Thread: Honing Pastes! Help with choosing please!

Ok gents, all the talk of stropping pastes has got me confused, and I don't want to get messed up before I get started.

First, the things I think I know:

Daily strop:
Linen: White paste (optional)
Leather: Non-abrasive, yellow, aka strop dressing, mink oil etc. as needed to keep leather conditioned.

Pasted/Honing strops:
Diamond pastes are what they say they are, and that includes being pricey!
Dovo Green - 6 micron
Dovo Red (tube, not hard paste) is 2 to 4 micron

Ok, for what I need help on:

Dovo hard pastes:
Is the red package a 5 or 6 micron, or what?
Is the black .25 or something else?

I ordered a 4-sided paddle strop from Tony (and a hanging strop), and I would like to set it up properly to be a flexible and complete honing strop (I know that it can't substitute for a true hone in extreme cases). I am trying to follow the advice Randy gave me, and I would like to set this up with 6 micron, 1 micron, .5 micron and .25 micron on the different planes.

So I could go with Dovo green ($4.99), Diamond 1.0 ($16.99), Diamond .5 ($15.99), and Diamond .25 ($16.99) for a total of $55 just for pastes!
[all from ClassicShaving)

I also see this as an option:
Assuming that he Dovo 2 part strop paste is 6 micron and .25 micron ($6.99) (ClassicShaving), 1.8 micron Boron Carbide from handamerican.com ($9.50) and finally .5 Chromium Oxide from handamerican ($12.00), for a total of $28.50.

I could also substitute the diamond 1 Micron from Classic Shaving for the 1.8 micron Boron Carbide for just $7.50 more, bringing my total up to $36 if the 1.8 is just not close enough.

Are the Diamond pastes worth the extra $25? I don't want to be cheap, but also don't want to waste money either.

I know that Randy is the one that I started this out with, and that I should probably just get his advise via PM, but I am hoping that by posting out here that maybe it will help some other noobs.

Thanks for your help!

Jim

Jim,
All my experience is with the diamond compounds so I won't be much help on the others. I do have the "hard" Dovo pastes but like you don't know for sure what the grit size is. I will also note they are only "hard" if it is 50 dergrees or below <g>. In mid summer they are like a stick of butter left on the counter and contained only by the wrapper......be warned, they are messy. I got them to apply to a vintage belt strop that already had red and black pastes.
I also have a strop with the green chromium oxide on it. It was already on so I don't know how messy application is.
I am sure all are proven performers but I have not tried them yet.
Diamond pastes are pricey but do go a long way. I have ben using the same 4 tubes for 9 months and have well more than half of each left. Figure that since I started selling my kits I have been useing pastes daily to prepare razors for sale. That is a lot of stropping. They are harder and probably a little more effective than the others but at a price tradeoff.

For your 4 side I think smooth leather all around may be a good choice but I do use rough on my coarse pastes. Lets see what the group says about choices on the pastes and I will setup your 4 side accordingly with corect leather choices.

Best,
Tony

So far as pastes go, they are messy. Buy some latex gloves at the local pharmacy -- clean up is a lot easier.

I use the boron carbide & chromium oxide from HandAmerican. For edge maintenance they work great.

Jim, the truth about pastes is that you DON'T actually need to use them. Their use originated from the old days of barbershops, when the barbers needed to refresh the edges after doing a LOT of shavings with their razors. I have read in some barber's manual that one should not use pasted strop before 10 years of plain strop experience, and it's not recomended using them at all... If you want to bring your edge a step further, you might consider getting 12-15K Chinese or Japanese wetstone. It will last you a lifetime, and will do the same if not better job than pasted strop. I am considering getting one myself, but for now, I am shaving very comfortably coming off the Norton 8K and DOVO plain strop.

Nenad

Originally Posted by sensei_kyle

So far as pastes go, they are messy. Buy some latex gloves at the local pharmacy -- clean up is a lot easier.

I use the boron carbide & chromium oxide from HandAmerican. For edge maintenance they work great.

