Recommended brush drying time

What kind of shaving brush do you use? Tell us all about it!
brothers
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Re: Recommended brush drying time

Post by brothers »

I swipe my brushes on the towel for two reasons. It transfers a substantial amount of water from the brush to the towel. Also, it wipes off any would-be soap scum/residue that would otherwise remain on/in the brush. I have bought enough used old razors to know that there must be an awful lot of guys who merely rinse them off and let them dry. That stuff doesn't go anywhere unless it's mechanically removed. The same principle applies to any other tool used in the shaving process, as far as I'm concerned.
Gary

SOTD 99%: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, soaps & creams, synthetic / badger brushes, Colonial General razor, Kai & Schick blades, straight razors any time, Superior 70 aftershave splash + menthol + 444
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jww
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Re: Recommended brush drying time

Post by jww »

I'm with Buzz ..... and Squire .... and Chris.

And for some reason which I cannot explain, I always shake the brush and then use a strop-like action to semi-dry it on a towel. None of my brushes have been damaged in any way as a result. Ymmv.
Wendell

Resident Wool Fat Evangelist & anglophile. Have you hugged a sheep today?
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Squire
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Re: Recommended brush drying time

Post by Squire »

I think we all pretty much just do whats in our nature and it all works.
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Squire
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Ouchmychin
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Re: Recommended brush drying time

Post by Ouchmychin »

I am nerdy and do everything by the numbers. When I finish shaving I hold the bristles under the tap and rotate and squeeze 48 times. Then I give it a shake and pound the base of the bristles or top of the handle against the base of my thumb 5 times. I rotate a bit and repeat until I have rotated 8 times. By then the bristles of a badger brush are pretty dry and I sit the base of the brush on top of my jar of cream or soap. Next day it is dry. Doesn't work for boar brushes because they retain water and must be wiped dry.
Ouchmychin (Pete)
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Squire
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Re: Recommended brush drying time

Post by Squire »

Unless someone can top that Pete gets prize for thoroughness.
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Squire
rsp1202
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Re: Recommended brush drying time

Post by rsp1202 »

I do everything super gently so as not to reanimate the animal.
Ron
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M6Classic
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Re: Recommended brush drying time

Post by M6Classic »

Ouchmychin wrote:I am nerdy and do everything by the numbers. When I finish shaving I hold the bristles under the tap and rotate and squeeze 48 times.
Okay...but what happens if one stops at the forty-seventh or forty-ninth rotation?

Buzz
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Squire
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Re: Recommended brush drying time

Post by Squire »

You have to start over of course.
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ltjaw
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Re: Recommended brush drying time

Post by ltjaw »

I have a very dense brush that I was using daily for a time. My drying routine is similar to what others have mentioned here: shake vigorously and gently swipe on a towel. I noticed one day that the knot had taken on an unpleasant smell. Checking the base of the knot a day after it had last been used, I found it to still be quite damp. The smell was not unlike the aroma that develops on clothes that have remained damp for several days.

I let the brush dry out several days, and the smell went away. Since then, I have made a habit of rotating brushes every other day to allow the knots to fully dry between uses.
Andrew
EL Alamein
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Re: Recommended brush drying time

Post by EL Alamein »

EL Alamein wrote:I lightly towel to get the soap scum off the handle and somewhat the bristles.

Makes the black handle of the brush look nice but I don't know that it really does anything for the bristles. Habit mostly.

Chris
So recently I remembered why I developed the habit of toweling the bristles - travel. I had to travel this weekend and planned on shaving early and then going immediately home straight afterward.

When I traveled weekly for business I developed the toweling to help remove excess moisture because the brush would be tossed into the Dopp at a moment's notice if I had to leave and go somewhere else. That Dopp also had a straight razor in it. The straight was in a side zipped compartment but I just didn't want to take a chance that any excess moisture would cause corrosion if I had to high-tail it out of there unexpectedly - which sometimes I did. The habit stuck because you never know where your next assignment is going to take you.Thankfully, for the last few years, I've been close to home. But the memory lapses.

Chris
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