A razor blade is made of hardened steel. My face is made of nice soft skin, and my beard hair is certainly softer than steel. Shouldn’t a razor stay sharp unless it is abraded by a material with a greater hardness than steel?
It’s not actually dull. The edge folds over.
A sharpening steel for kitchen knives does not actually sharpen, it straightens the bent edge.
Now if you could figure out a way to do that for razor blades, you’d make a mint.
This article suggests the problem is corrosion. The metal is very thin, and thus even a little corrosion will have a huge impact on the cutting edge.
An effective way to slow down the rate of corrosion is to dunk the blade in denatured alcohol (100% - not rubbing alcohol) immediately after use.
Traditional double edged blades can be honed by pressing the blade on the inside of a glass and sliding it back and forth. Flip it over and repeat. In the 1930s various glass companies produced a product just for this, essentially a section of a glass that made it easier to keep your finger on the blade:
I have a few of them as part of a glass collection.
Dennis
Yes, a big issue with disposable razors is corrosion. Dry the crap out of them after use and don’t store them in the bathroom if you want them to keep long.
Of course, disposable cartridge razors are practically designed to go bad. It’s partly why there’s no way to cleanly unclog them, or to dry them well. They want you to buy new ones at $5 a pop as frequently as possible.
But there’s no reason razors can’t be dulled by shaving, and they are. Think about diamonds. They are the hardest substance, and they cut glass. But don’t take a hammer to your diamond ring! You will destroy it. Being hard doesn’t mean it’s invincible.
A log isn’t harder than an axe, but your axe will still get dull if you chop a lot of wood. Same with razors. Your stubble won’t scratch steel, but using a razor to chop down hundreds of your stubbly face hairs will still dull your blade.
Of course you can do that with razors, but you won’t make a mint. The technology has been around for centuries*. The issue is that we’ve abandoned better shaving technology for worse shaving technology, in the name of convenience.
Personally, I think safety razors with 10¢ replacement blades are a great compromise between convenience and shaving quality. But for some reason the $5 cartridges and plastic disposables are what sell. I suppose we have advertisers to thank for that.
*Straight razor sharpening site chosen at random for illustration purposes. I don’t vouch for any product or service they may offer.
Having used the 10 cent safety razors and a cartridges razors I find that the cartridges are superior in every way but price. Cartridges gave a closer shave they are easier to use and they generally result in a faster morning routine.
Which is why I shave at night. heh.
I think my safety razor can give you as close a shave as you get with a cartridge razor; in order to do that, though, you do have to do more pre-shave prep, go slower, and do multiple passes. There’s a trade-off in choosing the cartridges, though: the closeness of the shave also means razor burn is more likely. I’ve never had razor burn from a double-edged or straight-razor shave.
Wow, not my experience at all. Excluding price, and ability to clean, dry and unclog the razor, the main benefit of a safety razor in my opinion is the ability to change the blade’s angle of attack, which is set permanently at the factory in the case of cartridges, but which you can adjust yourself in the case of safety razors.
Which means that with safety razors (like straight razors but unlike cartridges), technique is important. I do wonder if decades of nearly exclusive cartridge use has made shaving technique something of a lost art?
Certainly safety razors don’t rely on technique nearly as much as straights. That’s why I see them as a good compromise. Most people should be able to get the hang of it in one or two shaves, whereas a straight razor takes weeks to be proficient, and a lifetime to master.
I’ll grant you speed and ease of use for cartridges. But I don’t feel safety razors are much slower or significantly more difficult. Maybe I’ve been using straights and safeties so long I’ve forgotten the learning curve though.
No. Running water is nice and soft, but eventually smoothes out the sharpest, hardest stones.
You can greatly extend the life of razors by storing them in a tiny cup of mineral oil between uses. It also lubricates the blade so it gives a better shave. You can also resharpen razors by rubbing them backwards on a spare swatch of denim. As noted, much of the problem is caused by corrosion or microscopic folding of the blade but you can preserve or restore the edge fairly easily with some basic prevention or maintenance.
The very thin metal not only folds but fractures also, and corrosion has an effect too as already mentioned. A steel or razor strop will do the same thing but the edge will still degrade over time. The thicker body and and angle of a straight razor lasts longer but those still need eventual sharpening too.
I suspect stones would stay jagged much longer if you removed the sediment from the water. Plain water at extreme velocities can cut soft materials, but getting through harder materials requires abrasives.
“Nice soft skin” readily does a number on hardened steel. I see this routinely on the job.
[Peter Lorre voice]I need new scalpel blades, human flesh dulls the old ones so fast.[/plv]
I just dry off the blade well before putting it back in the medicine cabinet and it lasts 10 times longer than putting it back wet. It’s corrosion that’s the problem for mr.
I buy the 12 pack of disposables at the 99 cent store for less than $2 and use each razor for a week and then dispose it. Total cost for the year is like $8. Shaving… meh.
My theory why storing a razor in a pyramid makes it last much longer is because you wouldn’t want to display a grotty, gunked up razor so you always clean it after you use it. Pyramid Power!
I don’t know… in my experience, it’s all about technique. I get better cartridge shaves now than I used to back when I only used cartridges.
I’ll say this though- for single-pass shaves, the cartridges are slightly better than the DE razor. But comparing a quick 2-pass DE shave with a 2-pass cartridge shave, and it’s hard to tell them apart. And a 2-pass DE shave is better than a one-pass cartridge shave.
The sharp edge naturally is subject to corrosion. My Materials 25 teacher thought razor blades should come with ax expire date.