Pumped About My New Hair! Pictures Attached.

[deg_dilemma]

Hi all

So I have been wearing for I guess 2 years or so now. It's felt much longer than that but looking back at my pictures, I wish I had started 2 or 3 years earlier so that the transition would have been less obvious.

Every new system has been a learning experience. I paid £hundreds for my first system to be ordered and cut-in, and then I deliberately pushed it as hard as I could (holiday in the sun, swimming, tweezering the hairline, cutting the base off to change the hairline shape etc.). I pretty much ruined it and looking back at the pics I realise how awful it looked! But I learned a lot and I would always advise guys to push the boundaries and learn as much as you can because this hair is going to be on your head pretty much 24/7 and you have to learn to deal with it.

I have been through only 4 systems in those 2 years - always UTS - and with each one I experimented and made changes to make the hair more "mine". My first 2 systems were stock and now I am wearing custom pieces - and what a difference it makes.

I am really happy with my latest system. Pics attached - don't mind the hair style, the hair is still puffy and needs to settle down, and I deliberately pushed the hair back for you to see the results. The hairline is what I wanted to concentrate on this time.

Anyway I'm talking too much as I always do. To cut a long story short, the big change with this system is that we ordered the front in a lighter colour and then dyed it to a shade of off-black, but made sure not to get dye down to the roots (and obviously not on the base!). The reason I did this is that black hair v-loops can look awful and too obvious. It's even worse when the hair breaks and leaves a dark black 'root' exposed on the base. We seem to have fixed this problem now.

The other changes are that the rest of the hair is a mix of black and dark brown and some gray thrown in. This mix of colours breaks the hair up so that it doesn't look like like 'lego' hair. And the hairline shape is more v-shaped to give some impression of slight-recession. The density is light so that it suits my age a bit more.

I'm quite sure this piece won't last as long as previous ones, but I am in awe of how good it's turned out. Plenty of thanks to my very adept salon stylist too.

Still always learning, but getting closer to my own perfect piece.

 

[BaldBearded]

Wow... perfect hairline.

 

[grincher]

So good, its unreal but real

 

[Noah]

Excellent job Deg. I can't see a thing, no matter how close I look. You've really aced it.

 

[ChromeyFirefox]

This is simply amazing. I really can't pick fault with it. The extra recession really does make it look good.

Good job.

 

[Manny007]

man the frontal part is perfect...very natural...excellent results...enjoy ur new look

 

[deg_dilemma]

Just so that we can compare, I have added some pics here which show my hairline on previous systems over the past 2 years. The hairline was always too harsh for me to be able to expose much of it, so I would usually go for a semi-covered hairline style.

I've also added a couple more pics of my latest system, in my original post above.

I hope that this gives hope to the guys out there who are struggling with their systems. It's taken me 2 years to get to this point and yet I'm still learning. And certainly sharing ideas with everyone here has been so helpful - thanks guys.

I've already got some more ideas for my next piece

 

[Diesel guy]

The hairline is so make-it or break-it. I still struggle getting the hairline I want every time. Your last photos are fantastic - and I like how you comb your hair over. I know what I'm looking at, and I didn't see a thing. You ordered this one with a graduated hairline I am assuming?

 

[Mystery411]

Bro, that may be one of the best (perhaps the best) hairlines I’ve seen. Incredible!

 

[crikey1980]

Wow...... As someone who doesn't wear a hair system, that is amazing realism.

 

[deg_dilemma]

The hairline is so make-it or break-it. I still struggle getting the hairline I want every time. Your last photos are fantastic - and I like how you comb your hair over. I know what I'm looking at, and I didn't see a thing. You ordered this one with a graduated hairline I am assuming?

Thanks Diesel and thanks everyone else too. The hairstyle will change.. at the moment the hair is new and puffy, so needs to settle down, but yes I have liked the combover style too.

