RayClem's Blade Evaluations

Thank you RayClem for the time you invested in these blade trials. I have enjoyed this thread immensely.

After waiting a couple of days, I thought I would try to sumarize what I have learned from the past four months of shaves using a variety of blades and reading comments from other forum members.

1. DE razor blades tend to be one of the more YMMV aspects of wet shaving. The performance of a blade is highly subject to a variety of factors:
a. The coarseness and density of an individuals beard. Because dry beard hair is similar in tensile strength to copper wire of similar diameter, the coarseness of your beard and the density can play a huge role. Those with coarser, denser beards often will appreciate a sharper blade.
b. The proficiency of your preshave preparation. Removing the oils that coat your beard hair and allowing the hair to become thoroughly saturated with water causes a significant decrease in the strength of the hair. It also causes the sheath to swell making it easier for the blade edge to penetrate the hair folicule. Some folks can dry shave, but for most of us, cleaning and hydrating the beard will go a long way towards improving the shaving experience.
c. The sensitivity of your skin. If your skin is like like elephant hide, you won't be too concerned with blade smoothness. You might be able to shave with a sharpened pocket knife. For those with sensitive skin, smoothness is important.
d. The quality of your lather. A good shaving lather is not one that provides a head of lather on a brush that looks good in an Instagram photo. A superb lather is one that provides excellent primary slickness, residual slickness, and protects your skin from blade irritation. If the lather conditions and moisturizes your skin after the shave, that is even better.
e. The razor in which the blade is used. Razors vary greatly in blade gap, blade exposure, blade curvature, and blade clamping. All of these head geometry factors affect the way the blade contacts the beard hairs and the skin. Using a super sharp blade in a more aggressive blade might lead to skin irritation or even nicks and weepers.
f. Your shaving technique. Some people like shaving at a steep blade angle and shave with pressure in an attempt to do a 1 pass shave. Others shave at a neutral angle. I like shaving at a lesser blade angle "off the cap" with minimal pressure. As a result, it takes me four shave passes to get as close as I prefer. I have found that is the best way to minimize skin irritation.
g. Your shaving experience. An experienced shaver might have developed the techniques that enable them to shave with a very aggressive razor using a super sharp blade and live to describe the experience. Someone with little experience is well advised to use a milder razor equipped with a less sharp blade.


There are some 8 billion people in the world. Even if only half of them shave some part of their face or body, that is still 4 billion individuals now two of whom will be identical. That is why there are so many different razors, soaps, razors, blades, etc. Each shaver needs to experiment to learn what works best for them I started wet shaving about 9 years ago. It took me about five years of experimentation with various hardware, software and technique before I could attain a near-BBS shave with zero irritation on about 95% of my shaves. That still means one shave per month is less than ideal, even when using my preferred method. During the last four months, since I was using a single razor and a variety of blades, my success rate was far lower than 95%, it was something closer to 15% if I count only those shaves that produced zero irritation. If I include shaves with minimal irritation, that goes up to about 50%,

Today, I am going to shave with two razors with which I have almost no experience. for my WTG and XTG passes I plan to use Timeless TI 0.95. I plan to use a 7 O'Clock SharpEdge yellow in that razor. Then for my ATG and clean-up passes I will use the milder Timeless TI 0.68 equipped with a BIC Chrome Platinum. I am hoping those combinations will deliver an ideal shave, but once again, I am experimenting. I did not find the SharpEdge yellow to be quite sharp enough in the Karve C-plate razor, but the Timeless 0.95 should be more aggressive. I will post the results of the shave in this thread.

I think the most important thing to make any blade last longer and cut whiskers properly is getting out the moisture..I always loosen and rinse under hot water and blow 2-3 times each side,then loosely tighten and put away on a small piece of cloth,or a piece of paper towel,you would be surprised what tap water does to a steel edge,eats away at that edge..my knife routine is always to strop on leather,cut my veggies,meat whatever,rinse the knife and strop again and put away.
6th shave with the Rockwell and the best,smoothest one yet.Don’t quite remember I gotten this many smooth shaves with that first pack.seems this blade is getting better with every shave..

I think the most important thing to make any blade last longer and cut whiskers properly is getting out the moisture..I always loosen and rinse under hot water and blow 2-3 times each side,then loosely tighten and put away on a small piece of cloth,or a piece of paper towel,you would be surprised what tap water does to a steel edge,eats away at that edge..my knife routine is always to strop on leather,cut my veggies,meat whatever,rinse the knife and strop again and put away.
6th shave with the Rockwell and the best,smoothest one yet.Don’t quite remember I gotten this many smooth shaves with that first pack.seems this blade is getting better with every shave..

That is certainly possible. Human skin is like a type of leather. Thus, as you shave you are stropping the edge on leather. Unfortunately, my "leather" is too sensitive to be used as a strop. As for cleaning and drying blades after shaving, that is a matter of some conjecture. Some people remove the blade from the razor, rinse it, dry it and store it for another day. Others do something akin to what you do. Others like me just rinse out the soap and set the razor aside until the next shave.

My typical shave procedure involves four razors and four blades. I use a different razor/blade combination for each pass of my shave when following my normal procedure. I have not been doing that during the blade evaluations as I have used a single razor for nearly ever shave except when doing a face-off between two blades using two razors with similar head design.

In the next post, I describe this morning's shave in which I used only two razors and blades rather than four. Either way, I am not going to go to the trouble of cleaning and drying four blades and four razor.

