Thread: Stropping only on pasted strops

Why is the standard to strop on plain leather every day and hone every few months instead of honing once and maintaining indefinitely by doing only a few strokes every day on a pasted strop?

It seems like it's a choice between letting the edge slowly deteriorate until the shave is noticeably/significantly worse and then doing a full honing session/sending it off and just stropping a few times per day on a pasted strop and always having a 'fresh' edge.

I was gonna speculate as to the responses I'd get, and give my thoughts on them, but I'll just see what you guys actually say first

When you strop with pastes you tend to round the edge. It is still effective but you will reach a point where you will not get very many shaves out of a stropping. When I first started I had my razor honed and bought a 8EE diamond plate and a 4 sided paddle and had 2.0,1.0,0.5, and 0.25 micron pastes. Worked very well and I could keep a blade going for almost a year but eventually one has to reset the bevel if you want a really a keen edge that will hold up. I then bought a 16K Shapton and started giving my razors a final stropping of 0.5 Green Chromium for about 6 strokes and eliminated the 1.0 paste. What I found is that now I was able to get a longer lasting blade and smoother shave. I think the 16K, which is 1.0 micron, let the blade keep its bevel better before going to the pastes. I now only have to drop back to a Coticule for about 10 strokes and work up with very few stokes on each step. Seems like this is happening about every 3 months or so. I may be to particular with the sharpness and smoothness of my razors but to each his own.

I am sure others with more experience will weigh in but the important thing is to use something that works for you. I have found for the money the 4 sided strop was cost effective and worked very well for me when I was a total noob.

Take care,
Richard

Some guys did exactly what you are talking about. I don't because I think it will, over time, waste more razor than periodic honing. In part because of what the above poster was talking about but also because the razor will be seeing far more hone time than one that is just honed up once it dulls.

I think stropping in general is the least understood part of our hobby, and more people other then just mparker and AFdavis need to do some serious experimenting....

I have for a long time believed the stropping on pasted strops creates a concave edge and eventually you have to hone...I am not as convinced of this any more.
We here at SRP tend to be a hone based forum, we are all about the hones, strops are a distant second, the red headed step child of keeping our razors sharp... I think we are going to eventually find that the strops and stropping in general are much more important then we realized....

Originally Posted by gssixgun

I think stropping in general is the least understood part of our hobby, and more people other then just mparker and AFdavis need to do some serious experimenting....

I have for a long time believed the stropping on pasted strops creates a concave edge and eventually you have to hone...I am not as convinced of this any more.
We here at SRP tend to be a hone based forum, we are all about the hones, strops are a distant second, the red headed step child of keeping our razors sharp... I think we are going to eventually find that the strops and stropping in general are much more important then we realized....

I think you're right Glen. I have followed mparker's and Alan's posts on stropping since I've been around. I must have read this thread here more times than I could count. I have been really concentrating on my stroke with stropping and not doing it on auto pilot . I personally only use a pasted strop, paddle, flatbed, blasa.... occasionally if I feel the razor 'needs' it. My daily driver is clean leather and webbed fabric.

I agree completely, Glen. I never bought into the argument that a pasted edge needs more attention to keep it keen than a honed edge. I'm not saying that I don't believe that necessarily, my argument to that is that I don't see increased maintenance as a serious detraction. My pasted paddles are easily accessible. A few passes on them to refresh more often that a re-hone, I don't see the downside.

I'm experimenting a ton with pastes right now and intend on exploring it a bunch more. I'm still cautious on how I feel about pastes in general (other than chrome ox which for me is a proven ingredient in my honing process) but time will solidify my experiences with the pastes.

Chris L