Thread: Don't slice your strop in half

My 3" English Bridal strop has been through the wars, it was my first strop and I feel sorry for the poor thing.
Saying that I repaired it successfully, sanded it a bit and rubbed it with a mix of neetsfoot and glycerin. The glycerin has slowed it down a lot.

I also have a 2 1/2" Buffalo strop. I have found, for me anyway that a narrower strop like 2 1/2" is much nicer to strop on and is much less likely to get nicked.

The only thing I feel is that my razor feels like it's being seriously stropped with my heavier Bridal, the Buffalo is very fast and my razor doesn't feel like it is being stropped into submission.

Fortunately, I understand that it doesn't matter what the draw is, it's just preference and they all strop the same. It's technique over leather, just feels more stroppy on a heavier draw even though it makes my wrist ache more.

Several years ago as I was preparing to shave I took one of my better strops, I think it was a Tony Miller and started stropping the razor as I had done a thousand times before and I realized I was stropping in the wrong direction meaning the razor in the wrong direction

I have a very light touch when I strop so the damage was "minimal". Why did I do that just that one time? Was I just not thinking?

In reality these things happen to everybody. How many tradesmen have serious accidents with tools they use every day. Ask anyone who carries a weapon every day as part of their job for many years if they ever had an "accidental discharge".

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

Several years ago as I was preparing to shave I took one of my better strops, I think it was a Tony Miller and started stropping the razor as I had done a thousand times before and I realized I was stropping in the wrong direction meaning the razor in the wrong direction

I have a very light touch when I strop so the damage was "minimal". Why did I do that just that one time? Was I just not thinking?

Funny you say that.

I bought a really cheapo crap strop for about $20 from Amazon. I just wanted something I could coat with Crox.

I gave that cheap black strop a good coating of Crox and turned it green, I did put it on quite heavily so it took two days to dry.

A couple of days later i got out a beater, set the bevel and progressed to 12K.
I turned to my new Crox strop intending to finish on it but I suppose because i had been edge leading on the stones, I put my razor on the strop and without thinking did a complete edge leading lap. I shaved all my new Crox off.
The strop is still greenish and still works as a Crox strop but it doesn't look like I intended it to.