Too Much Stropping?

Howdy.

I've been reading old barbers' manuals, and they seem to agree that you only need to make six to twelve passes on the strop before shaving.

Dovo's FAQ (http://www.dovo.de/_english/e/index.html) says that you can go six to fifteen shaves between stroppings!

But people on this forum who seem to have a lot of experience favor thirty, forty, even sixty strokes.

My own experience with old razors has been that after honing they need a /lot/ of stropping to get to where you can shave with them; but now that I have a set that's good and sharp, I'm going to see what happens if I minimize the stropping.

What do the rest of y'all think?

Regards,

Jim Crutchfield
Long Island City, NY

I think one of the differences between the traditional barber straight razor shave vs. a home shave is that barbers had their strops literally within arm's reach (the barbers I've talked with still have their old strops hanging right from the barber chair.

I've heard that it was common for them to strop during the customer shave even several times or as needed. 12 passes x 2 or 3 times is getting to the realm of the typical number of passes made by a home shaver.

Most of us home shavers have also gone back to the strop for a few passes during the shave; I've sure done this but try not to (I try to get my razors to where I can complete my shave with no additional stropping necessary).

Chris L

Don't remember what it was called, but a stropping test was done a while ago that helps to answer this question. Do a search for "Strop Test" and see.

I was told by an old school barber years ago that it was nearly impossible to over strop a razor.

So far my experience seems to support that claim, although I rarely exceed 35 round trips. I'm usually in the 15 - 25 range.


Scott

Twenty some odd years ago a barber in his seventies, who had been cutting hair most of his life, told me that you can over strop a razor. OTOH, as Chrisl said, I have seen many barbers in my sixty years use there strop before during and after a shave. The same barber who told me the above also kept a Swaty in his smock and would use it to "touch up" (his words) a razor if necessary. He did that dry BTW. On stropping I have been going with the more is better viewpoint that I have seen on this forum and the results seem to be satisfactory.

You have to remember barbers used their razors continuously all day for shaves and trims so they would strop before every customer. I still remember seeing that when I was a kid getting haircuts in the 19xx ho hum. Yes they would do maybe a dozen strokes or so. personally I think it was part showmanship like when you go into a japanese restaurant and they cook at your table. Here they would pull up the strop which hung on every chair and slap the razor back and forth. In any case we just shave 1x a day so what is in the barbers Manual does not apply to home use in this case. Or at least that's my story.