Thread: Strop and paste vs. hone

Concerning the subjectivity with naturals, I have never enjoyed shaving with a Coticule edge, while everyone on other forums seemed to love them. [Same with most other finishing stones in all honesty, they never hit that sweet spot for me]

I even visited some friends over in Belgium that honed up razors for me in person on their Coticules; but it never worked for me, and they're probably some of the most knowledgeable and experienced Coticule honers I know.

And tbh I found the whole slurry thing a huge PITA for me personally. I despised it. Using the Coti and BBW dry, they proved much more efficient while leaving a super smooth edge. I'll never understand using slurry on the coti/bbw. My La Petite Blanche is not noticeably faster on thick slurry than it is dry ... au contraire, using slurry never gets my coti or bbw edges as keen.

Naniwa 12K, Suehiro 20K, Coti, Escher, Green Puma paste, etc. All did a good job providing for good shaves, but never felt like "it" for me. I also never enjoyed shaving with a DE razor / blade.

So there's that. You can't go by what others like.

I find using slurry on a coticule useful when I have to build or rebuild a bevel, but when I am only interested in refreshing an already pretty good edge, I generally avoid slurry and use a water/glycerin mix.

I haven’t tried either the BBW or coti dry, but the next time I have to refresh an edge I will - just to see how it works.

When I’m done with the BBW/coti, I move to a finisher (Vermio or OOzuku, depending on what is closest at hand) and chromium oxide on a paddle strop.

I haven’t touched my 1k Shapton or my 4k/8k Norton in quite a while. They were useful when I was working on blades that had to be restored and for which the bevel needed significant resetting.

I only use my 1K diamond plate when sharpening knives or when I have to hone out a major chip in a razor or to lap one of my water stones.

Originally Posted by TristanLudlow

...I also never enjoyed shaving with a DE razor / blade.

So there's that. You can't go by what others like.

Yeah, me either. The point was more that there are two, I believe, separate issues which are being conflated here. I'm not saying to shave with a DE or SE other than to see if with one of those the OP can get that spot shaved clean without rash. If so, chasing a sharper edge is not likely to help anything. I sort of tried the same thing and I did find that a keener/sharper edge did seem to help a little but could even make it worse because it was not going to completely get that spot shaved clean and I was doing more to abbrade my face than anything else. The only thing that would get that spot was figuring out a way to turn the razor in a direction that would get the hair and do it without cutting the crap out of myself. It took a lot of practice but I did actually finally do it and no amount of resharpening or buying more stones or paste was going to fix that. YMMV

I do not care for any abrasive whatsoever on a regular hanging leather strop. My leather strops never get paste.

The only way I have ever found to get the edge that I like is to finish with a progression of lapped and backed balsa strops with a SMALL amount of diamond paste rubbed into the balsa, and then wiped clean so that there is NO paste coating on the surface. The grits are .5u, .25u, and .1u. The .5u gives a sharp but sometimes uncomfortable edge. The .25u, sharper and definitely not a comfortable shave. The .1u gives me a very smooth and comfortable shave. .1u is about 200k grit, FWIW and for those who insist on assigning a grit rating. There is more to it than just the tools and material, of course.

The balsa does not replace normal stropping on leather. Stropping on hanging leather is for me, essential, before shaving. After shaving I go 50 very light laps on the .1u diamond balsa. The edge stays very sharp indefinitely and I never have to return to stone or film, ever.

More in depth info about this on my website. Anyway this is one way of using paste that does actually work and will definitely give a sharp and smooth edge. The same cannot be said about using the same pastes on a leather paddle. As far as other pastes besides diamond, I have tried the more common green and red (Chromium Oxide and Iron Oxide) pastes and coaxing the same level of edge quality out of them is all but impossible. CBN is reported to behave similarly to diamond but I have not tried it, and won't until someone convinces me that it works better than diamond.

