Thread: Strop Between Passes?

After 3 weeks with a shavette, I'm 3 shaves in with a straight. Doing my usual 3 pass WTG, XTG, ATG. I'm doing great with just a weeper or two each time and fairly smooth results. ATG seemed to offer a lot of resistance, until I did 20 laps then, voila!, it mowed the whiskers fine.

Anybody else strop between passes? Maybe my technique is misaligning the edge...

I never had or felt the need to strop during a shave. It the razor isn't doing the job you'll know it the first swipe you take. I do however strop heavy before a shave well over 100+ laps, but that's just me. Y.M.M.V.

I tried it a couple of times but noticed no benefit, however, I've never used a shavette, so have no experience with the quality of a shavette blade. I'm very respectfully wondering why, with 'three shaves in', you are doing three passes? Do you have a very heavy beard growth? I know very few experienced straight razor shavers who would do three passes; many only do one (me included).

As a beginner, I feel the weepers are caused by the three passes. I would advise that you're over doing it. My advice would take it back to just one pass. If you must do a ATG pass, ensure you use a very light touch, very short strokes, and weaken your lather with a little water before applying the lather for the ATG pass.

Hope this is of some help.

Carl

I think the only time I did this was after I refreshed a razor once and it was a bit off on the first pass, but that probably indicated more about my refresh. I have seen a few threads about this and have come to the conclusion that with a razor made with decent quality steel that is correctly honed and maintained mid shave stropping is unnecessary.
Ed.

Thanks Gent's for the quick feedback! I'm fighting my way up the learning curve, and appreciate the hand up....

It kind of leads me to question what kind of razor you have and if it was professionally honed or not.

Oh my goodness, this would be insanely tedious; not to mention how would you keep your lather from drying out while you strop? I strop only after shaving and that is too much stropping already for me. Stropping for me is the most unenjoyable aspect of SR shaving. I am sure there would be some benefit, but not so much making it practical. Rather than doing 75 strop passes per shave this would bring me up to 225.....I might just start hoping to hit an artery while I shave if that's what it come to. I would also encourage you to limit yourself to two passes or less. I also started out doing three but realized I was mostly causing skin irritation vs getting a closer shave. If I can't get it done in two passes with the occasional touch up then I grab my DE. As you get better with your razor and understanding YOUR facial growth you will need less passes.

I think you need to look to the [arguably agreed???] use of stropping, that being to remove micro corrosion and debris from the edge.

It seems a bit like re-polishing your boots on the bus on the way to work...

[EDIT] I haD to Google 'Pennsyltuckey'. Interesting.

Good advise ,, don't take on too much at this way of shaving at first ,, got to learn how to shave before really going all out ,, and that takes time to figure it out ,, now for your razor is it shave ready ? Maybe it's not the best edge if your having to strop between passes ,, if it's a shavette no need to strop,, but weepers and tugging are one sign of a blade that's not right. Good luck. Tc

Never have stropped between passes during a shave....stropping occurs for me before and after a shave.