I'm having a lot of trouble keeping my Boker Edelweiss sharp and smooth for more than a shave or two. I've touched it up on the 8k side of my Norton twice now, and gotten great shaves off of it. Then the next shave is rough, and while it doesn't pull, it doesn't cut smoothly either. I have 2 other razors in my rotation, a Wolfertz and an AJ Jordan.

I need to find what part of this whole process I'm messing up, and here are my thoughts:

1. I'm not honing properly on the 8k.

2. I'm stropping poorly.


I've said in numerous posts that I'm uncomfortable stropping this particular razor. I made an adjustment while I was stropping it today, and instead of stropping with the strop parallel to the floor, I lowered my hand and titled the strop to the floor. It was a significantly more comfortable and smooth strop. Right now, I'm thinking the stropping is the issue.

My plan is to give it another go on the 8k this weekend and see if this altered stropping technique allows me to keep the edge smooth. When I use the 8k to freshen the edge, I've been doing 40 or so x-strokes with little-to-no pressure and clear water (no slurry). Then I do about 3 or 4 backwards (stropping) strokes, followed by 75-100 laps on linen. Could this progression be the issue too?