Okey dokey I have a little update of my first Dilucot method and the plethora of newb questions that come with it
First I must admit to playing just about exclusively with my DE razor this past fortnight. If you are results oriented these things are amazing, efficient and effective hair removal but I felt again the pull of the process of the straight.
I took my test razor and dulled on glass. Built a slurry and woah! Two weeks without touching the coti is not a good idea for a newbie I really made some laughable strokes for the first minute or two. I calmed down a bit and made a set of 30 slow and deliberate X-strokes and felt like I had got back on the bike. I refreshed the slurry and started with some much nicer half strokes. 3 sets of half strokes and the bevel is looking pretty good. Just a bit more work on the toe area with a couple more sets paying more attention there. Ok I have a pretty good bevel. Quite easy to get the bevel right when the razor is in OK shape to start with. Baby starts to cry and I go to play dad for an hour or two.
Baby goes down for another sleep and super-dad
P ) returns to the coti. A fresh slurry and away I go. I probably spend about 40 minutes from here on the razor. I worked out pretty quick that, at least for now, half strokes are not for me once the bevel is set. I just can't pick up any feedback when I use the half strokes.
I think I learned a few things as I went along. I really felt the abrasivness of the slurry drop away after say 15 or 20 strokes at a dilution point. It was a similar sensation to the stone on just plain water. From this point one of two things would happen. If I continued to make strokes without touching the slurry I would within 10 strokes or so feel the abrasive sensation return. I am guessing this is the slurry thickening slightly and regressing to a "coarser" cut?
The second thing was that if I added a drop at this point I also felt an increase in the abrasive sensation of the hone. 15-20 strokes and it smoothed out again. As the dilution increased it would take more strokes to reach the smooth point and I'll readily admit that a few times I added water as I felt the cutting sensation was increasing due to the slurry thickening. This may have thrown my steps out of whack but I felt like I was progressing in the right direction in general. All up I would say I felt like I made about 20 dilutions + corrections at which point I felt it was time to move to water or restart with a fresh slurry. I decided to go to the water stage and see what resulted. The TPT was feeling good to my limited experience and I have decided to try and learn this test. My request for a lock of clean hair from the wife was greeted by "the look"
:
I remembered a tip/step from one of the members honing guides. I rinsed the slurry from the stone but didn't rub it down. 50 strokes on water. Rinse and rub the stone and 50 strokes on water. I then went to the sink to make some laps under the trickling tap. I made about 4 laps and it was like a magnet switched on inside the coticule! A really suprising amount of suction onto the hone that I have not experienced before. I made a bout 40 laps under the tap before I decided to quit. The more akward position and the muscle fatigue was making it likely I was going to make an error if I continued.
The TPT felt really quite OK. 60 linen and 60 leather and the TPT felt excellent to me . I shaved with this edge this morning. Definitely the keenest edge I have off my coti yet. Unfortunately 2 weeks of DE shaving left my straight technique a little wanting, I gave myself a little razor burn with my first stroke of the day. I also managed to have a bad MWF lathering day so I decided to quit at two passes. Fine shave for work but I felt it was not my best effort
looking forward to trying the edge again under better conditions.
Just curious...
Was the suction under the running water any indication of sharpness or just coticule personality trait?
Am I interpreting the feedback from the hone in an accurate way?
When I get the smooth feeling at a dilution step, how many strokes am I aiming for with this sensation before moving on?
Cheers,
Pieguy