Does normal, plain leather stropping keep the edge sharp? And if so, is it safe to say the strop sharpens the razor?
Printable View
Does normal, plain leather stropping keep the edge sharp? And if so, is it safe to say the strop sharpens the razor?
I was under the impression that stropping was to align and straighten the edge and any sharpening it did would be insignificant (too minor to be noticeable).
Then again my post could accurately reflects my experience so don't put too much weight on my words.:D
Stropping will keep an already sharpened razor sharp, I do not feel that it will actually "sharpen" a razor that is not already sharp.
However, if you strap your razor instead of stropping it you can turn a butter knife into a top shelf shaver in no time.
:p
I am assuming that by normal you mean less than 100 laps....
Because in theory on a molecular level I guess it is actually an abrasive and after 1 million laps or so I guess it could sharpen a razor :p
Let me know how that test goes, meet ya here in 20 years :D
:rofl2::rofl2::rofl2::rofl2:
AFDavis, Alan found an article some time ago that IIRC confirmed that there is sharpening going on in addition to the realigning. So I voted yes to sharpening.
Chris L
Well, this is my twisted reasoning:
When I shave without stropping beforehand, the razor feels dull. To me, that means it's not as sharp as it ought to be. You might say that means it's just misaligned or something, but to me that is the same as dull.
When I strop that dull feeling razor, then it feels sharp again.
That's why I am asking if stropping sharpens the blade
thanks everyone for your input, I am just curious what the opinions are. maybe I am splitting hairs again. maybe strapping is the word I am looking for, as Seraphim suggests :)
It seems inevitable that there is some amount of sharpening going on when you strop, however it is not enough to completely undo the dulling effect of shaving. Hence the need to touch up a razor once in a while.
A problem with semantics looms....sharpening..aligning...polishing...
Anything that creates friction will have somewhat of a sharpening effect if you do enough of it. But practically speaking no it does not sharpen the razor, just dress the edge. I'm still waiting for someone to sharpen the blade under running water. After a few thousand years it should do a good job. Any takers?
I think the strop does more to clean and polish than to sharpen. It gets rid of slight oxidation that may form on the blade and maybe dust. It does to a small degree repair damage the act of shaving does to the edge and delays the honing somewhat. If it sharpened you wouldn't have to rehone.
bj
Opinions are unnecessary. We have evidence.
WONDER PHOTOS REVEAL UNSUSPECTED FACTS ABOUT Razor Blades and Shaving
X
Thanks X, wise giver of incontestable facts! (facts are stubborn things!)
I guess we can close the poll now that the evidence has invalidated all erroneous opinions :)Quote:
The effect of stropping this blade is easily seen. Not only has the edge been restored to original smooth shaving condition, but the size of the nick has been reduced to one third of its original area and the bottom of the nick has, moreover, been formed into a sharp cutting edge so that a hair end that happened to drop into this nick would be parted just as cleanly as those encountering the unbroken line of the cutting edge.
[Edit: Wait a minute, X, you voted that stropping only smooths the edge, but right there the article showed that the strop also sharpens the edge - what gives? :)]
Ah ha, that's the article I was referring to. Thanks for digging it up.
Chris L
Yes it did :)
So, does stropping sharpen the razor?Quote:
Originally Posted by Popular Science Article
I just let the evidence speak for itself :shrug:Quote:
Originally Posted by Popular Science Article
So if I understand it correctly, rust dulls the razor. Stropping will remove the rust and draw out the metal in the blade so that the edge is keener and smoother than it was before, but the metal that was oxidized and removed by stropping will erode the edge in such a way as to both round the edge and create dulling variations in the previosuly straight cutting edge.Quote:
Originally Posted by Popular Science Article
I am playing a word game again in a way, but I am still curious what people think about it, and how they describe what is happening. I see no problem in telling someone that stropping will help keep their razor sharp for many shaves as long as it is qualified that the razor will eventually need to meet a hone to restore a properly keen and straight cutting edge
hogla,
I think the evidence is incontrovertible and the photomicrographs prove it, incontrovertibly. If the strop can remove rust, it is abrasive and an abrasive is used to sharpen things; therefore, post hoc ergo propter hoc, a strop does sharpen a razor.
Cogito ergo sum and leather is as leather does, and all the rest of those neat quotes... If a strop can roll an edge, by golly it can unroll an edge :w
Answers don't quite match the question of "does stropping KEEP the razor sharp?" I answered yes because a stropped razor is sharper than a non-stropped razor. This would be especially true (odd phrase, I admit, kinda like someone I used to work with who constantly used the phrase "more sterile," which drove me nuts BTW) if you skipped stropping several days in a row. The non-stropped razor would not shave as well as a similar razor that was stropped because it would no longer be as sharp.
I would define "sharp" as the ability to cut. I think Webster and a few others might define it similarly but more expansively. Stropping is considered to re-align the edge and a non-aligned edge will not cut, will not shave, as well so it is not as sharp.
H*ll, it's all semantics. Just strop.
I do remember that article. It was very informative and I suggest that it should be at least linked within a sticky.
