Post by spidey9 on Jul 5, 2015 15:50:27 GMT -6
I have a new toy.
In my adventures with the Rolls and various wedge blades, I read of the Hanging Hair Test. This seemed subjective, confusing, and besides, I have few enough hairs on my head - I can't afford to be pulling them out!
Pictured above is not some sort of weird mechanical bug, but rather an inexpensive digital microscope, up to 200X, or so the manufacturer claims. Before moving on to my wedges, I decided to to take a look (a really close look!) at some popular modern blades. All images are of brand new never-used blades.
First, the famous Gem Stainless Steel PTFE:
The 3 facet edge can clearly be seen. Next, let's take a look at the Gem Blue Star carbon steel blade:
Okay so our first question is, are the generic blades sold by CVS the same? Lets take a look at the CVS blade:
Looks pretty close, but I'll leave it to the viewer to decide. And of course, looking at a two-dimensional picture doesn't tell us everything, or even very much about actual sharpness.
On to the next question. Ted Pella sells a blue carbon steel PAL blade in packages of 100 with "PAL" on the spine. Since they are advertised as 3 faceted blades, one would think that they would be okay for shaving. However, nearly everyone who has tried them (myself included) has found that they pull and tug like a box cutter blade. Looking at one:
While the 3 facets can still be seen, this looks very different from the other blades. The final facet on the blade edge is barely there, and the hone marks would seem to indicate that a more coarse stone (or whatever they use to sharpen the blade) was used.
Let's compare it to a PAL super blade, the blue blades sold in 5 and 10 packs with "009 RD" on the spine, and one of my favorite carbon steel blades:
Wow - even at a glance it can be seen that this is a completely different blade, much more like the Gem blades.
At under $25 from eBay, this little microscope has its limitations. The stand is quite light and flimsy, and it takes some fiddling around to get the images in focus. It has built-in LED's that illuminate the subject, but not always evenly or from the best angle. I was afraid that the VGA (640x480) resolution would be an issue, but it seems to be adequate for this purpose, and the small files make for easy uploading. All things considered, I think that it is a useful tool.
Next up: The Rolls, Wilkinson Empire, and wedge blades.
--Bob
In my adventures with the Rolls and various wedge blades, I read of the Hanging Hair Test. This seemed subjective, confusing, and besides, I have few enough hairs on my head - I can't afford to be pulling them out!
Pictured above is not some sort of weird mechanical bug, but rather an inexpensive digital microscope, up to 200X, or so the manufacturer claims. Before moving on to my wedges, I decided to to take a look (a really close look!) at some popular modern blades. All images are of brand new never-used blades.
First, the famous Gem Stainless Steel PTFE:
The 3 facet edge can clearly be seen. Next, let's take a look at the Gem Blue Star carbon steel blade:
Okay so our first question is, are the generic blades sold by CVS the same? Lets take a look at the CVS blade:
Looks pretty close, but I'll leave it to the viewer to decide. And of course, looking at a two-dimensional picture doesn't tell us everything, or even very much about actual sharpness.
On to the next question. Ted Pella sells a blue carbon steel PAL blade in packages of 100 with "PAL" on the spine. Since they are advertised as 3 faceted blades, one would think that they would be okay for shaving. However, nearly everyone who has tried them (myself included) has found that they pull and tug like a box cutter blade. Looking at one:
While the 3 facets can still be seen, this looks very different from the other blades. The final facet on the blade edge is barely there, and the hone marks would seem to indicate that a more coarse stone (or whatever they use to sharpen the blade) was used.
Let's compare it to a PAL super blade, the blue blades sold in 5 and 10 packs with "009 RD" on the spine, and one of my favorite carbon steel blades:
Wow - even at a glance it can be seen that this is a completely different blade, much more like the Gem blades.
At under $25 from eBay, this little microscope has its limitations. The stand is quite light and flimsy, and it takes some fiddling around to get the images in focus. It has built-in LED's that illuminate the subject, but not always evenly or from the best angle. I was afraid that the VGA (640x480) resolution would be an issue, but it seems to be adequate for this purpose, and the small files make for easy uploading. All things considered, I think that it is a useful tool.
Next up: The Rolls, Wilkinson Empire, and wedge blades.
--Bob