Gssixgun; yes, all the hones I listed in my progression are barber hones. It's hard to know what the grits really are, but the coarsest one seems like it's around 1k and the finest is around 10K or thereabouts. The coarse one is my bevel-setter. I always hone in an X-pattern because the hones are too small to hone any other way.

It's also true that I don't know what that red stuff is (or rather, was). I'm guessing ferric oxide, but it could have been anything.

There's no slack in my pasted strop because it's a loom strop set as tight as it will go.

Puffah, earlier in this thread sixgun suggested using the linen after honing to remove the wire edge, and it actually seems to work. But you're saying backhoning would be better? I've never tried that. But why is it bad to do it with the linen if it seems to work?

Now I'm twice as confused as when I started.

Confucius said a fanatic is someone who redoubles his efforts while losing sight of his goal, so let me restate the goal. The coarseness of my beard makes frequent touch-ups necessary. When I first started shaving, I'd do the touch-ups on the Lithide hone, but that would lead to a wire edge that would break off. Then I started doing touch-ups on Cr02. This was better than doing them on the hone. It didn't create a burr anymore. But it would eventually convex my edge into oblivion.

My third stab is now to revert to touching up on the Lithide hone, but to use the linen (1) to make touch-ups less frequent, and (2) to remove any wire edge that might result. I also might try stab #4: backhoning to remove the wire edge, and linen to reduce the frequency of touch-ups.

There are too many goddamn variables & I'm getting lost in them all.