Geo F Trumper Limes Shaving Soap

Azatadine

Bought a puck of this soap. I have never come across such a bad shaving product. I just could not get a lather out of it. Turned to bubbles almost straight away.

I'll try it again tomorrow to see if its improved after a day of sitting with some water but I think it's the worst shaving product I've ever used by a long way. Even if I got a bad lather, it actually disappeared completely on my face! Could not even see where I'd shaved or not shaved a few seconds before!

Has anybody else used it?

beardybrewer

I haven't used that soap myself, but a little hot water on top while you soak your brush is a good place to start with a triple milled soap. Shake out your brush so it's quite dry and load up. From your description it sounds like maybe you didn't load up enough. Use a stiff bristled brush. Get the brush and the soap good and hot so you can really dig in. Start face lathering across the whole face for 30 or so seconds. Now start adding water but just a drop or two at a time and keep lathering. Make sure you lather across the whole face and not just one spot so all the lather is a similar amount of water in it.

Keep in mind you are looking for the soap's "sweet spot". Every soap has one and a shave on either side of that window, too dry or too wet, results in a bad shave. Some soaps have a notoriously small window while other are a mile wide. Sometimes with a new soap I'll purposely take the lather from too dry through it's sweet spot until it is too wet just to find out how small the sweet spot is. Work up the lather for a good 4+ minutes. And if it's not working, it's not so precious you should suffer a bad shave. Just rinse it up and try again. Don't be afraid to practice or find another product that's easier/faster for you.

Azatadine

I'll give it another go. I did look up reviews yesterday and the soap has horrible reviews. Same experiences as mine. Apparently it used to be good but it was changed from tallow about 5 years ago. I've never seen anything like it. It may look like a decent lather for about half a minute and then it turns to bath suds.

I'll start from a dryer spot and add water slowly but I'm not confident that I'll work out for me. Scent is nice and even though the lather is poor, the layer that's left does feel kinda slick.

Azatadine

Jaysus....this stuff is strange. I soaked it in hot water for about 15 mins and tried three different brushes (boar, badger and synthetic). Sqieezed out the water from the brushes, tried damp brushes and actually used the puck like a shave stick. Crap every time. Just disintegrated to bath style bubbles every time and turns to a film on everything. Even the puck itself loses all lather consistency after about 30 secs and looks like a wet bar of soap.....

Strange! I'm pretty seasoned with both creams and soaps but never saw this even from budget products.

adrian522

I had the same experience with it, ended up just using it as a very expensive bar of soap. Nick shaves had the same result with it.

Azatadine

adrian522 wrote: »

I had the same experience with it, ended up just using it as a very expensive bar of soap. Nick shaves had the same result with it.

They do themselves damage having stuff that's not fit for purpose on the market! Bad from a reputation point of view.

Wiggles88

Yeah I have one of their soaps somewhere around here. The scent is alright but no lather to speak of. Crap stuff altogether

Azatadine

Funnily enough, their Limes cream is not far from a soap itself. Fantastic lather from a small amount of the cream.

p2p2p

Azatadine wrote: »

Bought a puck of this soap. I have never come across such a bad shaving product. I just could not get a lather out of it. Turned to bubbles almost straight away.

I'll try it again tomorrow to see if its improved after a day of sitting with some water but I think it's the worst shaving product I've ever used by a long way. Even if I got a bad lather, it actually disappeared completely on my face! Could not even see where I'd shaved or not shaved a few seconds before!

Has anybody else used it?

I have the Sandalwood version and mine's the same, utterly useless.

beardybrewer wrote: »

I haven't used that soap myself, but a little hot water on top while you soak your brush is a good place to start with a triple milled soap. Shake out your brush so it's quite dry and load up. From your description it sounds like maybe you didn't load up enough. Use a stiff bristled brush. Get the brush and the soap good and hot so you can really dig in. Start face lathering across the whole face for 30 or so seconds. Now start adding water but just a drop or two at a time and keep lathering. Make sure you lather across the whole face and not just one spot so all the lather is a similar amount of water in it.

Keep in mind you are looking for the soap's "sweet spot". Every soap has one and a shave on either side of that window, too dry or too wet, results in a bad shave. Some soaps have a notoriously small window while other are a mile wide. Sometimes with a new soap I'll purposely take the lather from too dry through it's sweet spot until it is too wet just to find out how small the sweet spot is. Work up the lather for a good 4+ minutes. And if it's not working, it's not so precious you should suffer a bad shave. Just rinse it up and try again. Don't be afraid to practice or find another product that's easier/faster for you.

That's some good advice but I think this soap is seriously broken

Azatadine wrote: »

Apparently it used to be good but it was changed from tallow about 5 years ago. It may look like a decent lather for about half a minute and then it turns to bath suds.

Same, I got what I thought was a shaveable lather a few times but it just vanished shortly after, just bath suds.
Don't think tallows the problem, see below...

Azatadine wrote: »

Jaysus....this stuff is strange. I soaked it in hot water for about 15 mins and tried three different brushes (boar, badger and synthetic). Sqieezed out the water from the brushes, tried damp brushes and actually used the puck like a shave stick. Crap every time. Just disintegrated to bath style bubbles every time and turns to a film on everything. Even the puck itself loses all lather consistency after about 30 secs and looks like a wet bar of soap.....

Strange! I'm pretty seasoned with both creams and soaps but never saw this even from budget products.

I've tried a few Boar brushes and a synthetic that'll lather everything else I have fine.

Apparently what happened was Geo F Trumper USED to use Potassium Palmate, which produced a fine lather, but some genius, probably just in the door, decided they'd change a 140 year old recipe to Sodium Palmate instead and the soap is now impossible to lather.

Azatadine

I dont understand how they keep making this flawed product. It surely must damage their reputation. Imagine if you were dipping your toes with making your own lather and your first experience was with this stuff.....

hitemfrank

Azatadine wrote: »

I dont understand how they keep making this flawed product. It surely must damage their reputation. Imagine if you were dipping your toes with making your own lather and your first experience was with this stuff.....

I share your sentiment on this. You should try Penhaligons shave soap if you want a truly terrible soap in proportion to the companies reputation. A big name in men's fragrances and the shave soap is horrific.

I've a puck of Penhaligons English Fern (once one of the best performing soaps around) and it's just crap. I bought it at less than half price in a sale and I still feel conned.

Makes a nice soap for using in the shower though.

Azatadine

Dammit.....resurrecting an old thread that I started about Geo F Trumper shaving soap....I forgot how bad it is....

Bought some sandalwood (Trumper) shaving soap by accident and its just as bad as it was years ago. Absolutely the pits. Weak, foamy, rubbish lather that only last a few seconds before disappearing completely. I can shave with it if I run around my face real quick before it disappears but it's just shocking stuff.

Grated some of it down but still rubbish. Guess it'll just be a nice smelling bath soap.