Quick stropping experiment
OK, so all this talk about stropping being king got me thinking: How much of a difference does stropping make, anyway?
Tonight I pulled out my paddle strop, loaded with 1 and .5 micron diamond paste, my hanging Tony Miller strop, and a handful of hairs.
My daily shaver was pulling a bit, so I did 10 laps on the 1 micron and tested. It plinked the hair--I could feel the gentle tug on the hair.
After another 10 to 20 laps, it was cutting the hairs without any noise. I noticed that the razor is very sensitive to pressure at this point. No pressure at all worked best. Just a touch of pressure and the razor lost ground; a few light laps and it came back.
On to the .5 micron side. Again, very sensitive to pressure. A couple of times it lost ground after about five strokes, and I realized that my edge was losing contact briefly at one point in the stroke. I think that slight unevenness made the edge bend off alignment. A couple of good light laps brought it back. I got it to cut my lighter hairs cleanly. On to plain leather.
Ten strokes on the linen, then 20 on the leather. Test. Pulling and noise on the HHT!
Ten more strokes, lighter this time. Some improvement, but still not cutting the hair cleanly.
Ten more strokes, with some pressure at first, then very light pressure on the last three strokes. It was just about back to its original sharpness.
This was a big eye opener for me, proving just how much stropping matters. Bad stropping took my edge to what I'd expect off the 8K Norton. More careful stropping brought it close to its full potential at 25K to 50K.
Here's what I learned: Stropping is crucial. The number of strokes might matter, but the quality of each stroke matters more.
Start with enough pressure to make the razor drag just a bit. For me, this pushes the strop down just a bit--maybe 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch. Then lighten up toward the end. Concentrate on each stroke and take it slow.
Nothing new, I know, but I was really impressed with just how much of a difference it made.
Josh