me.

[@ramonmurillo167]

Great video Greg. I have fall down the rabit hole when it comes to JNats but I concede that synthetic stones can get you sharper results with some steel combinations. About chromium steel razors and in your opinion, couldn't one be able to trade time/efficiency with results? Meaning that if I am willing to hone for longer with a JNat, could I also achieve the same results as with synthetic stones? Or would I hit a wall with JNats because they simply wouldn't be able to thin the apex, just like synthetics do, because of the chromium elements?

[@greggallant5058]

I *think* that what happens with JNats is that the silicates have enough hardness to abrade most of the steel matrix but can only abrade the chromium carbides with much more effort. But, this additional effort removes the metal around the chromium carbides and tears them out instead of abrading them. I have not read anything about this with stainless steel, but it is definitely an issue with steels that have vanadium carbides. With vanadium carbides, synthetic stones with aluminum oxide (like my Shapton Glass stones) have the tear-out issue, but diamond stones (which have the hardest abrasives known), can abrade the steel matrix including the vanadium carbides evenly without tear-out. So with vanadium alloy steels, we get the best edges with diamond stones. In the end, though, there's no *right* answer. While I may not care for the edges I get with stainless on Jnats, it might work for you for any number of reasons.

[@ramonmurillo167]

@@greggallant5058 I have been suspecting that for a long time but I was not aware of the facts supporting it but it makes sense now. Thanks for your video

[@billm.2677]

Nice work Greg. Re: tape - If I felt the need to preserve a razor with tape, I probably just would not use it at all. When I started accumulating some expensive high end stainless steel cookware the loss of a reflective polish and small scratches really bothered me. I still take the best care of them that I can, but looks does not change how it cooks. My dearly beloved wife left a saucepan on an electric burner once and thought she destroyed it 😢. I was able to clean it up somewhat with great efforts but I could not do anything about the warping it caused, and It still cooks the same as the replacement I went out and bought. It is only occasionally that I actually need to use them both at the same time. One could consider that I now have one for show and a service unit. 😎 Re: Feather Artist Club blades - Company publication indicates that blades are 0.010” and processed with a triple compound bevel. I have reasonably observed this at 80x stereo/binocular and the last cut is quite small. I have read somewhere that the final edge angle is over 20º. I think most straight razors wind up thinner near the apex than 10 thousandths and have more acute angles. There should be little doubt that the Artist Club blades perform so well because of the baked on final coatings which always wear off. In my experience once the coating has worn off they become quite rough to shave with. I do love to shave with them for the first couple of times. Re: Packing Peanuts - I usually gauge the early higher grit edges with some lateral slicing motion. It is one of the things I like best about is, a stepped improvement is somewhat quantifiable. Take care and be sharp.

[@greggallant5058]

Hi Bill. Thank you for your comments on the video. I thought about including a discussion of curved stones and sharpening wheels, but I'm long-winded as it is. I'll do a segment on curved hones when I figure out how much math and materials science to include to present the benefits and drawbacks objectively while holding the view that each person's preference is what matters most. [ I've had quite a bit of correspondence with Jarrod, and have shaved with a razor he honed for me. ] Re: machined blades. For the past two Austere Augusts (r/Wetshaving on Reddit), I have used machined blades for 31 days; a Personna GEM, and a Kismet. Both blades come with PTFE coatings. I have used my microscope (940X) to track wear on the blade throughout the month. The PTFE coating is typically gone after 3 days with the majority of the coating taken on the first day. For many of the folks in our subreddit, these blades improve after several uses. For me, I could sense and see dulling of the GEM blade around 12 days. For the Kismet blade, I saw small edge degradation within the first 3 days, but performance of the blade did not change appreciably over the entire month of use. Obviously, YMMV.

