Saturday, July 11, 2009

Neo-Tribal Razor

I said to myself a while back that after shaving my left cheek with my work knife that I wanted to make a razor. So I did.

The design was inspired by a decorative scroll that I'm making hundreds of at work, as well as a little knife I had seen from Neo-Tribal Metalsmith Tai Goo several years back. I saw how the scroll made a nice handle that I could slip two fingers into comfortably and then control the blade-like flaring of the scroll end.
So I took a little section of car coil spring and, while working on a commissioned long blade, forged it out as well.

First I drew out the tang very long. I rounded the corners a bit with my hammer. When it was good, I flattened the remaining stub of stock with the face of my hammer before switching to the cross pein of my hammer to spread it out into a fishtail. The spring had been cut at an angle, which gave me a blade angled pretty much as I wanted it. I just cleaned up a little with a belt grinder.


The next day I used files to round the edges of the handle a bit and smooth out the sides of the blade where my thumb and fingers would brace. After that, I forged a little pig-tail scroll at the end and curled the handle around. I came out with a larger scroll than the decorative scroll that inspired the design, but decided that it was where I wanted it. I can comfortably grip the handle with four, three, or two fingers now.

After forging, I used a file to bring it down to a cutting edge. I forged it thinner than I would a regular knife blade and filed it at a steeper angle. The corners were somewhat rounded to reduce the chances of cutting off prominent features of my visage. Once I was done filing, I heated just the edge and quenched it in veggie oil. This picture shows it right after quenching.

[img]http://i242.photobucket.com/albums/ff35/jamesbhelm/Knives/razor02.jpg[/img]

After taking it home and tossing it in the oven at 350 degrees, I took a nice relaxing swim in the pool with a couple of visiting out-of-town friends and my girlfriend. After all, forging all day in San Antonio, Texas in July is hot work!

Afterwards, I took the blade out and tossed it into some white vinegar I have on hand for such purposes. It will eat the scale off of the metal, leaving the texture but not doing anything much to the blade. I left it in for a few hours, then washed off the sludge of the liquefied scale. It wasn't completely clean, but I wanted to work on the edge so I could shave in the morning. I used my coarse whetrock to work the edge at a steep angle, moving the blade in circular motions for a given number of revolutions and then switching sides. This is a weird whetrock, to me at least; it absorbs oil like a sponge, which I had never seen before. I guess it's a water stone. Spit works well as the lubricant for it.
Here's the blade after the brief vinegar soak and work with the coarse whetrock.

[img]http://i242.photobucket.com/albums/ff35/jamesbhelm/Knives/razor03.jpg[/img]

In the morning, after pulling it out of the vinegar again and washing it off, I started to work with my medium whetrock, using 3-in-1 oil for lubricant. After cleaning up the edge some on the medium where it was more polished and I could feel and see better what was going on, I returned to the coarse stone. Sometimes that's what you have to do to get the edge established before you can really sharpen. After that, I moved back to my medium stone, moving the edge forward like I'm taking a thin slice out of the stone. Usually I go straight from my coarse stone to my fine stone and get it where it will shave hair effortlessly off the back of my hand. However, the face is more sensitive, and my beard stubble is thicker than the hairs on the back of my hand. In addition, from reading a bit about razor sharpening, I knew that the more polished the edge, the better. After working a while on the medium stone, I moved to a combination stone with a somewhat finer medium grit and a fine stone. I worked it on both sides. When I had the blade where it would shave hairs decently off the back of my hand, I took it to my strop, a long triangular piece of scrap leather that I secure on one end. I put a little Simichrome polish on it and then repeated my whetting motion but in reverse. At the same angle that I had been whetting it on the stone, I draw it backwards along the leather. I do one stroke on one side and then one stroke on the other. With work knives I typically do it about six strokes per side, but I did it more for my razor.

Here it is after the longer vinegar soak and sharpening:

[img]http://i242.photobucket.com/albums/ff35/jamesbhelm/Knives/razor04.jpg[/img]

After all this, I shaved with the sucker. I didn't have a mug and brush, which I know I should, and I knew that the edge needed more polishing to be really comfortable. I started off with a hot shower to soften the stubble and made sure that my spray lather covered everything well.

The razor worked pretty well. I was slow and careful and I had to think a little bit about what angle to approach the strokes with sometimes, but I was in no hurry. I gave myself a tiny nick in my nostril from the tip extending a bit further than I was paying attention to. It did quite nicely on my cheeks and jawline and around my mouth. The neck was a different issue. It's always the most sensitive area and the one that razor blades seem to have the hardest time shaving smoothly without nicking. It was not comfortable shaving the neck. I ended up with little nicks, but nothing worse than I would get on a clumsy morning with my normal Gillette. Splashed on aftershave, cleaned off the blood and I was good to go. After giving it a few mintues I washed my face to clear the dried blood from the nicks and you couldn't tell that I had been nicked at all afterwards.

This little razor slices leather quite nicely, too. I re-stropped the blade, then cut a little protective square of leather, folded it over the edge, and held it in place with a spring clamp. My buddies and I were on our way to visit with one of the other original Neo-Tribal Metalsmiths, Tim Lively, and I wanted to show it to him. When I have the chance, I'll build a little carrying case out of red cedar. I intend to keep working on getting the edge more polished and keep shaving with this. If I don't get lazy, I think this or another I make will be my razor that I use from here on. It's currently soaking in vingar. I'll leave it in until all of the scale is eaten away, then polish the edge some more.

I had never shaved with a straight razor before. I had never watched anyone in real life shave with a straight razor before.