Yes the hairline is graduated, though with the method I used it actually looks a little too thin in some lighting conditions (like bright sunshine) because the roots/v-loops are very light brown and the illusion is that the hair is thinner. I might go for a slightly higher density in the front next time.

The hard part was getting to this stage, and now having been through it I think it's not too difficult to get the result now, but then again I had an awesome stylist!

I have concerns that this system might not last me long. Normally I can get a good 5 or 6 months out of a UTS - with some maintenance like snipping away 'dead' UTS - so I am interested to see how long this one lasts.

 

[Nostab2]

Wow, how do you get the hairline like that? Who do you order from?

 

[Baldrik]

Amazing!!

 

[deg_dilemma]

@deg_dilemma looks great.

Btw, why won't you put up a tutorial or post a guide here so people can also get that hairline, you could help many.

I thought I had made it quite clear in my post above: it's where I mention buying the hairpiece in a lighter colour at the front, and then dyeing it to your colour.

But if have any specific questions then just let me know and i'll do my best to help.

 

[Baldrik]

Are you allowed to share the name of the salon?

 

[deg_dilemma]

Are you allowed to share the name of the salon?

Hi Baldrick, it's in the South East of the UK. I will PM you.

 

[jabberwocky]

Darn that's amazing! what does your maintenance routine look like?

 

[deg_dilemma]

Darn that's amazing! what does your maintenance routine look like?

Hi JW, thanks.

Maintenance on UTS is pretty simple. I choose the refit every 7 to 10 days, at home. I use a single layer of bond all over so that the bond is strong enough for these few days only. I follow what others have recommended on here before: dishwashing liquid, maybe some isopropyl alcohol (sometimes). Not much else really. Mostly the glue just rolls off after 7 days or so.

The hairline is the tricky bit. I find it looks great for 2 days, and then maybe I can get away with it on the 3rd day... but by the 4th day it needs to be cleaned up and re-bonded so that it looks good again.

I am thinking of trying G2B Glued (the hair styling gel) to use as the 'glue' on my hairline. Then I could do the maintenance on this small bit every morning and hopefully have a nice clean hairline every day.

I will say that UTS is only ever "perfect" for a few weeks, maybe 2 months or so. After that I doubt the hairline can look so good, because of the UTS becoming harder over time. I don't know why this happens but it's probably natural wastage of the plastic and build-up of dirt and glue etc.

 

[cottonReville]

@deg_dilemma What's the difference between the first set of pics & the second set?

In the first set, that's the best toupee I've ever seen, would never even question it. It's UNUSUAL. WOW. Congrats.

The second, if I look carefully, I can see the skin of the piece's being differently colored than your own skin & it doesn't look as unusually realistic as the first set. Either way, who cares - I doubt ppl can tell.

 

[deg_dilemma]

@deg_dilemma What's the difference between the first set of pics & the second set?

In the first set, that's the best toupee I've ever seen, would never even question it. It's UNUSUAL. WOW. Congrats.

The second, if I look carefully, I can see the skin of the piece's being differently colored than your own skin & it doesn't look as unusually realistic as the first set. Either way, who cares - I doubt ppl can tell.

Hi @cottonReville. I posted the 2nd set to show how previous systems were, before I learned about this method of dyeing the hair.

I was never really happy with these previous systems, it never really felt like my own hair and I was fooling myself psychologically into believing they looked fine. And I guess they did look 'fine' but that's not good enough, which is why I constantly tinkered with changes over the past 2 years.

The major differences between my latest system (pics in 1st post above) and older systems (2nd set of pics) are:-
1. Buying with hairline in light colour and dyeing it, carefully to avoid the bottom of the shaft and of course the base.
2. Adding more grey hair to match my age better
3. On rest of the hair (i.e. not hairline), mixing in some dark brown and grey with the black, to throw off the colours and create 'breaks' in the hair. This gets rid of that all-over single colour blocky look.

I'm still tinkering and have outlined changes to my next system already.