Thread: Linen on stropping

A linen strop should be thick and stiff and bumpy. That's what makes it such a great media for stropping.

I have two vintage linen firehouse strops and various other vintage linens. They all are very good stropping materials and are loud and give lots of “touch” feedback. None have harmed any of my razors.

I put 50 laps on the firehose (top) and 50 on the finer weave linen and then 100 on the leather after each shave.
My thinking is coarse, fine and finest. It works for me. Some make more noise than others but they all make noise,
it doesn't bother me.

Originally Posted by Southbound

Just need some info on stropping on linen. I bought an old vintage Russian strop off of ebay. The linen says extra heavy Scottish linen
.....

It looks good to me. You seem to have cleaned it well.

Most noise is from the spine not the edge (should be).
Strop smooth and slow and life will be good.

Barbers and honemasters make us look slow but slow
30 licks is done inside a minute or two and whiskers take
longer than a min to soften.

After washing I suspect it shrunk and the hills and valleys are a bit exaggerated.
That should calm down with use...

You can strop with the spine at a 30 degree angle or so to the line of the strop.

Genuine linen should be hand washed, with a proper soap. Laundry detergents are probably not the best choice. I have used woolite, but prefer to use a 50 year old bar of Proctor and Gamble Naptha Soap. (what grammy used to wash the table linens)

And just because I didnt like the rough feeling, I iron the suckers on Medium heat =P

Originally Posted by Chugach68

Looks like its good to go. How stiff is it? I have a couple that look similar and are really stiff. They still work good though.

Yes its pretty darn stiff! When i first got it, it was full of grime and stains I will tell you how tuff this linen is, it took it to the carwash and hung it on a mat hanger and used high pressure wash on it. Lol. I thought it would destroy the linen, it being old and all, but it came out looking pretty new. and undamaged. Me being fairly new to this hobby, it just figured that SRD probably finished my razor at 30k. If i take it to a heavy weave linen id be going backwards in sharpness. Oh well im still green at this, a man learns something everyday.

Originally Posted by Southbound

Yes its pretty darn stiff! When i first got it, it was
....
Me being fairly new to this hobby, it just figured that SRD probably finished my razor at 30k. If i take it to a heavy weave linen id be going backwards in sharpness. Oh well im still green at this, a man learns something everyday.

I would ask how it was honed. Next time you have someone hone it ask.
My guess for the last hone would be a gentle touch on one of
those unobtainable old slate hones or a nice pasted strop with
submicron spray. The 30K edge is unfriendly to my face...
I am using my 13K hone for touchups.

With the bevel nicely set someplace from 8K perhaps finer will give
that magic shave for a lot of us. The one SRD razor I shave
with had been honed very nicely. A kid sold it to me at a loss because
he could not strop it correctly. I gave it a couple 13K wipes and it
is one of my favorites among too many years later.

Strop smooth with a light touch and enjoy the process.

The flax linen component I use is 3" wide and a corse weave, but fairly soft, and works very well on the edge.

The first time I got to pick up a real linen strop in an antique shop I couldn't believe how coarse the weave was or how rigid it was. It was not what I was expecting.