Rather than even a "small section" of the blade and spine touching the rod, the blade would only be touching the rod in two points. As small as you can get. Absolutely even bevels and hone wear as well.

I experimented with a similar method over a year ago. I used 1" wood dowels and varying grits of PSA and non-PSA honing films all the way to the .5 micron chrome ox film. I have to hand it to you. I did not get satisfactory results. Bar none, this method ensures that no matter how "twisted", warped, uneven, unflat a razor is, the bevel and spine on both sides will be honed evenly. It's the edge quality I couldn't get to be where I needed it.

IIRC at the time Randy Tuttle had cautioned that finesse is needed to hone this way since the weight of the blade is magnified on the two points of contact much greater than when the blade's weight is dispersed across the length (or most of the length) of the blade on a flat hone.

In theory, I thought honing on a cylinder or rod would be the ultimate hone since you could evenly hone ANY razor with any type of problem, no matter how severe and have both the bevels and the spine make total contact with the rod for the entire stroke.

Why it didn't work for me I can't say. I probably didn't experiment enough with it.

Chris L