The goal has been reached, 100 shaves on a single DE blade and a single puck of modern Williams soap. Last year I was able to make it to 105 shaves with a vintage puck of Williams. In that instance it “just kinda happened” as I was not taking measures to conserve per say, but just enjoying good shaves.
So what is the difference this time around? Well lets talk about some of the tips and tricks I’ve been employing.
Firstly after 100 shaves how much soap do we have left? This appears to be about 1/3 of the puck left to go (pic is before todays shave, so technically 99 shaves there). I would easily estimate that there are 30 plus shaves here, possibly 50. I’m not giving up on this one yet, just because we’ve hit the pre-set goal.
How have we been working to conserve soap you may ask? I have discussed this a bit in the thread, but lets get into some details;
- DO NOT RINSE YOUR BRUSH! : For those using a brush and actually building a lather, it is way too easy to just wash good soap down the sink by rinsing your brush out at the end of your shave. I am using a synthetic brush, to help reduce the possibility of something getting moldy/wet-dog/ewww during the use case. At this point I’m pretty sure I could run a week of shaves off just what is stored in the brush alone.
- Build a lather, and put extra back in the bowl: So I have been building a lather by barely dipping the tips of the brush in the sink, then turning the tips upwards to allow the water to move into the brush, one swirl or so on the puck, and then face lather. Once built I then use the brush to somewhat tame down the thickness of things, and almost smooth off excess lather, leaving a nice thin layer, and then scraping that back into the bowl to not lose it or overuse it. I am very confident this has helped increase my longevity.
- Re-use shaved lather: Yep you heard that right. My super secret, has been when I run my first pass (maybe even second), I snag the built up lather from underneath the razor and slap it back on my face. Sure there are some whisker bits in there, but this is the “Ultimate Minimalists Competition” is it not?
- Shave with residual slickness: Pass 3 has been nothing but a bit of water and the left over slickness of Williams on my face for about 60-70 of these shaves. Sometimes if I get enough re-used lather I can do it for passes 2 and 3.
But what about the blade? I have been using a single Gillette Nacet in a pre-war Tech for this entire run. What do I think I’ve learned?
- Dry/wipe your razor: I typically use my towel to wipe off the razor head (top and bottom) to help dry it out. Is this helping? Maybe? It isn’t hurting
- Don’t switch setups: Once things are aligned and set, it just seemed very easy to keep shaving. Until today I hadn’t opened the razor at all, but I wanted to check on the blade for this thread.
- Mild is wild: Good mild razors allow for me wanting to push a bit now that this blade isn’t as sharp as it once was. Still great, easy, and comfortable shaving.
At this point, I’ve now switched out my Tech handle with a heavier Maggards MR5 handle, just cause I had the opportunity to do so. I may switch the blade into another razor at some point just to test the “don’t switch setups” theory and see what happens. Otherwise there are more shaves to be had, and I’m going to keep on doing them.
Thanks
@Spider for a helluva fun competition idea. It is certainly the longest I have documented a single soap/blade setup, and it is cool to know not just that it can be done, but that I can do it.
