Paul
Well-Known Member
So, I spent the evening/large part of the night honing razors with a couple of buddies. Whitebar, mostly a lurker here, and a another guy who lives in the same town as my second home that I met at SRP spent a solid 3 hours honing. Whitebar recently lost his mind and bought 3 coticules and lucky for him, there was a La Petite Blanche in the bunch... Lucky I say because I can almost hone a razor blind on one of those.
In fact, that's the point of this thread. I'm in Shreveport, and my HHT hair supply here is too limited to try to take for an extensive honing session (literally 1 long strand). So, I was forced to go totally by feel. I have talked a lot about honing by feel, but I've never been forced to go through a honing session without the aid (crutch :-/ ) of my trusty HHT. It was really an interesting experience.
Knowing I didn't have that option going in, I was really concerned about judging if it was going to be shave ready. However, I went ahead and worked through the process paying special attention to the feel. It was fun to really dial in on the feel, and listening to the stone. So, by the end of the night, I had honed 4 razors on 3 different coticules and one barbers hone using a synthetic slurry stone and doing dilucot-esque technique.
I'm going to have to wait for some full shave tests later, but judging by my totally dry, ATG shave test on 4 day's growth, I'm expecting the results to be great... on all four razors.
Anyway, what I learned is the lessons I "earned" in the early days (before the guidelines of stroke count, dilution, etc.) about understanding the slurry and "listening" to the stone is the most valuable experience in my honing journey. I learned to feel where I was in the process, and from that early experience, I've become a much better honer.
So, while I'm glad there are guidelines in place for people to try, I am glad that I didn't have them in place when I was learning...
Anyway, it was fun to sit around, hone, strop, and chat with a couple guys instead of talking about it with you guys
I know you all enjoy such encounters as well, so I thought I'd share a little bit about tonight
In fact, that's the point of this thread. I'm in Shreveport, and my HHT hair supply here is too limited to try to take for an extensive honing session (literally 1 long strand). So, I was forced to go totally by feel. I have talked a lot about honing by feel, but I've never been forced to go through a honing session without the aid (crutch :-/ ) of my trusty HHT. It was really an interesting experience.
Knowing I didn't have that option going in, I was really concerned about judging if it was going to be shave ready. However, I went ahead and worked through the process paying special attention to the feel. It was fun to really dial in on the feel, and listening to the stone. So, by the end of the night, I had honed 4 razors on 3 different coticules and one barbers hone using a synthetic slurry stone and doing dilucot-esque technique.
I'm going to have to wait for some full shave tests later, but judging by my totally dry, ATG shave test on 4 day's growth, I'm expecting the results to be great... on all four razors.
Anyway, what I learned is the lessons I "earned" in the early days (before the guidelines of stroke count, dilution, etc.) about understanding the slurry and "listening" to the stone is the most valuable experience in my honing journey. I learned to feel where I was in the process, and from that early experience, I've become a much better honer.
So, while I'm glad there are guidelines in place for people to try, I am glad that I didn't have them in place when I was learning...
Anyway, it was fun to sit around, hone, strop, and chat with a couple guys instead of talking about it with you guys
I know you all enjoy such encounters as well, so I thought I'd share a little bit about tonight