I love my "Kangaroo" strop (though it's actually just a very nice piece of horse shell), but have wanted an actual "Roo" strop since I tried one at the Asheville meetup years ago:
Attachment 305091
Here little buddy-I just want to scratch you behind the ears-honest!
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Anyway, I was going to get one of Gabe's highly-regarded roo strops, but I decided to save some money and make my own. So I got all the hardware from Razor Emporium, and a really nice pre-cut brown roo piece from the Aussie seller "Outthere09." The hardware is basic, workman-like gear, nothing fancy, but sturdy enough to do the job-about what I expected. I suppose I could upgrade the Chicago screws if I want to get fancy, but this was not intended as a fancy piece.
I was pleasantly surprised by the 'roo piece, which got here surprisingly fast, expertly rolled and packaged-just a quality piece for a very reasonable price! At 600x75x1mm, it provides a nice long stropping surface of 21"x3." Really, as everything was pre-cut, it was more assembly than actually making anything. I cut and shaped the corners, and punched the screw holes with a leather punch-easy peasy!
Top end front:
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interestingly, the back side is surprisingly silky, almost like a finely-napped suede, and is also a very fine stropping surface with a totally different character from the front side:
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In practice, it's a very loud, "singing" strop, especially on the front side. It's very thin and strong, and almost feels and functions like a drum head when stretched out. The back side is much quieter and smoother. I've tried it on a few curvy Sheffields, as I know some of you guys like Mike/Outback feel that the deflection of such a thin piece strops those outer curves more efficiently-we'll see what tomorrow's shave says.
Anyway, I'm very happy with this set-up. Not sure yet where it will fall in my stropping "progression" (yeah, I do that lol!), but it's a nice addition, and would probably work just fine on its own. You guys who are posting looking for options for strops, it's just one more way to go. I put about $75 into the materials, for what it's worth. Aaron/SHD