Thread: Help... I think I stropped my razor dull!

Originally Posted by Jimbo

We did an experiment (more an observational study, really) a while back on the speed of stropping and how that equated to the shave. Admittedly there were only two of us and the observations were very qualitative in nature, but one of us was AFDavis so I think that adds some weight to it!

In any event, we found that there seemed to be a minimum speed below which stropping is fairly ineffectual. However, this speed was surprisingly slow - cannot remember exactly what it was now but I seem to recall it was slower than one would reasonably expect a beginner to be able to achieve, other things being equal. On the other end of the scale, it appeared that there was a maximum speed beyond which the edge/shave did not appear to be appreciably better. This maximum speed was not as fast as some people might expect it to be - again, I cannot recall exact details but I think Alan suggested something in the order of one stroke per second, or thereabouts.

Anyway, the point is that I *think* (suspect, conjecture, hypothesise, whatever...) speed does not play a major role in good stropping per se. My theory is that speed (that is, speed without killing the strop! ) can be indicative of a better stropping technique and it is this stropping technique that matters in terms of stropping efficacy. In other words, speed may indicate you have your technique going well but the converse is definitely not true: good technique does not necessarily mean you're a fast stropper.

So what I am trying to say in my typically long-winded way is that you should concentrate on your stropping technique and not on the speed. Technique will eventually drive speed increases, but speed in and of itself will not improve the edges off the strop.

James.

Dang James - that's really cool!! Crazy cool actually. Please tell me you got video! If not, maybe you should re-create the experiment and post it on the Wiki as I ended up kind of selling myself on the speed thing lol... sigh. If I can help at all - let me know - and thanks for the input.

david