Is all flax linen created equal

for purpose as strop

as a DIY, found some material by the yard
no where near as stiff nor as coarse as fire hose

will this still work?

please advise

The flax linen component on strops can vary widely in thickness, weave, and coarseness, which can affect at least the stropping feel; the differing effects are a whole other argument. But they all seem to do roughly the same function, which is to clean and possibly debur an edge that has been roughed up a bit by shaving.

Unlike many on here, I don't actually like linen fire-hoses for razors. The ones I have gotten at least are far too rough, hard and coarse for razors IMO, but are great when treated for knives.

That said, many of my strops, both modern and vintage, have a linen component. All have a slightly different feel and give different stropping sensations. Some I like better, though I doubt it makes any difference to the edge. I like to do about 20-30 strokes post-shave before the 50-60 on leather. Everybody seems to have a different stropping regiment on here.

I say it's worth a try. someone suggested using a type of linen used for forming loaves of french bread(couche) once. Seemed like a good possibility though one would have to put a seem on one side because it didn't have selvedge edges. Don't recall if anyone tried it though.

Vintage waxed linen is nice. As long as it isnt pasted. Which many of them were. Scrupleworks is my favorite. Firehose may be treated with God knows what. And I prefer not to think about what it may have been dragged through. Get a scrupleworks. You know it's new and clean and not pasted. That's what I did.

Also westholme uses, a similar to Scrippleworks, really great linen, as does Tony Miller. DryGulch uses a really nice hemp which I like as much as my other linen strops.

Is all cotton the same or all wool the same?

The product varies wildly depending on quality of raw material, the thread count and weave and finishing and workmanship.

There is a difference between cotton linen and Flax/English linen being made from different plants but both will work. I have a Neil Miller strop with an English linen component. The weave on that looks similar to the weave on nylon webbing used in seat belts. I have a vintage strop with a cotton component that looks like flattened fire hose and the weave is like that found on old style cotton fire hoses naturally enough. It's also thicker than English linen being a flattened hose and not a single layer like the English linen. Again they both will work.

Bob

People sing the praises of the Scrupleworks linen strop, but I haven't had good luck with it. From my experience, it seems to sag a bit from side to side, even when pulled taut, and the toe of my razor seems to sink into it in a strange way like a hammock. Best luck I've had with linen has been when it is more like hemp, as in the Solingen dedicated linen strop and the French Rasoir-Sabre strops. These seem a little bit rougher and almost starched in comparison to the Scrupleworks linen, which I will admit feels wonderful apart from my toe-sinking issue.

My favourite is a strop made of replacement webbing for Bruno Mathson chairs that I had made. Stiff and flat. Pretty expensive stuff but very good quality.
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I purchased a yard of linen from my local Jo-Ann Fabric store. It was too thin to make a strop, but I applied some Pellon to the back to stiffen the linen and prevent the edges from fraying too badly. Pello is a non-woven material that has a thin layer of hot-glue, so you use a hot iron to fuse the Pellon to the linen. Then you can cut the laminate to whatever size you desire. You can make several such strops from a set of material. I got about a year out of my strop before it started to fray, so I made another one.

The problem with using linen fabric is it unravels when cut, and if you sew it or glue it, you have to deal with the seam. For stropping you want it flat.

There are sources that sell flax webbing, though hard to find and you may have to buy more than you need.

For a strop it does not need to be thick or stiff.

The best source for Linen for strops is vintage strops, you can often buy them cheap with a trashed leather strop. The linen is often pristine but dirty, that can be washed rolled and Ironed to like new condition. I like the linen from old Knakayama strops.

The vintage material was specifically for strops which of course is why it works so well. The modern stuff is made for other uses so you be trying to McGyver it into something it's not meant to be.

You can find Linen on Amazon meant for bread baking purposes and it's thick stuff but the texture or weave isn't made for strops. Maybe that stuff sewn with a stiffener and another backing might do the trick.

I have five vintage strops with linen and only the red imp 700c and c-mon look similar but all feel different. I have a vintage firehose strop that a 44/20 had and that is unique feel to. Hope this helps.

I have only found two current sources for flax linen, Europe and India. Most of the pics I have seen of the current flax linen strops look pretty similar and it looks like the European stuff I have found. I have not handled the stuff from India but it does look different than the European. Pretty sure the USA mills have stopped running it a few years ago.

I agree that firehose feels much different, more coarse and louder but does have a unique feel many like. Not sure if it the texture or the heft of it but it does have a certain quality to it that thinner webbing does not have.

Some guys strop holding both cloth and leather together, other holding just one component. Two together helps make up for the give in the thinner webbing style linen.

Of course the word linen has become so generic one can not always be sure just what the actual fiber being used is as everyone seems to be calling it linen now.