Thread: Filarmonice double temple 7/8. A stor of love and hate.

So, hi again to all of you. I basically havent been around since -07!
That year i bought a filarmonica doble temple 7/8, didnt order it to be shave-ready from CS since i was a bit cocky after maintaining and keeping a good edge on my Dovo's.
I got the knife, dull as a beavertooth, started honing on my 4/8. Honing, honing, honing. Basically nothing happened, I could shave with it but it wasnt really pleasant, it was just endurable.
What i've done since -07 is to take it out 2-3 times/year giving it some detached honing. Same result every time. Didnt care that much since i had other straights i could maintain and get a good shave from.
Today I woke up kind of pissed, I had dreamt about my doble temple. Today it was here to haunt me. I felt the urge to tame this sucker once and for all.
Basically, what i did was:
1,2 k
50 circles with pressure
100 circles no pressure
4 k
50 circles no pressure
40 X no pressure
8 k
40 X no pressure
A pyramid on 4k/8k
Balsa green
50 X
Balsa red
50 X
Final strop.

After this straight to shaving with sandalwood cream applied with my badger. And this was a dream. Second best shave of my life (first with a straight will always be my #1)!
Im sitting here now, high on life with quite the lean skin after a 2-pass shave.
Why i couldnt get this one shave-ready i still dont know, I do think i didnt care enough when trying to get it done until today (besides my first time when I really put myself into it , but then I was way too bad at honing in general).
Im writing this little essay for 2 reasons.
* Thanks to all SRP's members for their discussions regarding Filarmonicas (especially gssixgun regarding honing in general) .
* Writing down the recipe that works for me on this particular straight with my tools.

When comparing to others i used quite the high number of strokes on each grit, perhaps that's an expression of my lack of skill compared to you honemeisters. But whatever, I got this piece of love/hate exactly where i wanted it eventually!

Sometimes I find it's best to walk away from a problem razor for a while. I was honing a Genco a few months ago that was giving me fits at the bevel setting stage, I basically worked it for more than half an hour without any ability to shave arm hair at all. I left it for 24 hours, and when I came back to it I had the bevel set in 5 minutes!

Congrats, though I must say that 4+ years is quite a while to walk away from a razor lol

Welcome back.
Glad to see that you had success at last.
Please stay and let us know of your experiences.

Hey, if you got it to shave ready and you love it that's all that counts. So you may have taken a little extra metal off....meh....what's a 7/8 for anyway!

Good for you

Originally Posted by Maxi

Hey, if you got it to shave ready and you love it that's all that counts. So you may have taken a little extra metal off....meh....what's a 7/8 for anyway!

Good for you

Haha, true that! With that said: The doble temple shaves superb as a 6/8 as well

Nice to hear it all went well.......in the end

Well done on sticking with it, paid off for you by the sounds of it.

Yeah, it certainly did! Already longing for next time