I have shaved off a lot of different edges but none match the edge that the diamond/balsa progression gives me. I have honed on coticule and Jnat and Arkies but I prefer synthetics or lapping film to 12k/1u as a base edge for improving with the balsa. I use a lot of different brands for repair and bevel setting but my progression from the bevel is always film or Naniwa Superstones, mainly because that is what I have and I am not about to spend money for Shaptons when the Nannies and the lapping film both work just fine. That's not to say that maybe they aren't better, only that I can't justify buying them. By hearsay only, I don't think that any synthetic stone finer than 12k will be very pleasing to me, nor do I care fur sub-micron lapping film edges. The half micron diamond on balsa is quite an easy jump from 12k Naniwa or 1u film.

Everyone likes what they like and there is a ton of subjectivity in razor edge treatment preference. And it is very hard to dislike an edge that is created or maintained by many many hundreds or thousands of dollars worth of stones when you have already spent for and bought them. There is also a lot of what I call "faith based honing" where you simply "know" that the edge will please, and so it does. And honestly, a really really good Jnat or Arkie edge is pretty darn good, but I do like my diamond paste edge best.

Paste.

Well, there is more experimentation to be done, for sure, but I am impressed.

Last week did a 12k touchup on 6 razors. Today I tried balsa with some .5 green paste on the same razor I used yesterday. After the paste, I did 75 laps on a naked leather strop. Shaved.

I must say, it is a MUCH smoother shave! I was hoping it would be like a hot knife through butter...and I have to say it's pretty close! The razor burn on that 5% area of my neck? MUCH reduced...and some redness may be from yesterday's shave. My next test is to not shave for a couple of days, let all redness disappear, then shave with the same paste stropped razor again, for comparison.

Likely had more paste than I needed. With a 30x loupe, I could see some definite smoothness on the edge compared to coming off the 12k. Technique and practice may improve things, but even with my rather rudimentary test, I believe the paste passed the test. I am turning into a believer.

Paste. So far, so good.

Originally Posted by CrescentCityRazors

I do not care for any abrasive whatsoever on a regular hanging leather strop.

Me neither, I've never put paste on leather, always on the component part. I also like to keep my leathers clean.

I only use paste on leather for my woodworking tools, but never for razors.

Mark, where did the paste come from and is it pure Chrome Oxide?

You might try pasting a piece of cardboard, inside of a cereal box. Balsa has some silica naturally in it and many complain of harshness coming off balsa. Several years ago when balsa was all the rage, it was a common complaint, especially if use with pressure.

Cardboard is much smoother and makes a great test substrate for paste. Avoid the temptation to use pressure on the strop.

Use pure Chrome Oxide for best results. 75-100 laps on pure Chrome Oxide should remove any visible stria from the edge and about half-way down the bevel, Run a Q Tip along the edge lightly, you will feel the slightest snag if you have a chip, joint the edge and reset it 10-20 X laps on the 12k.

Another thing you can do is perfect your 12k edge. The slightest swarf on the 12k can damage the edge, and I believe a lot of folks over hone on the 12k. The 12k is an aggressive stone but can be a good polisher. Years ago, I did a post on chip removal with a 12k, it is that aggressive. (12K Chip Removal/Bevel Setting).

When you have a good stria pattern on the 12k and a straight edge, where you would normally stop, joint the edge, strop 20-30 laps on linen, lap the 12k clean and hone 10-20 laps under running water. Strop 10-20 laps on linen and 10-20 on leather. Test shave to see if the edge improves.

You can also take it one step further, add an extra layer of tape, joint the edge, strop on linen and do 3-5 light finish laps under running water. Strop and shave. Then strop on pure Chrome Oxide, linen, leather and shave.

Originally Posted by Euclid440

Mark, where did the paste come from and is it pure Chrome Oxide?

You might try pasting a piece of cardboard, inside of a cereal box. Balsa has some silica naturally in it and many complain of harshness coming off balsa. Several years ago when balsa was all the rage, it was a common complaint, especially if use with pressure.

Cardboard is much smoother and makes a great test substrate for paste. Avoid the temptation to use pressure on the strop.

Use pure Chrome Oxide for best results. 75-100 laps on pure Chrome Oxide should remove any visible stria from the edge and about half-way down the bevel, Run a Q Tip along the edge lightly, you will feel the slightest snag if you have a chip, joint the edge and reset it 10-20 X laps on the 12k.

