Field guide · 01
Loading a
half-DE blade.
Two minutes, dry hands. The blade is sharper than you expect, and most cut fingers happen here rather than on the face.
Snapping the blade
The razor takes half of a standard double-edge safety razor blade. You snap a full one in two:
- Leave the blade in its paper wrapper. Never snap a bare blade.
- Fold the wrapper along the blade’s centre line, following the slot.
- Press down evenly through the paper. It breaks cleanly at the middle.
- Unwrap the half you want, holding the blunt spine only — never the edge, never the corners.
Do it over a table, not the sink, where half a blade can vanish down the plughole.
Seating it
- Dry hands. Always.
- Open the brass plate away from the handle.
- Lay the half-blade in the holder, edge outward, spine against the back of the holder.
- Close the plate over it.
Checking it
Look straight down the length of the closed plate. The edge should sit parallel to the plate and protrude evenly along its whole length. If it is crooked, open it and seat it again.
Do not shave with a crooked blade. A blade that will not sit straight no matter what you do is a fault worth returning — through Amazon, where the sale happened.
Unloading
Open the plate, tip the blade out onto a surface, pick it up by the spine and drop it into a blade bank or a sealed rigid tin. Never loose in a household bin.
Next: your first folding razor · blade types. Something wrong here? cutthroatcarteluk@gmail.com