And we all know it's steriler, then it becomes sterilest when you use the right spray. This, however, is not quite the same as keeping a razor sharper or making it sharpest. That, of course, is for the linen side(r), some would think this is the domain of the leathest, but they would be incorrectly.
There are times when it is quite difficult to describe the obvious.
Just remember that the higher it flies, the much.
:hmmm:
But it did remove material right? That nick for example. I suppose it could have been reduced by 2/3 because the smashed in steel fibers were straightened out but I would be more inclined to believe that the edge moved towards the bottom of the nick rather then the other way around.
No. The only material which would be removed is the Ferric Oxide (rust). What the stropping does is stretch out or lengthen the bits that get bunched up around a nick or from shaving. The trouble with those magnifications is that they don't show how steel is pressed back by shaving. I've drawn up an exaggerated look along the bevel to help illustrate my point.
X
Q "It did remove material right?"
A "No, it removed rust"
Conclusion: Rust is not material
It is metaphysical and should be treated as such. This is why Glen's magic mushrooms work so well
:roflmao
Xman, thanks for the drawing. It appears that sometimes smoothing and sharpening are one and the same, at least to the untrained eye. keep the ideas coming, it's interesting!
Well, let's define the terms shall we? Since you differentiated between 'smoothing the edge' and sharpening we must take the latter to mean removal of metal to make the bevel sharper and the prior to be simply reshaping the bevel to make it sharper. In order not to confuse the two processes I indicated that 'material' being removed referred to the steel and not any rust which may be removed. It should be noted that the article indicates that a blade coated in oil will not rust and then no material of any kind will be removed by stropping.
X
I wonder how many of the metal "fibers" that are "bent back" are straightened and how many are broken off. To be really picky, a strop is flexible and with an edge sharp/thin enough it would alway end up bowing the edge up from the last stroke on the strop. Assumably, each time you flipped the razor over it would bow the edge the other way. That's why it's so important to keep your razor flat; but on a soft surface I'd expect some of this to be unavoidable. Anybody notice that their razor seems to shave slightly better on one side compared to the other? :)
I say stropping DOES keep the razor sharp, via Utopian's semantic argument. I initially voted no, but he swayed me.
No stroppey, no good shavey.
:OT
I used to get that a LOT... then I got better at honing.
I wonder the same thing though, about the broken vs bent fibers. Once steel hits it's fatigue point it will break off, BUT if it hasn't yet, it will just bend back.
I don't know about the bowing effect though, something seems a bit wrong about that... I just can't put my finger on it yet.
After reading threads back all the way to 2005...
After collecting a serious amount of empirical data...
After reading the popular mechanics articles...
After much contemplation...
I've drawn an inevitable conclusion...
Stropping strops the edge.
:)
I think during honing, the main force is abrasion, together with a bit of plastic shaping.
During stropping the main force is plastic shaping, together with some abrasion.
After honing, or after a shave, the very tip of the edge, which is less than a micron wide, is left erratic. I think stropping creates a convex shaped sub-micron bevel on there. An arch shaped micro-burr, if you like. It's easily disturbed again, hence the need to realign it every shave. Slowly, with every shave, the pinnacle of the very edge deteriorates and gets wider. The sub-micron arch formed by the strop becomes obtuser. It's time for a touch-up.
If a leather strop really was abrasive, it would undo the damage of a shave, and a razor could be kept going forever with just a good stropping session before each shave. We all know that's not the case. That's why I think stropping just conditions the erratic part of the very edge.
with speculative regards,
Bart.
Removing rust and cutting steel are two very different things. rust is essentially a caked powder while steels is aligned molecules bonded together very strongly. Thats like saying that because a knife can cut butter you can use it to slice leather since they are both made from cows.
Technically rust is iron oxide. Steel is iron carbide. So where a chemical reaction has replaced the iron-carbon carbon portion with oxygen you now have iron-oxide which is no longer steel. If you're not removing steel, you are not sharpening but cleaning smut away from the steel surface, or polishing which could also be an abrasive process.
Hey, it's as good a circular illogical argument as have happened before. :hmmm:
Someone left out the idea that a bad stropping could worsen the edge.
When we are asked to differentiate between 'sharpening' and 'smoothing' we must take the smoothing option with regards to stropping and not sharpening. A properly stropped blade certainly acts and feels sharper than it was before stropping but it is actually not. It is only aligned to its optimal shape.
:bow
X
"What difference does it make? Just strop & shave (AKA I don't know)"
There are some things in life it is wise to just follow the herd and not create a disturbance in the force.
To quote Charles Dickens in A Christmas Carol:
"But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile; and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it or the Country's done for."
The wisdom of our ancestors is in the stropping....
No , stropping does not sharpen the razor . If it did , there would be no need for pasted strops , and finish hones .
but does it keep the razor sharp? Attachment 52859
Mmmmmmm Magic Mushrooms, aaaaggggghhh.....(use best Homer Simpson voice....)
When in doubt, Read the WIKI....http://straightrazorpalace.com/srpwi...azor_stropping