Thread: Too Sharp

Originally Posted by ace

If you suspect that something is amiss at the edge, you can view it quite well with good lighting and a 10X loupe. Any "wire edge" or other defect can usually be visualized at that power and diagnosed.

Sometimes you can see the stuff with your naked eye, too, if you have good eyesight.

You can definitely see an edge that's been stropped once vs. one that's right off the hone. I usually rely on that. If I can see the very edge of the blade has been worked by the strop, it's rare that the shave has that bite. I don't know how good everyone else's eyesight is, but mine is not scheduled to go south for another 10 years if family history is an indicator (last test at ER when I got metal in my eye, it was 20/13 in the bad eye (the one that had a metal particle stuck lightly into the middle of the pupil).

But, anyway, horse butt has taken away that super sticky sharp edge that I used to get when I was obsessed with honing extremely lightly on clear water and then stropping extremely likely. I have felt since then like a strop that will dull your razor if you use moderate pressure is just too soft, because moderate pressure on a tight horse butt strop does nothing but improve the edge. On my cowhide strops, it definitely takes a lot of their keenness away, but that may be due to something other than the fact that it's just cowhide (maybe it's the tanning and maybe it's because they're not broken in enough, but they're just missing that support that horsehide provides).

Originally Posted by jaswarb

I have seen Glen refer more than once to the Verhoeven paper. This should be required reading for anyone seeking the ultimate edge. Google it.

It's funny that you mention that, because someone from a woodworking board just emailed a PDF of that to me last night. Interesting coincidence.

Dave, I think you are right. About 2 months ago, a friend of mine gave me an old shell strop, it is quite hard and slick. Puts a wicked edge on my razors and seems to have taken them to the next level.

It would seem to me what is happening is that there are micro-serrations after honing which cause the harshness.
The chromium oxide must be removing them with a few passes? I use the backside of a lipshaw microtome strop after honing and before stropping.
I feel it does the same job. Interesting thread!

Originally Posted by sharptonn

It would seem to me what is happening is that there are micro-serrations after honing which cause the harshness.
The chromium oxide must be removing them with a few passes? I use the backside of a lipshaw microtome strop after honing and before stropping.
I feel it does the same job. Interesting thread!

Yep I think you are correct. You must post a picture of your lipshaw microtome strop!

Originally Posted by jaswarb

I have seen Glen refer more than once to the Verhoeven paper. This should be required reading for anyone seeking the ultimate edge. Google it.

When it comes to stropping the Verhoeven paper is all but useless.. great read for honing and edge dynamics

There is another micrograph study that shows a strop re-alligning the "Fin" after a shave

There are other reads (not on straight razors) that say that stropping can convex the edge..
(all those are referring to plain leather)


Now taking all of those views anyone can see that all three cannot be true, we as straight razor users know from our faces telling us, that stropping does something but we just don't know what..

There was a time when I tested two conflicting theories on pasted stropping, as one side said too much pasted stroppng created a fragile foil like edge, and the other side said too much pasted stropping would convex the edge.. Again both of these statments cannot be true.. After months of over-stropping and shaving with the same razor my conclusion was neither was true within a usable time frame of the razor, after that IMHO it just doesn't matter ..

It is my thought that the nearest term for what a strop actually does to an edge is 'Burnish" and even that might not be the perfect word...

Funny I was going to start a thread on this exact topic with the links to all these papers et all in the stropping forum when I had time next week

Originally Posted by jaswarb

Yep I think you are correct. You must post a picture of your lipshaw microtome strop!

Here you go. The backside is a diamond patterned, rubberized material. After much use, I can wipe it with my palm and get a bit of gray dust! I have 3. One at home and 2 at my honing station. Neil Miller made me several strops of different leathers. Come to think of it, I quit using pastes after starting with these! Also, I wonder if too much pressure in honing might cause these micro-serrations to worsen?

Originally Posted by gssixgun

When it comes to stropping the Verhoeven paper is all but useless.. great read for honing and edge dynamics

I have to admit I haven't read it yet (only got it last night) but a woodworker sent it to me asserting that no leather had any abrasive capacity at all, at least none that can be noticed.

I don't know what the verhoven paper says yet, but I'll find out soon enough. The reason he sent it to me was because I mentioned my horse butt strop (which is just plain 8/9 ounce horse butt strops) knocking the polish off of my razors when it was new, but once it was broken in (and grayed on the surface actually, just a little, despite not being introduced to abrasives) it no longer does that.

As new, though, the silica (presumably) was so sharp and brash that I could take a shine off of an old japanese barber hone (that was very close to a bright polished edge with no visible scratches) and see little abrasive scratches all over it. As it has settled in now, it will take a dull finisher like a japanese semi finisher and gradually work the dullness off of the bevel until after a couple of weeks the bevel is brightly polished with only remnants of scratches left in it (presume the edge is long since turned to what the leather does to it by the time it gets to that point).

It leads me to think the following are important before people talk about making a convex edge or pulling some fragile bits out to the edge:
*what kind of leather is being used
* how tight is it pulled or stretched
* is there abrasive, and if so, what particle size
* how much stropping is done
* when was the last time an edge was honed

I would assume that someone could round the bevel with a loose strop and coarse paste intended to take the place of honing, and to some extent the rounding may be a very small % with good technique, I'm sure some still exists. But if such rounding with good technique changes an edge from 17 degrees to 19 degrees effective, nobody will notice, especially if it's gradual. If the strop remains tight in use, even a coarse abrasive should do that much to round an edge, and I can't imagine anything but a coarse abrasive would "pull" a wire edge out to the end of the razor's bevel. One that would subsequently be removed with a fine abrasive and/or stropping.

What is always left on the edge of my razor is a barely visible edge that you can tell has been hit by a strop. IF the edge is in even decent condition after a hone before I get to that point, if I can see that faint uniform evidence of the horse butt doing its job, I know the razor will be a comfortable shave. If the edge isn't quite as good (like say off of a japanese stone that isn't quite as fine as I'd like to use) I might do 200 strops on the horse butt instead of 50 - which out of laziness I hate to do, but it proves something to my curiosity.

But this is all just my perspectve on it, and it's a lot of talk for something that is trivial in person. The part that makes it trivial, and leads me back to the thing that comes to my mind the most about things that used to be common and hardly discussed when they were widely used vs. things that are brought back on forums. That thing is that most people lack experience, and the experience does not need to provide that the subtleties that you find that will work well can be easily communicated. You just need to accumulate the experience so that you know what works and what causes problems. Figuring out how to communicate what it is exactly you do (if anyone even wants to hear it) can come second or never.

Originally Posted by JoeSomebody

Dave, I think you are right. About 2 months ago, a friend of mine gave me an old shell strop, it is quite hard and slick. Puts a wicked edge on my razors and seems to have taken them to the next level.

If you find the same as I have, you'll find that it will maintain a razor by itself much longer, and if it's hard like horsebutt, it will utlimately be more forgiving to pressure. After a month or so of use on the same razor, I will have to increase pressure on the strop from time to time to make it feel like a fresh edge (despite the fact that it hasn't been hit with abrasives). I was worried at first that I would create a small convex edge, but even after two months of use, the edge is brought back fresh with 50 laps in my finest finishing stone.

Honestly any time somebody says "Wire Edge" and Straight Razor Strop in the same sentence you lose my attention..

I cannot even imagine a wire edge on a razor, besides maybe at the 1k or less level, on a SERIOUS restoration, let alone "Knocking one off" with a strop..