I don't know how much the pharmacy charges, but I would recommend purchasing disposable gloves from Lee Valley - $8 for a box of 100. The also have latex and nitrile (for those individuals allergic to latex) gloves. Once you own some you'd be amazed how often you'll use them.

Seems you do have a lot to think about. And your right, you should get your advice from Randy. I will tell you this. I think you pretty much understand what your talking about. You understand that you want various pastes of varying grits, sort of like honing. In my limited opinion you don't want ALL diamond pastes. They are, as you have noticed, an expensive approach. First, remember this, you can't change pastes around too much. Once applied, that leather is impregnated with that grit. Second, paste strops are usually set for certain grits of paste. Tony can advise you on the leather he applied to the 4 sided strop and what you should apply and where.

I prefer the .5 in diamond from classic shaving. Fine honing seems great with diamond paste. I like the red and green pastes as well, cheaper and all from the same place (you have to consider shipping costs as well). Those would give you a regular unpasted strop, one .5, one 3 microns, and one 6 microns (I think, doesn't it say on the classicshaving website?) Well, regardless I know it is a good progression. Again .5, red, and green, with one side being unpasted (as a backup). Later if you want you can put .25 on the unpasted strop and just use the hanging at the end.

Its a little bit of a gamble but if you buy a shave ready razor I would imagine you'd not even need the green. Just red and .5 is where I would start and leave one side open for something else if you need it. Remember again, you can't just put any paste on any leather. Some leathers are designed more "porous" for high grit pastes and .5 should be applied to regular stropping type leather (being a very low grit). In fact I apply my .5, with spectacular results, to balsa wood.

Oh, also

The hanging strop. Just leave that be for now. Forget the pastes. Just rub your palm into it everyday for a while and let your natural oils work on it. Linen is fine too by itself. I rub candle wax into mine. But you don't need to buy all that stuff just yet.

I've heard of guys stropping on a hunk of rubber, and I myself have used my blue jeans. I've even used my palm in a pinch.

You can spend hundreds of dollars on straight shaving to get it "right" but without the knowledge and experience you still won't get a decent shave. You can't buy experience.

Here's my view on pastes. Using pasted strop creates beweled edge, as opposite to honing with finer stones (up to 15K+), wich keeps the edge wedge shaped. When you later hone this beweled edge, you will find it dificult to achieve desired results, needing more time on the hone, because you will have to remove more material to restore the edge. Depending on how long have you used pasted strop, this time is becoming guesswork. On the other side, when you hone nonpasted dull edge, you can usualy predict the strokes needed to restore the edge, as Lynn recomends, with two 1/3 passes on the Norton you can ussualy keen razor that is starting to pull. Using pasted strop also changes edge-spine angle, because pastes can "eat" faster thin edge than the bigger-surfaced spine, again needing more time on the hone to correct.

As far as using pastes on any oeather I would suggest they not be used on the red finish leather on my paddle strops, just the rough or tan surfaces. The red has an oil treatment and I think that may prevent the pastes from fully embedding itself into the leather.

As for the pasted strops creating a secondary bevel on an edge I think that is more a problem with a hanging strop and pastes than on a paddle strop and pastes. The paddle strop and the tan leathers I use creates a pretty hard surface. if using just the weight of a razor on the strop you are unlikely to create the wrong bevel. On a hanging strop that is a different story and I would agree 100% with that creating a problem edge.

AF, you mentioned balsa. I just finished up a 4 sided balsa strop today for use with soft pastes. I was thinking red and black Dovo on two of the 4 but not sure what to use on the other two. I will post a photo in the Gallery, Gear For Sale section with my other stuff.

Tony

Originally Posted by Tony Miller

As for the pasted strops creating a secondary bevel on an edge I think that is more a problem with a hanging strop and pastes than on a paddle strop and pastes. The paddle strop and the tan leathers I use creates a pretty hard surface. if using just the weight of a razor on the strop you are unlikely to create the wrong bevel. On a hanging strop that is a different story and I would agree 100% with that creating a problem edge.

Tony

Tony, that is right. If the leather is glued to wood surface, there is little fear of creating beweled edge. But if stropped on hanging pasted strop, you got beweled edge.

Nenad