Thread: A bit of heresy

Originally Posted by gssixgun

I think he was kidding

Ya, I was hoping so! Sorry!

My experience is I have a heavy beard, I strop at the beginning and like 20 passes before the 2nd pass. Then 20 after before putting away the razor. Sometimes like today I was short on time so I picked up the razor and only stropped when I finished. The goal was a decent shave and it worked. My minute or minute and a half of stropping is no big loss of time except when in a hurry. My opinion is it depends on your beard, all other factors being ok.(pre shave, etc.)

I suppose if we are going to have a knock-out, drag-out fight, THIS would be a good candidate topic! Better than politics or religion anyway. I think before we go all nuclear on each other though, we have to be clear what we are all planning on dying for!

It sounds like you (the OP) are suggesting that you can get away without stropping once. I can imagine a few other people on the forum that can do the same thing.

There is an important point we all have to keep in mind. I call it the "unknown" starting point. We can all imagine what is right or wrong based on the tools we have and use, but as soon as you add in a different person, with a razor honed on a different stone, and stropped in a different way, on a different strop--- we have the "unknown" starting point. Many times I tried to help someone in person only to realize that thier ideas made some sense when I saw what they were starting with.

Here is the hard part to swallow. The first thing you have to watch out for when testing the "I don't need to strop" theory. One, are you really stropping in the first place, and how do you know for certain that you really are? If you hone more often than the next guy, you probably aren't really stropping. You might think you're stropping an edge, when in fact you're simply making the edge a tiny bit better with an ineffective technique. I have helped many people with stropping. How? Long hours of tutoring? No. Simply by saying "Add a bit of deflection, and try again". And, viola, they see the light.

Next, make sure you're not damaging the edge. It's hard to admit it, but in any testing you do on effective stropping, you've got to be absolutely certain you aren't damaging the edge by stropping, and then, your results make perfect sense. A high grit hone can act nearly as nice as a strop. Maybe someone is even honing using a strop and powder/paste combo (which is already a form of stropping).

But, if the overall effect of your stropping is limited in any way, you'll achieve results that sound like the "I don't need to strop, ever!" solution.

Not to the same degree, but the antithesis is also possible. You could be such a fantastic stropper that you can go days without stropping, because of the effectiveness of your first stropping. I know someone like this that lives in my house! But, its pretty unlikely.

Final thought though is this . . . you've got to evaluate the edge as it shaves, not based on how it feels on your face. That is an ineffective measurement. What I do to evaluate my stropping is to watch the razor and whisker interaction with no shaving cream on my face. Yes, the blade is always smooth enough to shave without shaving cream too (wanna start another fight?). Anyway, the best stropping is not about face smoothness, that is easy. The best stropping also produces the best shaving edge. This is hard to measure, but much easier to observe than say, face smoothness and comfort.

So, my first question would be "How many days can you go without stropping without feeling an effect on your face?" and second "What do you need to do about it to correct it afterward?" If you need to hone after a few days of shaving without stropping, then you've clearly got an issue. If you can strop after a few days, then maybe less so.

Then you have to stop and ask yourself, what does your skin have to do with shaving comfort? Or, what does comfort have to do with the problem? If you have tough skin, then you don't really have a very useful conclusion, especially for guys with sensitive skin that might be able to tell the difference in one missed stropping session, immediately.

Its a really hard experiment to pull off if you don't have sensitive skin (although I can see more redness later in the day if I don't strop).

AFD, thoughtful reply for which I am appreciative. First, it's been amusing seeing the comments that my stropping technique is deficient. Or that I don't know how to properly sharpen a razor. Ad infinitum. I'll humbly deflect those suggestions. Clearly (or perhaps it's not so clearly!), not stropping before a shave is not for everyone. Guess what? Skipping a couple strops works fine for me. Nowhere did I state that it would work for all, just that it worked for me. And, yes, I still strop, but now with less frequency. And further, on the days I skip the preliminaries, my shaves are just as good as before--and happen w/o razor burn (which I almost never get regardless). My suggestion throughout the thread has simply been that folks should try for themselves.

In essence, I'm an empiricist. Don't give me theories or lecture me about what barbers did for 75 years. I've been STR8 shaving for years, and try everything until I decide it doesn't work. I'd love to suggest that "to strop or not to strop" should be easily tested. That's just not the case because there are so many variables. Razor steel, sharpness, hone angle, user's skin (& how sensitive or tough it may be), soap used, preliminaries, hot or cold water, barometric pressure, ambient humidity, etc... All of these influence a shave, and would somehow have to be factored in for any objective strop or not to strop testing to be meaningful.

