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anyone with experience? thoughts?

The only times that I've gotten sliced up good with a DE is when I put pressure on the razor; since finally learning that lesson, I generally don't go much beyond letting the weight of the razor do the work. That said, I like being smooth, but I'm not nearly as much of stickler for it as you seem to be.

Have you tried a number of different blades, yet? You can get variety packs from multiple vendors, even on Amazon. They can make quite the difference. In your position, I might take the time to play with different blades with the OC GC.
 
@inferno I dont feel that DEs ever match other razers for closeness unless you get a SUPER aggressive one, but because they are mild when used for what they do you get a good shave and skin that feels good afterwards.

as far as shaving around your jaw, I personally just pull my skin a bit so I can get a nice flat area to shave. it helps that Im still relatively young and quite thin so such things arent hard for me.

my next razor is the Blackland Tradere for sure. meant to get one ages ago but never got to it.
 
The only times that I've gotten sliced up good with a DE is when I put pressure on the razor; since finally learning that lesson, I generally don't go much beyond letting the weight of the razor do the work. That said, I like being smooth, but I'm not nearly as much of stickler for it as you seem to be.

Have you tried a number of different blades, yet? You can get variety packs from multiple vendors, even on Amazon. They can make quite the difference. In your position, I might take the time to play with different blades with the OC GC.

no only tried the gillette 7 days stainless so far, and the feather in the feather.

i had a very rough shave just now with the jaws. i think i overdid it. gonna try some milder blades in all the razors next time.
 
@inferno I dont feel that DEs ever match other razers for closeness unless you get a SUPER aggressive one, but because they are mild when used for what they do you get a good shave and skin that feels good afterwards.

as far as shaving around your jaw, I personally just pull my skin a bit so I can get a nice flat area to shave. it helps that Im still relatively young and quite thin so such things arent hard for me.

my next razor is the Blackland Tradere for sure. meant to get one ages ago but never got to it.

i want a tradere too. at least the handle. i cut up some 6al4v ti rod today. gonna make my own tradere handle :)

btw how do you like the blackbird? i've read it super aggressive and you have to be very careful with it. something i'm not very good at it seems.
 
i want a tradere too. at least the handle. i cut up some 6al4v ti rod today. gonna make my own tradere handle :)

btw how do you like the blackbird? i've read it super aggressive and you have to be very careful with it. something i'm not very good at it seems.

well I have the solid bar one, and while it's more aggressive than say, a Charcoal Goods level 2, or that Feather you own (by a lot), it's NOTHING compared to a CG lvl 3, and it's definitely less aggressive than the Timeless 95 OC you also see in the picture I posted.

I *really* like the Blackbird and It's my favorite razer. For me it's just the right level of aggressive to do a single pass shave, and I can do a cross-grain pass if I wanna get closer.
 
i tried the feather again today with 2 shims/ground blades to make it more aggressive. and the shave was super good. no irritation. very happy.
i could go over the trouble areas without getting totally destroyed. the feather is starting to grow on me. i'm glad i got it.

oh i also kinda went all in on a timeless. open comb, all ti. gonna look exactly like this i guess :) this is gonna kick so much ass! i used to work in manufacturing. programming and running cnc machines but with a bit beefier parts. like 700kg up to 3-4 tons. so i really appreciate this all this cnc porn. a real piece of art.
rs=h:1000,cg:true
 
today i shaved with the GC 84 SB with the gillette 7 o clock blade again. used the klar klassik soap. only used minor pressure. 3 pass. plus a bit extra where needed. this time i didn't go too far though. and it was a very good shave. no cuts. very minor irritation only.
so yeah the gamechanger will work.

recently i've been thinking about soaps. i need more soaps. thinking about getting the Truefitt and Hill sandalwood. kent/wool fat. and D.R Harris Marlborough. i also want to try try the golddachs lineup.

so far i think all my soaps have performed well. but some smell better than the others.

tabac - smells quite good, medium level. smells like classic shaving, soapy, unoffensive somehow. a bit too tame. scent power 5.

haslinger ringelblume - smells very good. much better than tabac. masculine flowers. power maybe 5-6.

haslinger sandelholz - smells good. not as good as the other haslinger though. but almost there. refreshing but not bland. power 5.

mühle buckthorn - smells very "soapy" and a bit fruity/flowery. "mild" somehow. scent power maybe 3-4. not used this one yet.

haslinger aloe vera - doesn't smell good at all. but not bad either. quite mild and tame. scent power maybe 3. not used yet.

klar klassik - this is fvcking intoxicating! very unoffensive. smells clean, fresh, round and warm, basically like you would expect a shaving soap to smell. hard to describe but this one smells awesome. wow. compared to the others this one i prefer klar by a large margin. its just pure quality. the haslinger ringelblume is my no2. but this one is so much better smelling.
scent power maybe 7. dont know if it actually smells more than the tabac but its a more penetrating scent for sure.

i think i need to get the klar sport too. they have been making soaps since 1840 so i guess they know how its done by now. and many people seems to like the klar sport.
 
