It Shaves Better, It Even Sounds Better

[canyonwalker]

This week I received the replacement parts I ordered for my 10 year old electric shaver. They're a pair of blades (there are two inside the shaver) and a cutting screen.



Removing the worn parts and snapping these in took less than a minute. I tried the shaver out after that and it cuts much closer now. One or two passes leaves the skin on my face smooth. Previously I had to shave over the same area 4-5 times.

The shaver even sounds sharper. 😅 The blades make a higher pitched sound as if they're moving faster... possibly because there's less friction with the screen.



So far I'm glad I spent the ~$50 to refresh this shaver. $50 is a big fraction of the original $75 I paid to buy the shaver 10 years ago... though a smaller fraction of the $125-150 it would cost to replace today. It's a good case of repair vs. replace.

As parts for this older shaver become harder to find and more expensive I wondered if I should buy ahead with a second and even a third parts kit. I decided against that. I figure by the time my need for the next parts kit comes around in a few years, the shaver's battery might be kaput (unable to hold a charge very long) or some of the plastic switchgear might be broken. At that point I'd have to buy a new shaver anyway.

Comments

[some_other_dave]

I bought a replacement blade and foil for my electric shaver. It was off-brand, because I figured it wouldn't matter much.

I was wrong. The replacement had fewer holes in the foil, so it took much much longer to actually have any effect on my facial hair. I returned it and ordered a foil and blade from the same manufacturer as the shaver. Which worked much better.

[canyonwalker]

Yeah, I'm always a little skeptical when buying third-party parts unless they're OEM. In this case there wasn't an off-brand alternative to consider. Though I did have to read carefully to ensure I was buying the correct replacement bits. That's one place where having good pictures online helped, because there was a kit for a different line of Panasonic shavers that erroneously matched my search for the model number I own. In scrutinizing the pics I could tell that it wasn't right. The screen had 5 sections to it versus the 4 on my shaver.