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Found a strop-sell-in-page ! All I can glean is that I can spend a little and get a useless waste of effort and money or take out a second mortgage and buy the "best" and still end up with a useless strop that may also drive me away from the good straight razor experience, Ugh! Really looking for some middle newbie suggestions here. Want to use a fine stone purchased at an antique store. My razors are pretty old also but look new. Suggestions ? Red
If you buy from a quality vendor you will get a quality strop no matter the price. As long as it's a quality piece of leather with no imperfections and smooth it will do it's job. More expensive strops look nice and make you feel better when you use them but the razor, he doesn't care.
Where are you from, maybe we can point you in a few directions.
Sounds like you are going full bore into the unknown. You haven't shaved with a straight yet and your going to hone a razor to use ?
SRD paddle strops are real nice and you can replace what you mess up. (and you will) You should get 1 razor honed by a pro to give yourself half a chance at the good experience your after.
What sort of budget did you have in mind?
Larry at whipped dog has inexpensive strops that seem to be well received by users. Star shaving has a big daddy strop that is also supposed to be very good value too.
I cant personally endorse either as I use a strop that I made at home.
The advice previously given is all good too, so I won't bother repeating any of it.
All the best ed.
Thanks all for the quick comebacks . I live in St.Pete.Fla. I currently use an old double edge . Gave a Rollers, the one in the chrome case with a build-in stone, 40 years ago but couldn't make a go of it . Stuck with the Gillette, the one with the "magic"dial. Now at 63 I seek another change. Some of the posts I've read state when learning this new art one must "slow down". Well I'm retired now ain't I! Anyway a close shave might just be the thing to turn on my bride of 33 years! I have been "drawn" to a 3"wide strop but is a cowhide ok? Is the canvas to be a "special" kind? dressing? Maybe a used strop? Some say they have multiable razors and strops. The only things I do in "multiples" in are dogs and rangefinder cameras!
I bought a pretty inexpensive "big daddy" (no, I'm not kidding!) strop from Whipped Dog that's been working great. You only need more than one strop if you're planning on treating them with oxide pastes(you don't need to, in the early stages.
With all this gear, you can go all out and mortgage the house, but you can do pretty well with minimal gear. I work with two razors, that Big Daddy strop and a barber's hone.
Red, It would help if you could fill in a little more detail or a link to a web page for the strop. Also give us some idea what your budget is. With this we can make a better judgement on the strop you're drawn to and make other suggestions based on your budget. We're kind of shooting in the dark here.
So the quick clean answer is....Get a shave ready razor from a reputable seller. The strop ....Go cheap because this has a learning curve that will leave cuts and gashes in the leather until you learn it. I bought a piece of horse hide online and glued it to a piece of wood. (paddle strop) Tandy has strap leather that you can hand pick. Smooth is the best. The smoother the better. Truth is you don't need much else to get started other than soap and a brush which you can pick up at the local CVS for 12 bucks. The rest is a matter of want verses cash on hand :<0)