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oh yeah also sanded down the knurling a bit on my razorock superknurl and ufo handle. these handles have very coarse knurling, probably 30degree, 1,5mm pitch or so i guess. and those knurls terminated to a very sharp pyramid edge. very clean knurls, seems to be pressformed and not cut ones. very grippy, but not very comfortable. way way too sharp.

but since i'm an old machinist i know its supposed to be done though. you always take the tops off with a sandpaper. i put an m5 screw in a cordless drill, threaded the handles on there. wrapped a p1000 paper around the handles and started sanding. 1-2 minutes. done. now thery're really good. just as grippy but they wont cut into your skin. feels more refined.
 
i went on a soap binge. some scent reviews:

kent (same as mitchells wool fat) - smells almost nothing, maybe wet wool. it is very healing for your skin though. very good product imo.

d.r harris marlborough - smells very little, an whatever its now smells is very bland, i dont like it at all. worst soap i have ever smelled.
should have gotten the windsor..

truefitt and hill 1805. smells wonderful. it really smells like an ocean. medium powerful.

truefitt and hill sandalwood - smells even better than the 1805. really classy. medium powerful. smells nothing like haslingers sandalwood.

taylor of old bond street sandalwood - smells very good! also extremely powerful, its smells a bit too much to be honest. smells nothing like T&H or haslingers sandalwood.

-----------

so i ended up with 2 soaps that smell almost nothing and one smelled quite bad to be honest. but both are tallow based and said to be among the very best.
so what i did is: grated them down with a cheese grater and then mixed the kent with the taylor 50/50 and this tamed the smell down to a better, more normal level. still smells wonderful from the taylors.

then i grated the d.r harris and mixed it 50-25-25% harris, palmolive green olive hand soap, some french boutique lavender hand soap. and now it smells really nice imo. and it lathers very good.

i used the harris mix today and i feel it was better than the kent (unmixed), and it smells good! better lather, same protection and same smooth healing effect after the shave.
 
there's a lot of great scents out there, especially from Barrister & Mann and Arianna & Evans, but by far, and I do mean BY FAR, the best selling soap I have ever used is Grooming Department's NYChypre.

personally B&M Reserve Lavender is a real winner IMO, both wrt performance and scent.

@inferno Id really strongly suggest something in the newest A&E base. I think you will find it a bit of an upgrade over the stuff you've listed.
 
My fave is grooming dept and zingari man. Also love a&e, wholly kaw, ethos, saponificio varesino, murphy and mcneil, and mammoth. I was gona put a soap lot for sale on another shave forum but would consider putting it up on this forum if theres interest. You can also buy samples of soaps from maggards.
 
usually i try to go with the players that have been doing it the longest. i guess they know how its done.
 
usually i try to go with the players that have been doing it the longest. i guess they know how its done.

in soaps frankly I think it's the opposite. they've gotten a lot better just in the last few years, and the old formulas are just not competitive with the stuff being released today. yes I've tried the old ones (Ive tried a LOT of stuff).

JMO and YMMV
 
well well well, just tried out this baby, and what can i say. this was easily the best DE shave yet.

today i used the taylors/kent hybrid soap. astra sp blade.

this razor is very good. feels very safe during use. almost as safe as the feather. but this one digs a lot deeper, i'd say it digs as deep as the jaws but it causes a lot less irritation and you dont have to be really really careful with it. weighs in at 67g and that might explain it, i dont know.

this gave me a completely smooth shave, even under the jawline. and i could go over the problem areas until done without irritation (unlike the gamechangers). very smooth feeling during use. very good secure grip. the knurling is done correctly (no sharp pyramids).

only downside was under the nose. its a bulky head. i accidentally cut the underside of my nose trying to jam it in there. twice.. but i found a solution though.
just push side of the nose in with your finger, problem solved.

timeless1.JPG

timeless2.JPG

timeless3.JPG

timeless4.JPG

timeless5.JPG
 
well well well, just tried out this baby, and what can i say. this was easily the best DE shave yet.

today i used the taylors/kent hybrid soap. astra sp blade.

this razor is very good. feels very safe during use. almost as safe as the feather. but this one digs a lot deeper, i'd say it digs as deep as the jaws but it causes a lot less irritation and you dont have to be really really careful with it. weighs in at 67g and that might explain it, i dont know.

this gave me a completely smooth shave, even under the jawline. and i could go over the problem areas until done without irritation (unlike the gamechangers). very smooth feeling during use. very good secure grip. the knurling is done correctly (no sharp pyramids).

only downside was under the nose. its a bulky head. i accidentally cut the underside of my nose trying to jam it in there. twice.. but i found a solution though.
just push side of the nose in with your finger, problem solved.

