Lather and honing

[DJKELLY]

Tok, I have a little six ounce pump bottle of water that has ONE DROP of dishwashing liquid in it that seems to stop beading and will remove or lessen surface tension of the water so it will run up a refined edge. I don't use it for improved honing but it might add a little. Coffee works in the same manner and you can tell a lot from the color after getting used to it. Weird, I know. Denny

 

[jfdupuis]

Tried the hard soap technique on two of my razors (Super Doll and Fily DT #13). The results on both seem very promising. The HHT off the stone is crazy! It seems to go down a bit after stropping, but I'm sure the shave will be very rewarding anyways. I'll probably use the Fily tonight. I used it Saturday so I should be able to tell you guys if the 40 passes on hard soap did anything to improve the quality of the edge/shave.

Cheers,

JF

 

[garyhaywood]

i tryed the soap on my new la drassante bout well i think thats what it is. I must post a picture of it. Any way i applyed some arko soap. Rubbed it in to the hone. the soap actauly turned bluish as i was rubbing soap in. Seemed like some cutting was going on, with the soap and my rubbing. i managed a good hht of the hone, not sure if there was any improvemant after honing on soap. certainly no reverse efect and a certain spot seemed to realy improve .

 

[DJKELLY]

I think one of the most interesting aspects of this technique is the fact that stropping does not improve the hht much if at all, or even drop it a bit. There is definitely something going on here in a mechanical way, or maybe just the increase of the hones working grit equivalent. It seems that using more strokes on the stone (Bart) and my use of intermediate stropping on my jeans or the "wet horn" technique have very much the same effect. Whatever, after using soap as described, stropping after honing might not be necessary, but I have yet to test it. Regard, Denny

 

[Guest]

I think one of the most interesting aspects of this technique is the fact that stropping does not improve the hht much if at all, or even drop it a bit. There is definitely something going on here in a mechanical way, or maybe just the increase of the hones working grit equivalent. It seems that using more strokes on the stone (Bart) and my use of intermediate stropping on my jeans or the "wet horn" technique have very much the same effect. Whatever, after using soap as described, stropping after honing might not be necessary, but I have yet to test it. Regard, Denny

Could you please give more information what is exacly the wet horn technique Denny?
Thanks Emmanuel

 

[jfdupuis]

there's a production video from Dovo on youtube showing the "horn lady". I'm really curious to see how the razors will perform.

 

[RicTic]

Could you please give more information what is exacly the wet horn technique Denny?
Thanks Emmanuel

there's a production video from Dovo on youtube...

@7.55 mins http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_-s0phRZng&feature=related

 

[Guest]

Thank you very much Ric Tic .I know this video but i thought that is a wet felt.
Thanks Emmanuel

 

[RicTic]

Thank you very much Ric Tic .I know this video but i thought that is a wet felt.
Thanks Emmanuel

Come to think of it I never gave it a thought as to what it is.
I can only assume that is the video Denny is referring to.

I may well stand corrected,

David.

 

[DJKELLY]

Well, lets stir the mix a little more. Snowed in today so playing with the stones. I took the same la dressante narrow bout and instead of soap with tallow, I just used a white candle to coat the surface of the stone. The first time, I just covered it and the blade shaved off what it wanted off and it proved to be very good in upping the keenness. Refining the technique, I wiped the surface with my fingers and a little lighter fluid or naptha. You have to be careful not to remove all the tallow/wax because the solvent is very effective. The surface was now very smooth and provided similar, slick feel to newly applied soap when honed dry. With a carbon Friodur I easily got an HHT4 right off the stone with no stropping. Wax is a little neater than soap to me and cleans up easily with the solvent, leaving the original surface on the stone. I will try several touch-up to see how long the effect lasts. Very Interesting, as Schultz would say. Denny

 

[RicTic]

Also, I have a question (at the risk of appearing dumber than I already am).
With the thickness of soap being applied to the hone, judging by the amount of soap seen on the blade, is it at all necessary to use a coticule?
What I'm asking is, does the hone play a part at all?

 

[DJKELLY]

Thank you very much Ric Tic .I know this video but i thought that is a wet felt.
Thanks Emmanuel

Come to think of it I never gave it a thought as to what it is.
I can only assume that is the video Denny is referring to.

I may well stand corrected,

David.

You stand correct, David. She uses the horn at 7:58 or so and I didn't know it was horn until informed by Bart. We might not have been talking about the same video, though, because Bart mentioned that she didn't do a hanging hair test, and in this video she obviously does, even though it looks like troglodyte hair and she cuts it very close to the holding point. I need to find a trog. Denny

 

[jfdupuis]

Also, I have a question (at the risk of appearing dumber than I already am).
With the thickness of soap being applied to the hone, judging by the amount of soap seen on the blade, is it at all necessary to use a coticule?
What I'm asking is, does the hone play a part at all?

Interesting suggestion!

