My second restore - EverReady 650 solid handle

I am fairly new to the DE wet shaving (a few months), but I did try it about 20 years ago or so. Back when you could buy an Ever-Ready brush at CVS. I have had an old Ever-Ready C40 around forever from those days. When I started wet shaving this time I restored the C40 with a pure black badger knot I was gifted. This was a practice run and it turned out pretty well. So I snatched up an old Ever-Ready 650PB, which seems to be a higher grade brush. Original loft was Pure Badger and the handle is solid plastic of some sort. Really nice and heavy. Kindof like the old classic chess pieces. The handle cleaned up nicely, but had some brownish-yellow spots at the bottom. Probably from a heat source. I installed a TGN Finest knot in the handle set at about 49mm. The knot hole is 22mm. Here are some pictures.

Original brush
   

Old knot partially removed
   

Knot drilled out
   

   

   

Knot arrives
   

   

Dry fit - too high
   

Hole adjusted, another dry fit - good
   

All glued in. The spots add character.
   

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Here are some pictures of the brush after the initial cleaning and test leather.

Loaded with Proraso
   

Whipped up
   

Blooming
   

Nice looking brush!

Nicely done! That handle is a beauty!

Great work!

Beautiful work and great looking brush!

Great looking brush!

Great photos.

You're going to like that Finest knot.

Excellent work and detailed photos!

Niiiiice! Really well done!

My friend,thats a gorgeous brush!Well done,sir.

(05-29-2012, 12:36 AM)Teiste Wrote: My friend,thats a gorgeous brush!Well done,sir.

IMPRESSIVE!

Thank you, all, for the compliments. I really love this brush now. First few shaves with it were a bit disappointing because it felt too soft and too dense for my liking. Felt like a sponge, not a brush. After about a week, though it became just fantastically good. It loosened up in the density enough to feel like a brush. It's still super soft at tips, but my idea of keeping the loft short to maintain backbone and the fact that the finest has stiff hair paid off and the backbone on the brush is very good. So, I got great backbone with very soft tips and lathering ability to be reckoned with. It ended up becoming one of only two badgers I now use (the other one is Wee Scot, which was an inspiration for this restore in terms of attributes).

Beautiful looking handle, and very nice job on the restoration

Have to agree on The Golden Nib - Finest Badger Knots, they really are excellent value for money and offer top notch performance...