Loosen blow hard 2-3 times,turn,blow 2-3 times loosely tighten and place on a piece of paper towel,10 seconds tops with some training,your shaves will be much more enjoyable guaranteed,my dad always did that routine and explained that the water from a faucet is very hard and eats away at the edge,I was 7 and remember this.

Tuesday's shave - an experiment with two new razors.

About the time I started this blade evaluation series, I got a Timeless TI 0.68 razor for my birthday. I used it a couple of times, but could not test it thoroughly due to the blade evaluations. I did like it well enough that I requested a Timeless TI 0.95 for Christmas. Even though I have had it a few weeks now, I have never used it. Thus, both razors were essentially new. I used both razors for today's shave.

I selected the 7 O'Clock SharpEdge yellow blade for use in the TI 0.95. In the evaluations, I found the blade to be mid-sharp and smooth, an ideal candidate for a more aggressive razor with which I am not familiar. For the TI 0.68, I selected the BIC Chrome Platinum. It is a super sharp blade. I figured that it would be OK for use in a less-aggressive razor.

The SharpEdge did a better job in the TI 0.95 than it did in the less aggressive Karve C-plate razor. However, there was still significant blade resistance. I used that razor and blade combination for both my WTG and XTG passes. It did a nice job of beard reduction.

Then I switched to the less aggressive TI 0.68 razor with BIC blade. That combination was used for my ATG and clean-up passes. I achieved a near-BBS shave, somewhat closer than many recent shaves, but I did receive moderate feedback when applying witch hazel. Thus, it was not an ideal shave. However, that was to be expected as I am still learning the technique required for the Titanium razors. Those razor are significantly lighter than the stainless and brass razors I have in my collection. The feel of the TI razors is significantly different. I suspect my results will improve as I gain experience with these two new razors and figure out which blades are most suitable in them.

The change in performance between the SharpEdge blade in the Karve C-plate vs Timeless 0.95 show how the pairing of blades with your razor can affect your shave.

I purchased an Karve E-base plate for my razor that originally came with a D-plate (0.98 gap). I might try the SharpEdge blade in that razor with the E-plate to see if the performance is even better..

I can't quantify blade corrosion and edge destruction from water and soap scum left on the blade. Maybe if you use the blade for only 3-4 tines over a week, nothing that noticeable occurs.

My routine, just in case, is to remove the blade, wipe the scum off with a micro fiber cloth. And then I pass the blade through a soft cork twice on each side. The stropping through the cork insures the edge is dry and clean. Maybe it removes any burrs or rough spots. Don't know - but i get 3 nice shaves with any blade and my razors are pristine, shiny, and it pisses my wife off - cigars and shaving have proven to be very effective wife repellant tools.

Sent from my SM-A536U using Tapatalk

I can't quantify blade corrosion and edge destruction from water and soap scum left on the blade. Maybe if you use the blade for only 3-4 tines over a week, nothing that noticeable occurs.

My routine, just in case, is to remove the blade, wipe the scum off  with a micro fiber cloth. And then I pass the blade through a soft cork twice on each side. The stropping through the cork insures the edge is dry and clean. Maybe it removes any burrs or rough spots. Don't know - but i  get 3 nice shaves with any blade and my razors are pristine, shiny, and it pisses my wife off - cigars and shaving have proven to be very effective wife repellant tools.

Sent from my SM-A536U using Tapatalk

Do you smoke the cigars while shaving?

I can't quantify blade corrosion and edge destruction from water and soap scum left on the blade. Maybe if you use the blade for only 3-4 tines over a week, nothing that noticeable occurs.

My routine, just in case, is to remove the blade, wipe the scum off  with a micro fiber cloth. And then I pass the blade through a soft cork twice on each side. The stropping through the cork insures the edge is dry and clean. Maybe it removes any burrs or rough spots. Don't know - but i  get 3 nice shaves with any blade and my razors are pristine, shiny, and it pisses my wife off - cigars and shaving have proven to be very effective wife repellant tools.

Sent from my SM-A536U using Tapatalk

Think about this…the water wth who knows what and how many chemicals eats away microscopily “is that a word”?I don’t know the jargon”at the very edge of the steel,then you shave the next day and microscopically the blade develops microchipping,repeat and that’s why shavers get 2 to 3 shaves per blade..just my thoughts…try loosening,hot water rinse,blow hard both sides,retighten loosely,place on some absorbent paper…works great.there’s no way a blade dulls on whiskers that quickly,under 60 rockwell blade hardness will never chip easily,maybe 70-80 hardness.yea that microfibre cloth I once took off the etchings of an expensive tube power amp.microfibre is like sandpaper.

I can't quantify blade corrosion and edge destruction from water and soap scum left on the blade. Maybe if you use the blade for only 3-4 tines over a week, nothing that noticeable occurs.

My routine, just in case, is to remove the blade, wipe the scum off  with a micro fiber cloth. And then I pass the blade through a soft cork twice on each side. The stropping through the cork insures the edge is dry and clean. Maybe it removes any burrs or rough spots. Don't know - but i  get 3 nice shaves with any blade and my razors are pristine, shiny, and it pisses my wife off - cigars and shaving have proven to be very effective wife repellant tools.

Sent from my SM-A536U using Tapatalk

Do you smoke the cigars while shaving?  

While singing “nobody knows the troubles I’v seen…they usually refuse to cook for you…works every time.