Remington F 510 F5 Titanium > Reviews > Excellent shave RUINED by design flaws

Author's product rating:   

Durability	Good
Quality of shave	Excellent
Value for money	Poor

Advantages:	Great clean shave, quick charge time, funky colours
Disadvantages:	Design and position of on/off button is infuriating !

Recommend to potential buyers:

no

Full review

I used to have an old Remington shaver and since that lasted about 4 years before it finally gave up the ghost, I decided to go for another. I plumped for the F510 F5 because it was on special offer at Amazon, so I got it for £29.99! Extra features for no extra cost were a big lure I have to say! Normally the Titanium series shavers come in at over £60, which would be a bit much on my budget. But let's see what you get for the extra money.

The main selling point is that the F510 uses Titanium coated foils, which is meant to give a better "cutting performance" and they're supposed to last longer. Initially I was quite sceptical as I don't believe anything can replace the feel of a wet shave, but I was surprised! These titanium foils are brilliant! The overall shave is much smoother, and over about 6 months I've not noticed any significant drop off in performance. I've also noticed that my skin isn't quite as irritated as after a wet shave, which must be a good thing.

On the downside, I don't really think the foils make any difference to shaving time. It's neither faster or slower with titanium coating from what I've experienced.

Let's talk about the "intercept trimmer". Remington have positioned this so that it cuts away the longer hair before the foil gets to work. In my experience you always need to go back, even with these special features. While this trimmer does get some hairs out of the way before the foil, it doesn't shift nearly enough of them to make much difference. The thing is, it's quite tricky to keep it at the right angle when you're concentrating on the foil too, so you just end up going back to get the other hairs.

There's also a big downside to the trimmer position. Longer hairs can very easily get trapped between the trimmer and the main body of the shaver. Because there's precious little clearance between the two, I end up having to stop and shake it around to clear the hairs. When you slide the trimmer back when you've finished using it, hairs also get caught underneath. It's a pain to have to clean that up just so you can retract the trimmer easily! Perhaps this is why it's made to be washable.

Very good points about this shaver now. The charge time is great - around 1 hour for 50-60 mins usage. The design is quite funky with a blue/silver colour scheme, and it fits quite comfortably in the hand, though it's a bit on the heavy side. It is also meant to automatically adjust to different voltages, so that you can safely use it abroad. That should mean that taking it on holiday won't ruin the battery life (which has happened to me before), though I haven't tried this feature out yet.

There is also a 2 year guarantee from the manufacturer, though going on past experience, you probably won't need to use this!

Unfortunately this is a super shaver spoiled by one absolutely unforgivable thing: the position of the on/off button.

Such is the design of the button that the slightest of brushes with my thumb turns the thing off. I only have to move the position of my hand even slightly up or down the shaver, and it will turn off. The button is not raised up or set into the body of the shaver, and it's very sensitive. Clearly it's a design fault. It drives me nuts! I've tried moving my thumb away from the button, but it just feels very uncomfortable that way.

You may want to seek out an F510 to try holding it without your thumb covering the on/off button, but I recommend you don't bother and buy something else!