Another thing you can do is perfect your 12k edge. The slightest swarf on the 12k can damage the edge, and I believe a lot of folks over hone on the 12k. The 12k is an aggressive stone but can be a good polisher. Years ago, I did a post on chip removal with a 12k, it is that aggressive. (12K Chip Removal/Bevel Setting).

When you have a good stria pattern on the 12k and a straight edge, where you would normally stop, joint the edge, strop 20-30 laps on linen, lap the 12k clean and hone 10-20 laps under running water. Strop 10-20 laps on linen and 10-20 on leather. Test shave to see if the edge improves.

You can also take it one step further, add an extra layer of tape, joint the edge, strop on linen and do 3-5 light finish laps under running water. Strop and shave. Then strop on pure Chrome Oxide, linen, leather and shave.

Much truth there. Balsa does NOT work well with pressure, for several reasons. To get fullest benefit, you must first of all go in with a good edge to start with, second use very very light pressure, and third, use no thicker than 1/4" (to reduce unequal swelling/shrinking) and back it with a good rigid and lightweight substrate that makes it easy to hold in hand but prevents flexing, and third, lap it smooth and flat before applying paste, and fourth, apply only a very small amount, and wipe the surface clean so that there is no coating. Without doing these things, balsa will not impress.

CrOx and cardboard are actually not a bad pairing. I suspect following up with red paste on another piece of cardboard might give a fairly good result. However, I would have to ask, not that it matters much, how much silica is in paper or cardboard, vs wood. I think it is not so much a question of actual silica content, as how it is presented to the edge being honed.

At one time I was experimenting with final stropping on a very thin unsupported balsa strip, used like a hanging strop. I could come off the .1u pasted balsa and see a very highly polished bevel and a very smooth and even edge under microscope. One day I looked at my bevel after stropping on the unpasted balsa and stria were quite abundant. I had assumed that I had somehow contaminated the unpasted strop, but I tried again and similar result. I tried lapping a new strip as best I could, then rubbing with a little saddle soap and then hand rubbing, and a final wipe-down with a tshirt. Results were much better. Still, not quite as good as ordinary leather stropping so I stopped trying to use unpasted balsa as a regular strop. But it definitely shows the difference between treated and untreated balsa. I was going from balsa loaded with abrasive to clean balsa and reducing bevel polish. And the difference was mostly due to the lapping and rubbing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zySumBYzjOU

Ignore the anti-metric rant. I had just spent some time on the boat turning normal SAE wrenches on the diesel, and then working on something else that used metric fasteners and I had to come back to the house and dig out a metric tool collection from the trunk of the old Hyundai to take back to the boat, and was really P.O.ed at the metric world. I'm sure metric has its place. That place just isn't America and it certainly isn't my boat.

I don't know how pure it is. Several razor places are sold out of it right now, including Fendrihan.
I bought mine on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B079S3G7WY/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o09_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1&p ldnSite=1

I used green, not the white. The green is supposedly .5u. Honestly, I doubt its purity, but as a nice cheap test it worked out OK. The balsa I used was 1/16" thick, and is 12"x4" with several pieces in a package. Placed on a solid table for stropping.

I also bought Herold Solingen Stagenpaste Solid Double Paste for Razor Strops, red and black paste, but it has not arrived yet. This appears to be a foil-wrapped bar instead of a cream in a jar.

If you have a better supplier in mind, I'd love to know where to buy.

I used balsa as my cheap test. So far, results are good! Euclid, I believe one of your posts from a long time ago showed your fabric strops, and I like your setup. Some D-rings are easy to buy, and if you could let me know where you bought the fabric, I'd appreciate it. If you need to send a PM that's fine.

Based on my paste test, and as basic and rudimentary as it admittedly was, I'd like more info on where to buy pure Chrome Oxide and fabric for strops.

My paste test was good. If higher quality or more pure paste is available, and I apply to a better medium like cloth strops, the results may be even better. I'm willing to jump in. Love some details as mentioned above.

Try Classic Edge:

https://classicedge.ca/products/p-15...2dd9bfba&_ss=r