Originally Posted by
gugi
Because that sits on top of the steel - you can not reach the steel without getting that off first. Think of it as something like teflon and you'll probably realize that removing that is not necessarily the same as removing metal. So, the abrasives that we use to hone our straight razors, which work really well on the high carbon steel of those, may not do the same on your cartridge blades until you remove the polymer on top of the steel.
That is a result from honing on one side only. That's why we flip the razor when we hone/strop it.
I don't have recommendation because we do not have this problem and do everything possible to avoid it (edge leading honing, light touch, stop before the burr is developed). Occasionally we have people with little experience show up here and tell us how wrong we are for doing it this way and that the alternative is far better. The last time somebody with very high profile did that it started a mini inter-forum war, which ended with all of his new followers concentrated on another forum silently switching back to the traditional way of honing.
Many of the people who hone knives intentionally develop burr repeatedly and then break it off. It is the lazy/ignorant way of honing - you don't have to know when you've reached the sharpness you'll get at that level and switch to a finer hone at that point. You just keep honing past it until a significant burr is formed, then you break it off and switch hones. You regress the edge by this breaking and then you have to do more work on the finer hone, but it works pretty well for knives where you very rarely get to the level of sharpness of a straight razor.
Anyways, may be somebody smarter/more experienced than me can suggest something, but I am 99.9999% certain there is nobody who produces shave-worthy edges by honing and stropping only one side of the edge.
You don't have to listen to me either, just try it and see what happens - may be it'll all work out and you'll be happy with your honed cartridges.