[@billm.2677]

@@greggallant5058 Re: Sharpening wheels - many years ago I first saw a demo of the Tormek sharpening system. I always wanted one for my knives but could never really justify the cost in my mind and largely settled for an EdgePro Apex. While I am at a place now where I do not need to justify that kind of expenditure, acquiring such goes beyond my interest with the exception of experimenting on razors. Jarrod tells the story of old grinders using novaculite wheels and I asked for his thoughts about one of the newer Japanese waterstones on a Tormek. He deferred to someone he knows who owns a couple and suggested that they rotate too quickly. My thoughts were the difficulty in maintaining the wheel dressing. I still think one could be of some service in cutting the back bevel that I now do by hand with stones shaped at 2 & 3 foot radius. I doubt I will ever make that investment though. Re: Austere Augusts - I have never been a Reddit guy but a Quick Look showed the philosophy of the old 30 Day Crew of the Shave Den Forum, which is largely where I hung out until banned under pressure from folks not wanting me to discuss my honing methods. I certainly approve of the repeated use of shaving tools to develop the individuals skill. By Kismet, I will assume ‘hair shaper blade format’ and the Personna traditional GEM SE. I don’t have any appreciable experience with either blade format, but have observed folks with great attachment to them. One of these days I will get some of the Feather SE blades for an old Valet Autostrop I picked up years ago. I suppose I could just break off the little blade holding tabs and use a GEM style blade, but have not had that kind of desire. I have never been one to make any pursuits into disposable blade longevities. I just don’t need to save money that much and don’t think I will live long enough to make it matter. Keep the vids coming. Happy Sunday.

[@greggallant5058]

I have used a Tormek to sharpen knives, planes and chisels. Like your EdgePro, in the end, it's a guided system. I have also freehanded knives on a paper wheel loaded with various types of abrasive paste. And, I've freehanded knives on the "flat" of a belt grinder in addition to using belt sag. I never had reports of one method being far superior than another. But, obviously, straight razors are different. A rotating wheel removes material pretty quickly and ruining the temper is a thing; especially for the small volume of material at a razor's edge. I think it is completely doable if you rotate the wheel slowly with a variable speed motor, though. Re: blades. Yes, I used a Kismet hair shaper blade in a Weck Sextoblade last August and a Personna GEM PTFE blade in a Micromatic Open Comb single edge razor in August 2022. No stropping in either case. I don't typically use a DE blade beyond 5-7 days, or an GEM blade or Artist Club blade beyond 10-12 days. When I notice them dulling, I toss them. There are people who just enjoy seeing how far they can marathon a blade. I don't think anyone exceeds @sgrdddyshaves at this.

[@billm.2677]

@@greggallant5058 Free handing on knives is something I was never successful at. It is a high skill in my book. My brother brought a cheap Chinese knockoff of the Edgepro after I did all his knives one year. He was never able to get that to work. He got a Worksharp Ken Onion and satisfied himself. Unless you deliberately flat joint an edge somewhat, nothing can survive aggressive cutting on plates long, which seemed SOP at his place. Later he bought me Ken Onion sharpener for Christmas. My standard kitchen drawer sharp knives are Victorinox paring knives. I have about 25 and did them all. It was fast, easy and they seemed good, so I went out and got the Worksharp blade attachment for the additional belt options. It does require freehanding the angle somewhat but the superfine grit and stropping belts make getting a high performance cutter easy. In time, I largely reprofiled them all back to the EdgePro. It became my opinion that a convex knife bevel off a belt degraded much faster than that from the EdgePro, not to mention how much metal is easily hacked off. I still use the belt job for my brisket slicer though.

[@danielemansilla]

Two hands to balance, but not pressure

[@greggallant5058]

I use two hands because I am primarily a knife sharpener and we tend to have our hands all over the blade when we're sharpening. It is just my habit. This is not typical practice for razor sharpeners. I try to apply pressure that is evenly distributed between the edge and the spine, and which gives me the most feedback on what is happening at the edge.

[@steveh7866]

Fun! Though, tbh it might be time to grow a beard :P