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really nice.

there are some razers that are as good as it, but none better, IMO. actually after we talked about it in this thread I pulled mine out and gave it a go. really like it, just need to be liberal with the soap lol.
 
i was very surprised how smooth it was and how i could whip it around. and the result was by far the best yet.

i also like the design. machining an polishing is top notch. it also feels like a serious high performance tool. not heavy like stainless, and not too light and toy like feeling like alu. just the right weight imo. feels very solid.
 
so i tried the astra blade in the gc84 and while the shave was better than the gillette green 7 o clock stainless blade i still think the timeless is much better. it shaves closer, its faster without tearing your face up. less irritation. and i can get to the problem areas under my jawline with fewer passes.

i did some head shaves lately and at first i tried the timeless. had about 10mm hair almost 2 weeks. and the timeless clogged bad. and you could not remove it with water only. had to resort to a brush. then i went to the feather. this one is impossible to clog. but still its very picky with the angle. very gentle and forgiving though. then i tried the gc84 SB and while this one is not as picky with the angle its still very suboptimal for the head. its really slow going.
and you miss a lot of places.

so i guess my preferred shaver for the head is a blue3 tilting disposable or the mach 3. its just so much faster. i can do my head in like 2 minutes with one of those. gonna try the timeless in 1,5 days. when i dont have 2 weeks of hair on the dome. and see how it goes.

also recieved a bunch of antique straights. and i will have to try these ones out too obviously.
 
so i tried the astra blade in the gc84 and while the shave was better than the gillette green 7 o clock stainless blade i still think the timeless is much better. it shaves closer, its faster without tearing your face up. less irritation. and i can get to the problem areas under my jawline with fewer passes.

i did some head shaves lately and at first i tried the timeless. had about 10mm hair almost 2 weeks. and the timeless clogged bad. and you could not remove it with water only. had to resort to a brush. then i went to the feather. this one is impossible to clog. but still its very picky with the angle. very gentle and forgiving though. then i tried the gc84 SB and while this one is not as picky with the angle its still very suboptimal for the head. its really slow going.
and you miss a lot of places.

so i guess my preferred shaver for the head is a blue3 tilting disposable or the mach 3. its just so much faster. i can do my head in like 2 minutes with one of those. gonna try the timeless in 1,5 days. when i dont have 2 weeks of hair on the dome. and see how it goes.

also recieved a bunch of antique straights. and i will have to try these ones out too obviously.

oof, astra are decidedly not my favorite in Timeless.

have you tried Personna med prep? My personal favorite by far, though I can tolerate the blue Gillettes if I must.
 
so far i have tried the:

gillette 7 o clock green stainless. didn't like these.

astra sp. these are better.

yesterday i tried the personna blue super (is this the med prep?), these were quite smooth and good i think.
however i noticed that i didn't stay clean for very long.

today i tried wizamet super iridium, these were also quite good. smooth and nice. maybe the personnas were smoother.

next one to try is the perma-sharp super, gillette platinum, gillette 7 o clock sharp edge (yellow).

hopefully one of these will be a keeper. i have a feeling they will be very different in different razors.

------------------------

also want to try out the nacet stainless (everbody seems to love these), gillette silver blue (these too), personna platinum chrome (i guess these are the red personnas), astra superior stainless but i dont have any of them yet.
 
DE shaving seems really complicated compared to straight razor shaving. So much mix n match. Maybe that's part of the fun.

I like, and use, a lot of different shave soaps, but if I had to use one brand of soap for the rest of my life, I think it would be Saponificio Varesino. Triple-milled, so it lasts a long time (worth taking into account when evaluating the cost). The scents are the classiest, and the most skilled at blending elements into a compelling whole, that I've encountered. Shave experience and post-shave are topnotch for me.
 
which blades have your guys tried and liked/not liked?

personna med preps - my favs

gillette silver blue - acceptable back up

gillette black - not my favorite, they seem a bit less smooth than silver blue

gillette green - fine, nothing to write home about

astra - rough

derby - lol

kai - feel ok but I carve myself up when I use them

feather - fine in milder razers, but I tend to prefer aggressive razer less aggressive blade

pol silver - didnt like these, so Ive never ordered more than a sample
 
which blades have your guys tried and liked/not liked?

