Zowada Time
Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2018 12:28 pm
I'm lucky enough to have eight TZ damascus razors, one from his early days and seven from the era when Tim had got into his stride. These, along with all the others on the Wall of Shame, have returned home now my office has been sold. My nicest razors have ended up in two display cases on my bedroom wall, and I have been working my way around them in turn. Tim has recommended in the past a double-bevel method of honing using two, then one layer of electrical tape. I decided some years back that they were so hard that they could withstand a narrower bevel angle and committed myself to honing them with no tape at all. This has worked well, and my only hesitation about using them is the fact they are carbon steel and our summers are humid. I don't think leaving them for someone else to use makes much sense, so I'm enjoying them as much as I can. I'm bothering to oil each one before it goes back in the display case so I think I'm avoiding rust issues.
I know they are far harder than the mild steel that used to be used in Sheffield razors, but I was curious to see what happened when using the traditional pastes after my usual touch-up honing. That's been described before, but it involves a Norton Arkansas stone that has been lapped with a 2k diamond plate (it's the scratch pattern from the 2k plate that does the work, just as on Spyderco ceramics, and the effective grit is around 8k) followed by a 20k Suehiro Gokumyo. I've followed that with paddle strops with Dovo Red paste, HandAmerican Liquid Chrome, and Herold Black paste. They are absolutely exquisite! Silent shaves with no resistance or tugging even with a three day beard. The results are close enough that I generally stop after a single WTG pass, although I confess I still go ATG sometimes just for the fun of it, and still feel no resistance even on the toughest area between my larynx and my chin. Delightful! If you think you can stretch to ordering one I can only say go ahead and do it - you won't regret it.
I know they are far harder than the mild steel that used to be used in Sheffield razors, but I was curious to see what happened when using the traditional pastes after my usual touch-up honing. That's been described before, but it involves a Norton Arkansas stone that has been lapped with a 2k diamond plate (it's the scratch pattern from the 2k plate that does the work, just as on Spyderco ceramics, and the effective grit is around 8k) followed by a 20k Suehiro Gokumyo. I've followed that with paddle strops with Dovo Red paste, HandAmerican Liquid Chrome, and Herold Black paste. They are absolutely exquisite! Silent shaves with no resistance or tugging even with a three day beard. The results are close enough that I generally stop after a single WTG pass, although I confess I still go ATG sometimes just for the fun of it, and still feel no resistance even on the toughest area between my larynx and my chin. Delightful! If you think you can stretch to ordering one I can only say go ahead and do it - you won't regret it.