Thread: How many strokes?

Well, I've been a drummer most of my life so I do 32 strokes on linen and 64 strokes on leather. That's 8 bars of 4/4 on linen and 16 bars of 4/4 on leather.

Six. Sometimes this extends out to a full 10, but I'm an impatient person with a wife that complains about the stropping noise. I shave around 5 am and it bothers her. Again, its because I'm impatient though. I don't seem to accomplish anything better beyond a few passes.

I like to strop and move on to the shave. I've been on a weird "do it right the first time with purpose" kick for a few years. Stropping 60 passes would drive me insane. To me that would be like 59 re-dos.

I have no problem with the generic idea of doing 30-60 passes if that is what you like to do. Ultimately it's your face.

Lately though I have been trying to do more passes and figure out what all the "stropping" is about.

I do agree though that stropping is about light friction, repeated. You need a gentle touch to strop correctly.

I think the objective is to apply a secondary bevel as lightly as possible.

Another odd datapoint is that I'm a firm believer in a high number of passes when honing. So I'll do maybe 100 passes honing without much thought. I do not get much more benefit after 40-60 passes, but, I wonder sometimes if there is a relationship between the number of stropping passes preferred and the number of honing passes preferred.

If, lets say, I only did a few passes on my finishing stone I might feel the need to do lots more stropping.

Ultimately though, like honing, I think a lot of it comes down to really knowing what you are trying to do and knowing when you have done it. Obviously, if you do 30 or 60 passes, or 100, there is a point in there, somewhere, where you actually accomplish what you set out to.

So I'd be curious to know, not only how many passes people do, but on which pass they think the razor is actually stropped and how many passes are just done for assurance.

Before shaving, I do between 10-20 passes on leather. Afterwards, I rinse the blade, wipe it clean with tissue, then do another 10-20 passes.

I do them pretty fast, and I started rolling my wrist to accommodate this (i.e. not changing my grip at each end of the stroke). That's supposedly a no-no, but after 2+ years of doing it the 'correct', more conservative way, I felt like I could tell what good contact was, so I practiced it a while and paid close attention to both the feel of the blade contact (degree of pressure on spine and edge) and the sound it made. More the sound than anything, really. I dulled two razors with errant spine-lifted strokes before I started getting the hang of it. For anyone why cares to try it, the secret for me is in focusing on horizontal movement, almost as if the strop isn't there, and making sure that the spine 'lands' on the strop first. Hard to explain.

If I were to strop, say, a friend's razor, then I would go the safer route with less speed and changing the grip at each end. However, I'm getting more and more confident with the wrist flip + high speed method. I believe the greater speed (maybe two up-and-back cycles per second) gets the edge where I want it FAR faster than the slower, more conservative way I'd done it before. Like 10 high-speed swipes = 30 regular swipes.

I've been doing this for several months, now, and I haven't noticed any increase in the need for touch-up honing.

Just putting this out there in the name of experimentation (albeit uncontrolled and totally subjective).

Originally Posted by northpaw

Just putting this out there in the name of experimentation (albeit uncontrolled and totally subjective).

I used to be a wrist turner and I know some experienced stroppers who are. Forum member and my mentor TheTopher watched my strop and told me that turning my wrist was not a good idea so between that and reading in the 1961 barber manual that it was better to turn the razor between the tips of the forefinger and thumb without turning the wrist, I changed my stropping to follow that method.

What the book said, IIRC, is that using this method allows you to feel the amount of pressure you're applying. I am able to moderate how much pressure I put on the edge to the strop as I can feel it through my finger tips better now than I could when I turned my wrist. I can strop with very light pressure IOW where I don't think I could before. Of course whatever works for each individual is what they will stick with and I agree wholeheartedly that experimentation is where it is at.

Originally Posted by AFDavis11

Six. Sometimes this extends out to a full 10, but I'm an impatient person with a wife that complains about the stropping noise. I shave around 5 am and it bothers her. Again, its because I'm impatient though. I don't seem to accomplish anything better beyond a few passes.

I'm kind of with you AFDavis11. I grew up watching the older generation strop the razors just a few times and then proceed to shave. I have seen on here where some do it 60, 70, or 100 full rounds. I believe the leather was to do one thing, and that is to get a bit more polish and straighten out the edge...gently. When I sharpened knifes, I used my leather belt to give it more luster along the edge and give it a nice razor cutting edge. With my 1" x 30" belt sander I have a leather belt made in Germany that does that to knives as well. I can strop a knife on both sides in less than a minute and cut any hairs off any place on your body with that knife. It's kind of the icing on the cake. There is often the tiniest of wire burr left on a knife and that helps to take it off.

Another thing "I" do, is I take a soft gum eraser, or a synthetic wine cork (I have access to thousands) and pull the razor edge along the rubber cork or eraser lengthwise, starting at the heel and finishing at the toe. THEN, I strop on a leather strop. In sharpening knives I can see that feathering "rough" looking bit of tinfoil look when I'm getting down to 800 and 1000 grit. Before using the 1000 and leather belt (sander) I draw the knife along a piece of soft pine wood and that takes off that burr. That way I am working on a fresh edge. I don't think running a razor blade across wood is conducive to getting a good edge, but a rubber eraser should accomplish the same thing, albeit softer and gentler on the razor edge.

When I took lessons in flint knapping from one of the masters back in Chadron, Nebraska, the main thing I had to learn was that when flaking stone once you get an edge done, to get it any sharper by flaking, I had to dull it with a piece of sandstone or abrasive rock. This provided a means for the deer antler or copper to be able to bite into and produce a nice flake. So I wonder, when honing, if when one gets done with the 4000 grit stone, if it would be prudent to merely swipe the razor edge LIGHTLY across a gum eraser before going on to the next progression of finer stones?

Anyway, my 2 cents. I consider the leather to finalize the hone work.

Before the shave I do 25 on the linen & 60 on the leather. After the shave I do 25 on the leather. Seems to work alright.

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

I used to be a wrist turner and I know some experienced stroppers who are. Forum member and my mentor TheTopher watched my strop and told me that turning my wrist was not a good idea so between that and reading in the 1961 barber manual that it was better to turn the razor between the tips of the forefinger and thumb without turning the wrist, I changed my stropping to follow that method.

What the book said, IIRC, is that using this method allows you to feel the amount of pressure you're applying. I am able to moderate how much pressure I put on the edge to the strop as I can feel it through my finger tips better now than I could when I turned my wrist. I can strop with very light pressure IOW where I don't think I could before. Of course whatever works for each individual is what they will stick with and I agree wholeheartedly that experimentation is where it is at.

Any tips on learning this? I can't seem to work it into a fluid motion, feels awkward & my wrist is unfortunately trained to turn, as that is how I learned to strop.

100 laps before and 50 after

I usually do 30 Linen and 50 leather before the shave, and then 20/40 after the shave.

Originally Posted by Firefighter2

Any tips on learning this? I can't seem to work it into a fluid motion, feels awkward & my wrist is unfortunately trained to turn, as that is how I learned to strop.

Yes, there are some youtube videos that show the proper hold of the hand, finger and thumb, and basically you rotate the razor at the end of your stroke while keeping your wrist in pretty much the same position. Just check the www.youtube.com site and do a search for razor stropping.