Thread: When is your Straight Razor Sharp

Originally Posted by Euclid440

Yup, it’s 3m. Just don’t buy the diamond film.

Been using it for years.

Really all you need is 3 and 1um and a flat substrate. You should get 10-20 honings from an individual piece and 3-4 pieces from each sheet.

How many laps do you do? Currently I do at least 100 or until I feel it to be sharp on the thumb.

Usually about 40ish, but it will depend on what you are setting your bevel on.

Your edge should be sharp on the 1k.

And you don’t need a lot of pressure.

I have been using a 1 micron and a .3 micron and I use a light to medium light pressure.
Received my brand new Mountain leather strop and really like it. The linen is much courser than my old Colonel Cronk. I used a conditioning paste I have had for awhile on it and rubbed the strop down for about half hour and using the lightest coat I could. I stropped three razors on it without conditioning and three with conditioning. There was less drag coefficient when I pasted the strop. Hope this is going to be correct. I dusted the linen side with a commercial powder. I usually use food grade diatomaceous earth. In part I cannot tell a lot of difference from the lapping film and the strop. The only sure test I am certain of is the shave test. That will come today.
Thanks for your information, it is much appreciated.

A sharp razor gives out a particular sound when stropping. A razor that is not as sharp does not have that particular **zing** when the edge meets and swishes across the strop. And even when stropping, I have now come to know when the edge is getting there very easily from the slight change of sound. If I use a small strop, then it is never beyond 20 times on that strop each side before I get where I need to get with the razor. If the strop is a largish one, like 2 feet long and 3 inch wide then less than 10 times on the strop is more than enough to get there.

Interesting almond. I have an old, old, Colonel Cronk made in Germany and I recently got a 3 inch by 2 foot strop. The little one I never heard a sound and the big one the blades only "S-swo-osh". I put a neutral prepping paste (leather conditioner) on, rubbed it in real well and the "S-swo-osh" is softer in tone. Well. I am hard of hearing, and if there is a zing I will never hear it, even with my hearing aids. All I have is my 60x loupe to determine if the blade is sharp, but my eyes are not so good either and looking doesn't seem to do much for me. Lastly all I have left is the shave. If it cuts hair and doesn't leave me with a red-neck then I assume it is sharp. When it makes my neck red I strop and try again. If I am still red then I go back to the lapping film and so on. I have most of my blades down now so I know what tactic I need to take.

Just tooling through the posts and caught yours which I apparently did not answer. I have Malwarebytes installed on my computer to prevent malware, Trojans and other bugs. When I go to Toolsforwoodworking Malwarebytes stops it calling it a contaminated site. Prove it? I sure can't, but I trust the application, and I am not gutsy enough to bypass the app. .

AlienEdge: Leather craftsman huh! O.K. You are just the person to confer with regarding antique bailing belt leather. Some time back, a long time ago before dinosaurs roamed the earth, I came into a lengthy piece of bailing belt leather (It was used on old farm equipment which bailed hay--just to clarify) Now this thing really gets dirty. I used my belt sander to scrape off all the old accumulations from both sides. Some pieces took longer to prep. due to concave gulfs created by the wheels it rotated over. I think I got them down pretty well. At its origins I stropped many of my wood tools with this. on some I introduced buffing compounds (black, brown, red and green and white{polish compound} most of the others were cutting compounds. To my estimation the stropped these tools quiet well and I have used them on some of my straight razors (chose it over the old Colonel Cronk strop) because I could get the whole blade stropped much like honing. Now you have the history of my cobble engineering. What say you regarding the hay bailing belt from a long time ago?

Originally Posted by Glock27

Interesting almond. I have an old, old, Colonel Cronk made in Germany and I recently got a 3 inch by 2 foot strop. The little one I never heard a sound and the big one the blades only "S-swo-osh". I put a neutral prepping paste (leather conditioner) on, rubbed it in real well and the "S-swo-osh" is softer in tone. Well. I am hard of hearing, and if there is a zing I will never hear it, even with my hearing aids. All I have is my 60x loupe to determine if the blade is sharp, but my eyes are not so good either and looking doesn't seem to do much for me. Lastly all I have left is the shave. If it cuts hair and doesn't leave me with a red-neck then I assume it is sharp. When it makes my neck red I strop and try again. If I am still red then I go back to the lapping film and so on. I have most of my blades down now so I know what tactic I need to take.

you can try the HHT,

btw I had once asked a question on this forum that does the edge retain it's sharpness enough after a fresh honing to repeatedly do HHT after each shaves after a round of stropping. I didn't get a conclusive answer from the replies, where people just said that HHT is not a conclusive test. I found the reply vague and it didn't satisfy me because nobody specifically answered the question.

I got the answer, when after my shave, (the second time I shaved and did HHT with it immidiately after), I stropped the razor and was immidiately able to pass HHT. The damn thing is sharp enough and retains it's edge after consecutive shaves.

btw I had to really work hard at honing this thing. Honing ain't easy.

“I had once asked a question on this forum that does the edge retain it's sharpness enough after a fresh honing to repeatedly do HHT after each shaves after a round of stropping. I didn't get a conclusive answer from the replies, where people just said that HHT is not a conclusive test. I found the reply vague and it didn't satisfy me because nobody specifically answered the question”.

Well, because HHT is not conclusive and is very subjective. While it may work for you there are way too many variables to say either way if it will work for the next guy.

And HHT cannot predict the shaveability of an edge. You can easily make an edge that will lop hair all day long, but will exfoliate skin during a shave, so what’s the point, if it is uncomfortable to shave with?

Sharp and comfort are two very different things. Sharp is easy...

O.K. Almomd. I am absolutely no good at acronyms, if I can call them that. What is btw and HHT?