 

[chti_lolo]

Well, lets stir the mix a little more. Snowed in today so playing with the stones. I took the same la dressante narrow bout and instead of soap with tallow, I just used a white candle to coat the surface of the stone. The first time, I just covered it and the blade shaved off what it wanted off and it proved to be very good in upping the keenness. Refining the technique, I wiped the surface with my fingers and a little lighter fluid or naptha. You have to be careful not to remove all the tallow/wax because the solvent is very effective. The surface was now very smooth and provided similar, slick feel to newly applied soap when honed dry. With a carbon Friodur I easily got an HHT4 right off the stone with no stropping. Wax is a little neater than soap to me and cleans up easily with the solvent, leaving the original surface on the stone. I will try several touch-up to see how long the effect lasts. Very Interesting, as Schultz would say. Denny

Denny, did you try to put some drops of water on the candle coating? the reason is if the effect of coating is like an increase of the grit, with some water you could have a somewhat better coticule (and the water doesn't dissolve candle wax whereas it dissolve soap). Maybe just a stupid idea, but I'm too lasy to put candle wax on my coticule and to test it.

Till sunday, I have tried to use the hard soap trick with my humble technique on two blades : it seems to improve the edge of the flat one but on the warped one the HHT decreases. So I give a try to the narrow size of my La Veinette but with my poor skillness and a 2cm wide hone, I can't succeed too.


Regards

Laurent

 

[DJKELLY]

Hi Laurent, No I did not use any water or other lubricant. I just honed a second razor with the same stone without any further application of tallow. It is a very thin but noticeable coat. The surface gets very smooth and the sensation of abrasion almost disappears. The coticule picks up a very "buttery" and soft feel that lends confidence that one cannot help but slowly refine the edge. It took quite a few strokes, probably eighty or ninety with the keenness increasing steadily. I have a feeling that water would drastically change the draw and don't want to add any until I see how long the effect will last. One other thing I forgot to mention is that I cleaned the edge with lighter fluid on my tissue before making the HHT.
YT, Denny

 

[DJKELLY]

Also, I have a question (at the risk of appearing dumber than I already am).
With the thickness of soap being applied to the hone, judging by the amount of soap seen on the blade, is it at all necessary to use a coticule?
What I'm asking is, does the hone play a part at all?

Interesting suggestion!

I would say the hone definitely plays a critical part since the soap or tallow is basically unable to hone at all, at least that is my assumption. Otherwise, dragging the edge against or through a cake of soap would dull the edge.

I believe only the very peaks of the surface of the hone are doing the work, maybe keeping the bevel from fluttering down the path of the stroke. It is a noticeable improvement in keenness. Denny

 

[chti_lolo]

I have a feeling that water would drastically change the draw and don't want to add any until I see how long the effect will last.

I think this maybe the point where adding water should work (if ever), just when the effect seems to disappear

Laurent

 

[Bart]

Well, lets stir the mix a little more. Snowed in today so playing with the stones. I took the same la dressante narrow bout and instead of soap with tallow, I just used a white candle to coat the surface of the stone. The first time, I just covered it and the blade shaved off what it wanted off and it proved to be very good in upping the keenness. Refining the technique, I wiped the surface with my fingers and a little lighter fluid or naptha. You have to be careful not to remove all the tallow/wax because the solvent is very effective. The surface was now very smooth and provided similar, slick feel to newly applied soap when honed dry. With a carbon Friodur I easily got an HHT4 right off the stone with no stropping. Wax is a little neater than soap to me and cleans up easily with the solvent, leaving the original surface on the stone. I will try several touch-up to see how long the effect lasts. Very Interesting, as Schultz would say. Denny

Nice idea, Dennis. :thumbup:
I would be very interested to know how long the keenness expansion effect lasts. With the soap I tried, it didn't seem to last much past those 30 laps. It seems already to revert back to after one extra attempt. I'll try a tea candle, next time.

This is fun.
Bart.

 

[Bart]

Also, I have a question (at the risk of appearing dumber than I already am).
With the thickness of soap being applied to the hone, judging by the amount of soap seen on the blade, is it at all necessary to use a coticule?
What I'm asking is, does the hone play a part at all?

The hone has to be involved, otherwise there would not be a keennes improvement.
If this was only a kind of weird (reversed) stropping effect of the edge improving alligment while passing trough the soap, we would see the same effect when shaving a bit of soap from a puck. I tried that, several times, and the effect was only minimal, if any.
The effect I observed from soap-coating the hone, shows a very clear difference: from only playing violin on a thin hair to severing that same hair at over 20mm from the holding point.

Of course, it's possible that the same principle works for other hones as well, meaning that their keenness limit can be extended by smearing the surface with a wax-like substance.
I can't help thinking about stearate sandpaper.

Kind regards,
Bart.

 

[pinklather]

I don't have specific chemical data to proof that it doesn't harm. However, there is a lot of testimony in literature, barber manuals, etc that Coticules have been used with lather on top for over 2 centuries.

I appreciate your kind help, Bart.

-r