Thread: Barber Hone and Pasted Strop?

Is a pasted strop roughly equivalent to a barber hone in terms of what it does?

For instance it's hard to over hone on the Chinese 12k but to touch up a razor you probably need more than 4 or 5 passes.

With a barber hone or a chromium oxide pasted strop 4 or 5 passes is probably enough and you can over hone.

Or are there some advantages to barber hones over a pasted strop (or vice versa)?

All barber hones are not created equal. There has been much discussion and experimentation to try to classify barber hones. Some are coarse enough that you can use them to fix a bevel issue and others are fine enough that you could replace your finish hone with them. I have a Zennith barbers hone that inputs a beautiful edge. The competitive axe men of Australia will pay big money for some barber hones because they are very fast and very fine. Also not alll barber hones are particularly aggressive. They are compact and easy to care for. As for pastes they too are not quite the same. There is CrOx which is probably the most common. If you over use it you can get an uncomfortable edge I am told. I think it tanks quite a bit to do that, although you need to consider the edge you are starting with. There is a group here that used it as part of their daily stropping routine for a year and it had no ill effects on their edges. Personally I use Cerium Oxide on a felt strop if I am trying to smooth an edge or revive one. I can do a lot of passes on my cerium strop without getting a harsh or prickly edge. The grade of paste is very important. Whatever you choose needs to be pure to give you a consistent edge. My cerium is optical polish and very fine, I forget the micron size. Chromium oxide can come in many micron sizes, but most often pure Chromium oxide is .5 microns. You need to be careful where you source it. Wood shops often have green polishing sticks that are a mix of compounds and often called chromium oxide. It is inexpensive enough when purchased from the shaving shops that I would not bother trying to find a better deal. There is Diamond and a couple of other pastes and film as well. I have done nothing with those though and leave that up to others to discuss.

As above not all Barber hones are equal, nor are all pastes.

That said I think they're a little different in the scope of what they are capable of. I think a good barber's hone is a little more flexible than a paste, since they will invariably be less fine. IIRC good razor quality ChromOx is something akin to a 30K hone, so naturally you're removing less metal with that, where most barber hones are in the ball park of 8K +/- 2K depending on the hone.

I can take my American Hone Co. or Swaty and bring back a razor in moments that would probably take a LOT of strokes on pastes. But I'll also freely admit I'm much better with a hone than I am with a strop.

As far as basic maintenance, it depends on your skill. Strop with paste early and often, you may not need to see a hone for a good long time - if your stropping skill is pretty good. If you've not quite got it down, you may find yourself doing more harm than good until you work out the kinks in your technique. But I guess that applies to everything to some degree.

If you're already pretty good with hones, you can't go wrong with a good barber hone. I'd suggest trying a little of each and seeing what you like best.

Also a pasted strop and a hone sharpen in different ways because of the action on the strop. Over time folks who rely on the strop will eventually need a hone to correct what the strop does.

Originally Posted by gcbryan

Is a pasted strop roughly equivalent to a barber hone in terms of what it does?

For instance it's hard to over hone on the Chinese 12k but to touch up a razor you probably need more than 4 or 5 passes.

With a barber hone or a chromium oxide pasted strop 4 or 5 passes is probably enough and you can over hone.

Or are there some advantages to barber hones over a pasted strop (or vice versa)?

A pasted strop has little in common with a barber hone. Sure, both remove metal from steel, and that's pretty much the only thing they have in common. A barber hone is a lot more like any finishing stone, including the Chinese one.
If you have all three, I would suggest you to use the Chinese stone (if it's a good finisher) and touch-ups. As for passes, it depends on the condition of the edge. Also, 4 or 5 or 50 passes are not enough to make that option less attractive from the other one where you give it fewer passes, so, if you are thinking about what to buy from the above, don't think about it.
Advantages of stones in general, not only barber hones, the most important of them anyway is that, you can maintain your edge indefinitely with a finishing stone and a clean strop. With a pasted strop and no stone, sooner or later, the edge WILL need refreshing.

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

Also a pasted strop and a hone sharpen in different ways because of the action on the strop. Over time folks who rely on the strop will eventually need a hone to correct what the strop does.

Does this apply to a pasted paddle strop in your opinion?

Also, for anyone who can remember what is the grit equivalent of white aluminum oxide (shaving) paste (crayon)?

Originally Posted by gcbryan

Does this apply to a pasted paddle strop in your opinion?

Also, for anyone who can remember what is the grit equivalent of white aluminum oxide (shaving) paste (crayon)?

Yes, it applies to any type of strop. Stone's surface is hard, the edge will be a " V ", not convex. Strops gradually round the edge making it slightly convex, and the more you use it, the more the V becomes U, ending up dull.
There are hundreds if not more types of Aluminum oxide pastes, with hundreds of different grits, not a single one.
I would also suggest you to get the "French" Cerium oxide powder, and then use it as a powder/oil or water suspension/paste. The one I'm talking about is 0.3 microns, and it's good.
The shape of particles is a serious factor when choosing a material for pasting a strop; diamond leaves harsher and sharper edges, Chromium oxide leaves smoother ones. Cerium oxide is even smoother.