Description
The Dovo Best Quality 126803810 (old model no. 100681) 6/8″ width carbon steel razor is their basic offering with round point and celluloid handle. There’s nothing fancy, just a great blade without the frills; an ideal beginner’s tool. It has a stabilizer within the scales preventing ‘closing’ too deeply & providing suitably enduring spacing. This razor’s ~5mm thick at spine and weighs ~57 grams. It is a full hollow ground razor, the most common grind style and the ultimate preference of a majority of users.
6/8″ Size
This Best Quality 100681 is a 6/8″ razor, thicker at the tang (the part held while shaving) and wider from spine to edge than a 5/8″ razor. Whether one’s better served in their maiden voyage choosing 5/8 or 6/8 is a well divided issue as benefits/drawbacks are present for each. I advise to choose based on one’s fingertips’ girth and overall hand size; large, thick hands feel at home with a 6/8″, while if one does not have such mitts they’re better with a 5/8″ razor. A 6/8″ obstructs more of the mirror, and while this may seem trivial, you’ll be surprised how much extra the +1/8″ obstructs when shaving around the mouth once you begin. There are many 5/8″ Dovo models, and many from other marques, but in the classic style of 6/8″ razor with shoulder Dovo only offers this entry level version here in 2021.
Celluloid Scales
The celluloid scales on Dovo’s Best Quality 6/8 are extra tight and fragile. Squeaky tight, they come; much tighter than all competition, and that does help when learning. While this handle will not break without your help, three things break this razor’s handles that will not affect in any way the other models. Read on, dear, for you will learn what you must (not) do.
Be Careful!
Never apply pressure to the pivot point upon the scales of this Dovo Best Quality 100681 (especially easy to do when stropping), never open this razor >240°, and NEVER use any solvents (including isopropyl alcohol!) near the pivot! Doing any of these things, even once, will break these scales. If you never do any of them, they will never break. This saves a lot of money, and gives a “newbie” a tighter razor – if that is a good trade for you, only you can decide.
“Shave Ready”?
This business is wholly centered upon the sale of one hollow ground straight razor to one shaver one at a time; “1 str8rzr alone” is ~50% of all our orders. You may elect to have your Best Quality with factory edge or further honed by ‘TSS’, as only you see fit; there is not a right or wrong answer. ‘TSS’ rather doubts the worth of debating this ‘Shave Ready’ concept today; anyone can bandy that term about as if objective, meaningful information (like a sprinter’s time), but in fact it is completely subjective.
If you elect for the factory edge, you’ll receive your razor exactly as its manufacturers intended…pretty simple!
If you elect for The Superior Shave to further hone your razor, this ‘BQ’ shall be honed in the manner taught in 2016 to The Superior Shave’s proprietor by two kind Solingen master grinders (whom did/do not work for Dovo, but do use similar 1840s grinders’ textbooks methods). Regardless of their poor refinement compared to further-honed ‘Honemeister’ edges on offer, some physical elements of factory edges [specifically, their flexibility and effective cutting angle] remain superior to most further honing attempts. The Superior Shave will devote the extra time to your razor a dying industry cannot afford in overhead, without taking away the factory edge’s inherently advantaged geometric metrics. We’re confident we offer the materially thinnest further-honed-by-vendor edge available for purchase – you’ll need to try that to understand why it matters. Please note: in the professional opinions of German and French razor grinders, a straight razor is not properly honed unless flush to the hone, without tape, so visual evidence of honing is unavoidable when honing is performed correctly according to its makers.
We hone with a method best coined as “the opposite of tape“ where a hone’s geometry’s wholly catered to performance of the razor and to no other concern. Unfortunately, this topic cannot be discussed upon any English-based straight-razor-centric forum because a select group of e-enthusiasts cannot abide such open discourse. Be encouraged to think for yourself, and let your beard and sense of touch be the judge; there is a lot of misinformation out there, much purportedly from experts! We wish you good shopping, and Happy Shaving.
