Quote Originally Posted by Marshal View Post
So, I've watched every stropping video I can, but I'm still messing something up somewhere. I can take a perfectly shave worthy edge off a Swaty barber hone, and within 20 strokes on linen and 40 on leather make it tug and pull. For the life of me I cannot get the hang of this stropping thing. On the bright side, I'm not cutting the heck out of my strop.

Either I have a tension problem with the strop, or a pressure/torque problem with the razor. Or maybe a combination of the 2? I was tugging the strop pretty hard to keep it perfectly flat, but I've since come to realize that's probably not the right route and eased up considerably. Now I keep it taught, but allow it to flex some as I've seen in Lynn's videos.

I've also tried various pressure types on the blade. I'm sure I started out a little heavy handed. Applying slight torque to 'force' the edge against the strop just feels inherently wrong, like I'm probably rolling the edge. Lately I've settled on light pressure, like I use for finishing strokes, but that doesn't seem to be making head way either.

I guess my question is, how tight do you hold your strop, and for those of you who also hone your razors how much pressure do you use relative to honing strokes?
I skimmed through a couple of your posts and a few others and it sounds similar to things I have gone through. The first thing I can take from it is that I think you overestimated the power of the strop. I think if it is honed properly you would have to do a lot of bad stropping to ruin the edge.

I am a poor stropper with six years experience and I just have to accept it. Part of being clumsy for me. I can do everything else well, and like you I verify my hone jobs through the lens of a microscope.

I went through a period where I did a good hone job but my face was irritated by the shave. At first I re-honed the edge before I had an epiphany. My lather wasn't slick (wet) enough. With slicker, wetter lather, my edge was performing as expected and the shave was close and comfortable.

The variables make straight razor shaving fun, but in the beginning it's hard sometimes to figure out the reason you are having difficulty.

Another time I watched a YouTube shave just for the heck of it, and I realized that my shaving angle was off. I tried copying it and got a better shave. All of this stuff comes together with experience, except that for me, my stropping will always be sloppy.