Thread: Two sides to a straight?

I think I know about what my problem is but let me run it by here to see if there are other ideas...

Just got my four-sided pasting strop from Tony Miller and applied the four different pastes. Since it has been a while since I got my Double Arrow I thought I'd tune it up with 10 or so laps on the 0.5 then 15 or so on the 0.25, leaving the 3.0 and the 1.0 out of the picture for now. I then stropped on plain leather (a paddle strop) about 100 times and shaved. I did 100 laps because the paddle strop is so small and I figured that would be about the equivalent of no more than half as many on a hanging strop.

Hey -- all that seemed to have made an improvement -- until I "turned the other cheek", switched hands, and shaved with the blade turned to the opposite side -- pretty rough.

Could it be that ...

1. my left hand is just clumsier than my right and the newly-sharpened blade brought out the difference.
2. I stropped poorly somewhere along the line. Perhaps my technique is off when going in one direction or the other.

Any other thoughts? Does one of the above seem like a slam dunk answer? I think number 2 is my best guess.

It could be both. It is easy to have an almost different "style" one direction or the other while stropping. I agree with the hand changing too though. I shave very well with both hands but it took me a while to get a feel for how each side should feel. My shaves were a bit different on each side due to learning with the left hand as well. I would strop some more on the leather concentrating on making both directional strokes even. Also really pay attention to blade angle and pressure differences when you change hands/switch sides. Hopes this helps some.

I would explore my stropping technique . You may not be holding the blade equally flat on both sides when you strop .

Stropping was the problem. I went through it all again for my next shave paying very close attention to stropping and things worked out much better.

Thanks guys.

I actually had the same experience for a while also, so I'm glad to hear that it wasn't just me! One thing I'd like to add is that the strop has a sort of grain to it that lies in the vertical direction. When you strop up you're going against the grain, so more draw, but coming back down you're going with the grain, so less draw. So the one side of the razor that's being stropped on the way down is continually getting the direction of the leather with less draw. That side of the razor is the side that shaves the left side of your face. I found that I had to apply a little more pressure on my downward stroke while stropping to have an equal amount of draw for both directions.

I hope that made sense!

I have trouble accepting that opposite sides would shave so noticeably different with the cause being the edge itself.

There is only one edge, even if formed asymmetrically on a western blade, the only possible difference I could see would be the need for different angle

Edge damage for some reason, i can imagine that, but then it wouldn't shave from either side.
Thoughts anyone?