Thread: Which Strops for a Beginner

Hello cbaytan,

Welcome to Straight Razor Place.

The Illinois 827, 127 and 381 (without a handle) are all good strops for beginners. Also, check Straight Razor Designs for their selection of quality strops.

For a razor, a quality 5/8 or 6/8 round point is ideal. Make sure it comes to you shave ready.

I suggest forgetting about honing right now. What is important is to learn how to shave with the straight razor, and how to strop properly, before tackling honing. There is plenty of time for honing.

Have patience and go slowly. Try not to accumulate a big collection of straight razors at the beginning, because your taste will change. One or two razors should be plenty for now. Good luck.

^^^^^ Sensible advice

No harm buying a nice strop early on. Just make sure you also buy a 2 inch practice strop, and use IT until you are comfortable and confident you won't screw up the nice one. Enjoy looking at and palming your nice new expensive strop, but learn and make your mistakes on the cheaper practice strop.

Originally Posted by Obie

Welcome to Straight Razor Place.

The Illinois 827, 127 and 381 (without a handle) are all good strops for beginners.

Thanks for the warm welcome,


Do you mean 361? Can you be more specific please which "one" is the best for me, (or from others) if you choose the 361, how it's used without handle (or do I attach one myself?)

Originally Posted by cau

No harm buying a nice strop early on.

Like....?

Thanks.

My first was a Tony Miller Heirloom. Very nice strop... I also bought his practice strop, and used it for a month or so before putting a razor to the Heirloom. I bought 2 practice strops with my Scrupleworks strop so I'd have an extra to pass on to a friend in need.

Originally Posted by cau

My first was a Tony Miller Heirloom. Very nice strop... I also bought his practice strop,

Ok, what is your best strop now below $100ish? These are not expensive as I thought, almost same as Illinois.

Great advice from some very experienced members. My advice comes from someone new to SR (90days) from the standpoint of what I wish I would have done differently. Basically things I screwed up.

My initial setup was from SRD 5/8 Ralf Aust and a SRD 3" Latigo hanging strop. The first lesson I learned is stropping is a skill and takes more time than you would think just to do an average stropping job. By comparison learning to shave with a SR seemed easier to me than the stropping. I then purchased additional razors, CrOx, Diamond spray, paddle strop all trying to make the process easier. Lesson learned is it is not an easy process, it takes time and patience, not additional equipment. I would add that using pastes before I was good at stropping probably did more to dull the razors edge than improve it, and it certainly made things more confusing.

Today I am getting the best results with the original razor and strop I purchased, and nothing else. The only difference today is I am 90 days better at stropping, and SR shaving.

If I had it to do again I would have stuck with a quality razor, and quality strop, and not made any additional purchases or tried anything new (honing & pastes) until I had 90 to 100 days of SR & stropping experience.

There is no substitute for Time/Patience/Practice.

I struggle with the patience part : )

Originally Posted by Newton3108

If I had it to do again I would have stuck with a quality razor, and quality strop, and not made any additional purchases or tried anything new (honing & pastes)

What would those be?
Thanks.

You've gotten some great strop recommendations and advice from the experts so far. Many recommend that beginners start with a cheaper strop in case they nick it up real bad learning "the flip" before it becomes ingrained muscle memory. Some of us, myself included, started out the gate with a nice strop, in my case a Tony Miller 3" Latigo, which I learned on very carefully, with only a couple of tiny, inconsequential nicks as reminders. You can certainly find many nice strops for under $100.

But yeah, I echo what was said about learning how to properly strop a true shave-ready edge and keep it that way with linen and leather only for a while. And the part about holding off on honing is also good advice. I probably held off with the hones for a couple of years before diving in, and am only recently feeling that I am any good at it.

But because of that, I had to get really good at stropping! In fact, when I was doing the stropping station demos for new guys at a meetup a couple of years ago, one of them paid me the ultimate compliment: "You've got glide." Now if I can just get that same "glide" on the hones!

Anyway, one more thing that really helped me was to just go ahead and get the 3" strop, which means I didn't have to worry about the x-strokes so much. In fact, all of my strops are 3 inches wide. While some purists will say that you should learn that stroke, I haven't felt the need, though I can when needed on a 2-2.5 inch model.

Let us know what you get! Aaron