Honing With Lapping Film

[rbscebu]

A cheaper and effective way to hone your straight razors (SR) is to use lapping film rather than expensive whetstones. Many users of expensive whetstones will scoff at this idea. They may be just trying to justify their outlay on expensive whetstones. Others just feel better inside using stones.

Lapping film can be used from setting the bevel right up to producing a great shave-ready edge. All you need is a set of lapping film sheets from 30μm to 1.0μm and suitable substrate.

Lapping film sheets can be purchased on line through AliExpress, eBay and Amazon. Get sheets without an adhesive backing. Cut each sheet lengthways into three equal-width pieces.

For a substrate, get a piece of cast acrylic 300mm x 75mm x 20mm to 30mm (preferred) thickness. This should be available from any good glazier. If not readily available, PM me and I will give you guidance on an alternative substrate.

To "attach" the film to the substrate, just wet the surface and lay the film on it. Make sure that there are no bubbles or any foreign matter under the film. Then just hone away with water as if you were using a 12" x 3" expensive whetstone.

One set of lapping film sheets (of three pieces per sheet) will last me for about 10 to 15 SR's from bevel-set to shave-ready.

 

[Bicep123]

For a substrate, get a piece of cast acrylic 300mm x 75mm x 20mm to 30mm (preferred) thickness. This should be available from any good glazier. If not readily available, PM me and I will give you guidance on an alternative substrate.

Online source for cast acrylic? For those who can't find a glazier within 5km of home .

Good tips. Thanks @rbscebu !

btw, what did you mean by honing with the stone in hand? I've been watching DrMatt and he does his stone honing on a flat surface.

 

[rbscebu]

I don't know of an on-line vendor of thick cast acrylic in AU, only in the US where shipping from would be a killer. If you want an alternative, look at the instructions for making balsa strops here in Annex A. You only need one substrate. In the "Composite" section, replace the balsa with 6mm to 8mm thick cast acrylic. Acrylic of that thickness is readily available on AliExpress, eBay and Amazon. You may have to get bigger than 300mm x 75mm and cut it to size with a fine-toothed saw.

DrMatt is very experienced at honing SR's. He understands what pressure to use when honing. I recommend that honing beginners hold the whetstone/substrate in their non-dominant hand hand when honing. This helps the blade to sit with even pressure and allows you to feel the pressure (usually excessive) that you are applying to the blade. Once you are experienced like DrMatt, you can try honing bench mounted.

After honing up about 30 SR's I then felt confident enough to do my rough honing towards bevel-set bench mounted. For final bevel-set and further edge refining, I still work hone-in-hand. I have only honed about 50 SR's now. If I get to 100 I might feel confident enough to do all bench mounted.

 

[rbscebu]

Lapping sheets generally come in a set of 7 from 30μm to 0.3μm. Do not use the 0.3μm. Many have tried and found that an edge off 0.3μm is not as comfortable as one off 0.5μm. I don't know and cannot explain why, just reporting on my and others' experience.

If you want to up the edge beyond 0.5μm (without going to diamond pasted balsa), after 0.5μm, finish your honing progression with a sheet of wet newspaper under the 0.5μm film. This will put a very slight convexity on the edge/bevel. Do not do this if you will be later going to diamond pasted balsa strops. The convexity will not allow the diamond paste on the balsa to properly do its magic.

If you do finish with wet newspaper under the 0.5μm film and later decide to refine the edge on diamond pasted balsa strops, you will first need to reset the bevel and progress through to the 0.5μm film before using the diamond pasted balsa.

 

[bald as]

Many users of expensive whetstones will scoff at this idea. They may be just trying to justify their outlay on expensive whetstones. Others just feel better inside using stones.

I'll just grab some popcorn while the children play with their wood and paper.

 

[rbscebu]

I'll just grab some popcorn while the children play with their wood and paper.

Lapping films is not for everyone but it's a cheap and relatively easy way to hone for a n00bie. They often later move on to more expensive synthetics and naturals. At least by then, they have a better understanding of honing, what they may need and what can be achieved.

Honing can often put a shaver off getting into SR shaving, particularly the expense involved. Lapping films can help overcome that hesitancy. I think that that is lapping films' main advantage.

 

[bald as]

You haven't mentioned the rivalry between "real honers" who use naturals and "pretenders" who use "synthetics" and then there are those who cannot decide at all.

By the way I'm not serious as I have and use both naturals and synthetics. I don't have a horse in the paper and wood race but I'm sure it works very well also.

I've contemplated doing a little piece on my own methods but in all seriousness a shave ready sharp razor only happens when the bevel and blade apex is accurately set and verified. Everything after that is icing on the cake and can be achieved with any or all of the above.

 

[Mastropiero]

Never tried it. When I got into SR shaving, and I wanted to learn to hone, I didn't even know lapping films existed. Bought myself three Shapton Glass stones (1k, 4k and 16k) and started learning on them.

I only got serious about it last year, that's when I got myself an 8k as well. After that I got an Escher, after that I scored a Coticule. By now I have honed, from scratch, probably around 40-50 razors, which means I am barely beginning to scratch the surface of it. I will stick to my stones, but I don't look down on lapping films. To each, their own.

At the moment I am very happy with my edges and, more importantly, so are those who buy razors from me. Still, a long way to consider I am mastering it.


For me it was the other way around. Started honing on my table, only much later did I find myself comfortable enough honing hand-held. Right now I find it much easier to control my movements hand-held than on a solid surface.

It is very much a never-ending learning curve.

 

[rbscebu]

Lapping sheets generally come in a set of 7 from 30μm to 0.3μm. Do not use the 0.3μm. Many have tried and found that an edge off 0.3μm is not as comfortable as one off 1.0μm. I don't know and cannot explain why, just reporting on my and others' experience.

If you want to up the edge beyond 1.0μm (without going to diamond pasted balsa), after 1.0μm, finish your honing progression with a sheet of wet newspaper under the 1.0μm film. This will put a very slight convexity on the edge/bevel. Do not do this if you will be later going to diamond pasted balsa strops. The convexity will not allow the diamond paste on the balsa to properly do its magic.

If you do finish with wet newspaper under the 1.0μm film and later decide to refine the edge on diamond pasted balsa strops, you will first need to reset the bevel and progress through to the 1.0μm film before using the diamond pasted balsa.

Corrected. In error, I wrote 0.5μm when it should have been 1.0μm.