Thread: Two Questions

1. Can steel that crumbles off of razors get embedded in the strop and cause problems? If so, is there a way to remove it? I have seen edges of razors that are stropped toohard and crumbled.

2. If I purchase an antique strop, how do I know it hasn't had some abrasive compound on the surface at some point?

I Have never heard of this being an issue. If you are curious though run a magnet over it and see if it pulls out any partials.

Originally Posted by toolarts

1. Can steel that crumbles off of razors get embedded in the strop and cause problems? If so, is there a way to remove it? I have seen edges of razors that are stropped toohard and crumbled.

2. If I purchase an antique strop, how do I know it hasn't had some abrasive compound on the surface at some point?

Answers:

1. No, I don't think so. Crumbling steel isn't elastic enough to be sharp therefore it won't break off in sharp edges that can imbed into a strop. This is just my guess so I could be wrong but like Doc it's never really come up. So it's either a non issue or extremely rare. A long time ago on the Yahoo SRP one gentleman recommended that you run a very strong magnet over your strop anyway. I've never done it and all seems to be well. I guess if you want to try there's no harm.

2. One technique I read years ago and have tried myself is to run the non-shiny side of a piece of tin foil over the leather and rub it gently. If you see any type of polishing going on you know it's been treated. I'm guessing it works because that's exactly what happened when I tested this with known pasted strops and leather only strops. You may want to do the test with each known type so that you can set expectations. It was good enough for me to declare one vintage strop paste free and so far so good.

Hope that helps.

Regards,
EL