Thread: Alternative to Canvas...

I want to know what you all think of this: I don't have a canvas strop (yet), and I've been getting by just using the smooth leather back of the one I've got, but this week I tried a new tactic. Since I wear denim jeans during the workweek, I tried pulling the cloth tight at the thigh, and went ahead and stropped on my pants. It worked like a charm, and it was the best shave I've ever had. I was just wondering if you all thought that this is a viable solution (though obviously temporary) or if the quality of that shave was all in my head.

Denim is actually a very good material for strops and there are a fair few number of people who use it on this forum! I've seen pictures of it used in both paddle strops and hanging strops.

There was another thread where someone had been on a trip and taken their razor and a paddle strop and was using their jeans, in a similar way to the one you mention, in place of their canvas.

As long as you dont have any grit or dirt on the material that might affect the edge, I think this is a viable option and I dont see any reason why you couldnt do this long term as well!

I'm making a denim flatbed hone from an old pair of jeans at the moment, and I'm going to put 0.5 diamond spray on the material.

Cool, I'll keep doing it then. I hadn't thought about turning an old pair of jeans into a strop. Not a bad idea actually. Although, I was just thinking, would denim equate more to a cotton strop rather than linen/canvas/whatever? I mean, denim is primarily cotton. Or would the coarse weave texture make it more like linen etc? Or am I overrating the difference between stropping on different cloths?

If you want a cheap linnen strop try a car seat belt. I got mine from a scrapyard and cost me nothing. I scrubbed it clean, cut it to size (making 2) One I use with paste. I find they work realy well and are cheap.

Believe it or not newspaper works very well too.

I am going to cut up the legs on an old pair of corduroy pants I have laying around today. One leg I will use with the corduroy running vertically, the other with it running horizontally. Why not? Never know until you try, right?

James.