Solingen Safachat

[tat2Ralfy]

The burnt tire smell may be Bakelite, it smells like coal tar if you rub it hard with a cloth, as if polishing it, then quickly take a sniff from the scales, if you do the same and smell menthol the scales are celluloid, sometimes if the pivot pin is a little tight, the smell is released as you open and close the blade.

Regards
Ralfson (Dr)

 

[Guest]

if you do the same and smell menthol the scales are celluloid, sometimes if the pivot pin is a little tight, the smell is released as you open and close the blade.

Regards
Ralfson (Dr)

I am working with celluloid every day making my musical instruments. For me the rubbed celluloid
smells like camphor.
Best regards
Emmanuel

 

[Matt]

On the "Safachat" razor in the photos, maybe there is some confusion caused by the reflection of the table top grain pattern on the sides of the blade. The only corrosion I see is along the spine, and that doesn't look like it was caused by cell rot.

Yes, exactly your point - although there are some minor spots closer to the edge, the rust definitely didn't follow the scales, I was mentioning it. Jannivar and Gerrit have started it all, and once they got their ball rolling...

Nice razor by the way.

It is nice, I agree.

Although I screwed up its scales. :thumbdown: I needed to widen the pivot hole a little before re-pinning, and the damn Dremel drill slipped off centre, which caused a something like 1 mm deep pit in the scale right next to a hole's edge. It turned out that the pin won't hold, I was re-tapping it twice - holds for a while, but gets loose after stropping / honing. I believe that the damaged hole's edge doesn't provide proper support now; I'll have to unpin it and try to fill that void, and if it fails - make / get new scales for it.

The burnt tire smell may be Bakelite, it smells like coal tar if you rub it hard with a cloth, as if polishing it, then quickly take a sniff from the scales, if you do the same and smell menthol the scales are celluloid, sometimes if the pivot pin is a little tight, the smell is released as you open and close the blade.

Ralfitus, indeed the handles are kinda hard (I'm talking about that razor), so if they were making bakelite as faux wood, and a quick googling revealed they did - that could be it.

regards,
Matt