Bentonite Clay stropping dust
Hi Guys,
Just wanted to share something I tried out today that I thought was actually good enough to mention here on the forum.
I bought a tub of Bentonite clay powder from a local health food store(http://www.natureschoice.co.za/bio-f...entonite-clay/) is a very, very fine white/grey powder, often used in homemade shaving soaps for it's lubricating effect. I bought it with the idea that I could use it to bulk up some Zulu Grey dust that I have as a by-product of cutting my hones. My idea is to create a sort of Zulu Grey slurry dust, that can be mixed up and applied to the stone instead of using a slurry stone.. I haven't got around to that as yet, but instead I thought I would test the mild abrasive quality of the Bentonite clay first. So I bought a cheap makeup powder brush from the cosmetics isle(some strange looks while doing that), and then simply used it to dust one of my strops - just enough to whiten the surface. I then took a shave-ready razor (it shaved smoothly enough) and did say 20 light turns on one of my Zulu Greys with just water and then went onto about 40 strokes on the dusted strop.
Well, the result was the smoothest stropped edge I've actually ever felt, appreciably better than just a clean strop - the bentonite clay has a very positive effect on the edge. It also adds a nice smooth gliding draw to the strop - which I prefer to a very heavy draw - I'm just so pleased with the result that I had to share it...
If anyone cares to try this out and let me know how it works for you, I'd really appreciate that. Maybe it's just me, but would be cool to hear if others find this to work?
Next project is working on that ZG slurry dust and seeing how that goes. But I'm super pleased with this dusted strop technique so far...
Cheers guys,
- Mike