What the hell happened to GSB blades?

[Drew71]

Well I’m very relieved to say the single wrapped GSB’s are every bit as good as they used to be. Used one this morning in my new Final Cut and it was excellent just like its double wrapped counterpart. Massive sigh of relief as I really do enjoy these blades. Slightly better than the excellent Nacet in my opinion. Panic over.

 

[PLANofMAN]

Usually we find out later that the user shortcutted somewhere, e.g., shorter prep time, etc. When I do all things equal I can perceive little if any difference amongst top tier blades.

I think you might be right on this. In 25 years of wet shaving, mostly with DE blades, I've never gotten a dud blade. Bad blades, yes. I remember Bluebirds as being particularly bad.

In the QC process, the blades are stacked on each other, and any defects in the edge are readily identifiable as white spots, much like checking a straight razor's apex for a proper bevel set.

I have had one or two blades crack in half on me before, because the middle was hardened too much, but that's it.

If anyone's curious as to how I know this, I've researched blade manufacturing, and I own one of these...
The black 'bar' is hundreds of NOS Gillette Super Blue Blades.