Thread: Floppy diy vrs 127 strop

Hay all
After a few months of using a few diy strops I wanted to see if a recommend strop, the Illinois 127 would give me longer lasting results. My impressions so far ; the 127 is extremely stiff , giving a cardboard like sound and feedback. The floppy broken in latego removes sharpie marks on the bevel way faster.
Before I sanded the 127 to level it, a fresh honed razor seemed to dull faster than when I used my most successful strop, the diy latego. ( I vacuumed and alcoholed the 127 after leveling.)

How important is the stiffness of strops?

I also use a dimond spray step on floppy latego for my normal progression, would it be worth making a stiff strop for that step too? I have some thicker veg tan and toung oil; I am thinking the 127 is treated with a hardening oil to make it so stiff.

I've had most success with almost no strop deflection and a light hand when stroping.

Thoughts?

Matt

Well let's be real for a second

That is no longer a Illinois #127, you took off the factory finish to the leather when you sanded it,

It should have been slowly and steadily broken in with Heel-Palm rubbing each time you walked by it, the other advantage with Illinois strops is the Linen they use, also to be broken in slowly as you use them..

Hard to follow your progression once you mentioned Diamond Spray too, not sure what you have going on

I usually don't express an opinion on such things because I'm not an expert on such matters. What I will say is that all of my strops (homemade and store bought) aren't stiff as cardboard. They never were. Some were somewhat stiff in the beginning. Glen has a point about breaking them in with your palm and rubbing at often until it is broken in. Personally, a like a nice stiff draw for my initial stropping (Homemade veg tan strop) and then a nice smooth draw as a finishing point (Lucky strike 1400 horse hide strop). I don't use and type of spray on leather but I do have CrOx on one side of my linen that I use.

I hope you find that which will work for you. It makes all the difference between a good shave and a great shave. Good Luck!

Strops should be kept clean and never have anything abrasives touch them. Unless you plan on coating it with diamond or crox or ... Permanently or need to repair a spot. Clean and smooth. Never scratched. Dont know where you learned about sanding a strop. Bummer.

I did once have a very stiff strop, it did break in fairly quickly with use and hand rubbing. I also unsuccessfully tried to fix a strop that had a bad wobble in it. I tried to level off a wrinkle and in the end it wound up being two small paddle strops. It’s a long time ago and I think I rubbed it with a Diamond plate. That spot was right in the middle. It never had an even draw after that. So,e lessons are more expensive than others.