I think that blade preference/impressions can be wildly different based on the individual with differing razors, hair type and hair density, among other things. Honestly, I haven't come across any that I really hated, but my favorite so far have been GSB and Astra SP. Personna Platinum and Astra SS were pretty good, but a step below. I'll have to revisit Feather - the first couple shaves with them were great, but I felt like they started to bite/grab after that.

If you haven't yet, just pick up a sampler pack. I got something like 20 varieties (5-10 blades each) off of Amazon for 12 bucks or so, free shipping.
 
i tried shaving with my personna super? its a US made personna. it might be the lab blue one.

either way third shave in the timeless 95. and this is good. feels very smooth and i can get a really close shave.

also ordered some new blades. a 50 pack of german personna platinum chromes. then small packs of: nacets, silver blues, rubies, voskhods, rapira platlux, german wilkinson swords and probably a few more i forgot. and then finally astra stainless in a 100 pack because these were cheap and many people seems to like them.

funny thing is that the text on the astra 100pack is a bit confusing so the person who picked it sent me double, because at a quick glance you might think its a 50pack and not a 100. i also got double of another small pack. and you know what. i'm gonna keep them. i'm not gonna say anything. because i deserve it :) and the place i buy these from makes very good coin on these anyway (a 100 pack of nacets is 50€ at this place) compared to amazon and ebay (market price), so its not like i'm gonna cry myself to sleep tonight for my somehow recently found low ethical and moral capabilities.

but this is also quite interesting. since now i have like 200 weeks of astra stainless. so these better be good!

--------------

anyway i found a guy who tested the sharpness of many DE blades with a bess tester. then i found a guy who compiled the results and made graphs out of them. lower is better. measured in grams to break the test wire. afaik it was tested in 6 places on each blade and then averaged. and then he did a head shave and a face shave and tested them again. then one more time.


razor blade sharpness besstested33.jpg


the forums seems to be shrinking the pic too much so you can't see the text. so i just post the original pic link.

download it and open it on your computer!
 
i tried shaving with my personna super? its a US made personna. it might be the lab blue one.

either way third shave in the timeless 95. and this is good. feels very smooth and i can get a really close shave.

also ordered some new blades. a 50 pack of german personna platinum chromes. then small packs of: nacets, silver blues, rubies, voskhods, rapira platlux, german wilkinson swords and probably a few more i forgot. and then finally astra stainless in a 100 pack because these were cheap and many people seems to like them.

funny thing is that the text on the astra 100pack is a bit confusing so the person who picked it sent me double, because at a quick glance you might think its a 50pack and not a 100. i also got double of another small pack. and you know what. i'm gonna keep them. i'm not gonna say anything. because i deserve it :) and the place i buy these from makes very good coin on these anyway (a 100 pack of nacets is 50€ at this place) compared to amazon and ebay (market price), so its not like i'm gonna cry myself to sleep tonight for my somehow recently found low ethical and moral capabilities.

but this is also quite interesting. since now i have like 200 weeks of astra stainless. so these better be good!

--------------

anyway i found a guy who tested the sharpness of many DE blades with a bess tester. then i found a guy who compiled the results and made graphs out of them. lower is better. measured in grams to break the test wire. afaik it was tested in 6 places on each blade and then averaged. and then he did a head shave and a face shave and tested them again. then one more time.


View attachment 127953

the forums seems to be shrinking the pic too much so you can't see the text. so i just post the original pic link.

download it and open it on your computer!


Ive seen that site and while I genuinely appreciate his work, Ive not found the ones he tested as the sharpest to be my personal favorites.

for example, those BIC blades can suck it. JMO

glad youre enjoying your timeless. really top class razer.
 
Ive seen that site and while I genuinely appreciate his work, Ive not found the ones he tested as the sharpest to be my personal favorites.

for example, those BIC blades can suck it. JMO

glad youre enjoying your timeless. really top class razer.

yeah thats just the thing! the guy that made the graphs has a site called sharpologist or something similar and his opinion is that blades at 40g is what you want. 50g will be to dull and 30g will be too sharp and tear you up.

and i have first hand experience with this. the 30g feather in the feather "r2d2" which is the mildest ever razor still tears you up. its just too sharp. not good.

but any other blade in the timeless is super good. and the timeless haves closer than the asd2 ever will. with pretty much all blades. but this time without the pain.

but i think this guy "the sharpologist" is on to something. 40g on the bess is the ideal.
 
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