Last, my OP was not intended to create a "a knock-out, drag-out fight." It was meant more as an amused aside to experienced shavers. Sometimes the sacred has no substance, and dogma is more tradition than a fast requirement. Again, my experiment works for me. Nowhere did I say it would work for you.

Originally Posted by pcg

Last, my OP was not intended to create a "a knock-out, drag-out fight." It was meant more as an amused aside to experienced shavers. Sometimes the sacred has no substance, and dogma is more tradition than a fast requirement. Again, my experiment works for me. Nowhere did I say it would work for you.

The point in general many of us are looking to make is this type of posting can be really confusing for someone with less experience or expertise than yourself.

There are lots of active new users here. Many of them are overwhelmed with the flood of well-intended advice and struggle with the myriad points of view and all the YMMV.
The endless choices and variables are at once the greatest attraction to this hobby and it biggest challenge.

In order to give the uninitiated the best chance for success and less opportunity for discouragement there is a sacred set of behaviors which will ensure the highest odds for success.

I don't hone using pyramids or counting strokes but I have rubbing steel to stone for long enough such methods have little value to me but for someone just buying their first set of
hones it is good place to start in order to develop the skills which will enable them to learn other methods.

Beginners if anything like me, will have a difficult enough time determining why they have razor burn, or pulling, or nicks, etc without tossing in the "no need to strop try it out" variable.

I have tried not stropping and it works a time maybe or two but not well enough for my face. I have shaved enough now to know my results are the effects caused by stropping and not something else I am learning.
If I had tossed this variable into my fledgling routine it wouldn't have been helpful.

Your OP was provocative(not a bad thing). It might have better been offered as advice for experimentation. Presentation is more than half of a good message.

Interesting point of view, but my OP was neither provocative nor poorly presented. It was an objective observation, and as such, certainly worthy of posting. As I last noted, the must-strop-before-shaving dictum is dogma, an article of faith. Nowhere do we have real science that verifies the belief. Although stropping before every shave is harmless (presuming you are an accomplished stropper and are not simply dulling the blade), doing so as a sacred axiom warrants testing. Which I did.

Quoting myself, "Skipping a couple strops works fine for me. Nowhere did I state that it would work for all, just that it worked for me. And, yes, I still strop, but now with less frequency. And further, on the days I skip the preliminaries, my shaves are just as good as before..."

A newbie is always better off following tradition and middle of the road advice. After feeling experienced, a shaver can experiment and eventually find a system that works for their particular skill, skin, tools and preferences. This is a basic precept that works in almost every field.

I re-read the op and am pretty comfortable that he is simply stating his thoughts. I see the whole beginner argument, but we're also not in the beginners forum. I noted that you strop once a week, or so. I'll just agree again. I don't really see a big requirement to strop every day, but I think it's a better starting point. We also have to be aware that the common beginner advice is often to not strop the first couple of shaves so you don't roll the edge.

To me an extensive stropping session at the end of every week would be sort of, procrastination, focused. It makes my anxiety level rise, but doesn't bother me at all, from a procedural aspect.

Also, I like to have fun with my posts, please don't assume that I thought you meant to start a fight. I think it's kinda cool that people are so passionate about it.

Originally Posted by AFDavis11

I have helped many people with stropping. How? Long hours of tutoring? No. Simply by saying "Add a bit of deflection, and try again". And, viola, they see the light.

Adding 'a bit of deflection' made a singularly positive difference in my stropping results. I used to try to get the strop as taut as I could. One day I visualized an old barber I used to watch and left the strop a bit slack. Viola ..... I saw the light.

I look at it kind of like changing the engine oil in your car. You can do it every 100,000 miles and it will run just great for a while. However what you can't see is the damage being done. Then one day zowee and you need a new engine. Of course if you won't need a new razor if you don't strop but the edge is deteriorating after every shave and I guess depending on how your beard is the deterioration varies.

I think anyone who strops and uses his own straights will, after a time, learn what stropping does to a razor edge.

I'm sure I'm not the exception when I say that I've skipped stropping on rare occasions and not suffered for it. And yet over time, I've found that stropping is good to do before every shave, and after honing.

Michael