Thread: Can anyone explain the reason behind the X strokes?

I had also heard / read that ideally you wanted the striations to be uniform on the bevel at more or less a diagonal pattern, i.e., 45 degrees, lined up from toe to heel along the edge of the bevel and meeting at the apex from both sides.

///////\\\\\\\ diagonal striations as opposed to ||| ||| straight striations...doubt it matters, whatever floats your boat, but the X stroke ensures you're getting the uniform creation of the bevel and produces these consistent type of striations.

Mind you, I'm basically at the place where honing gymnastics, i.e., do what it takes to pass the shave test...or do what works to try and get as uniform a bevel as you can will do me just fine.

That, and a tantrum or three I find helps immensely in setting the bevel, yelling at the razor encourages the bevel to set as well....think I saw that in one of Glen's videos....

Yelling at bevels. That's more for advanced honing techniques section of SRP.

Sometimes you just have to give the razor a little bit of verbal encouragement and moral support. Let the rusty little know that if it doesn't get it's together and shave right, there's gonna be a reckoning.