Thread: Vintage Strop Advice

Picked up a vintage strop probably from the 1930's.
One side is Horse Hide, the other is linen or webbing material.

Cleaned up the horse hide ok but the linen appears dirty. Just general use dirty not anthing ground in.

What would be the best way to clean this. Just soap water and a small nail brush keeping the leather a dry as possible??

Any advice or thoughts please.

I cleaned one with good results by rubbing a bar of soap into it. Work it into the fabric, then scrape it off with a steel ruler. I had to repeat a few times but it worked a charm.
I used the ruler so I wouldn't damage the linen. If you don't have one available, common sense should help you pick something similar.
Any remaining soap residue shouldn't harm the razor.

Thanks for the advice. I will give that a go tomorrow, I did not want to damage the Linen by doing something daft with it.

I've washed linen from vintage strops in a bucket of cold water and in the washing machine. I did it more to get lumps out than to clean it. I liked the bucket method with Woolite best. Dried flat on a table overnight and all was well and the lumps were either gone or substantially reduced.

Soap and water and a scrub brush with good old fashioned elbow grease.

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

I've washed linen from vintage strops in a bucket of cold water and in the washing machine. I did it more to get lumps out than to clean it. I liked the bucket method with Woolite best. Dried flat on a table overnight and all was well and the lumps were either gone or substantially reduced.

Jimmy - used your Woolite method to restore a vintage strop. It worked great. The only part to watch out for is if there is a maker's stamp on the canvas, avoid rubbing it while still wet - you can rub it off.

Thanks for the advice, Im expecting a vintage horsehide/linen strop in the next few days. As for the hide, would you recommend just neatsfoot oil as it is in good condition, or a treatment with tallow based lather also?

I have used JimmyHAD woolite method a few times and always worked well. Yes, do avoid the maker's stamp as it can easily be rubbed off.

For what its worth I had a vintage linen/horsehide strop and used saddle soap to clean the leather. Then I contacted the Pecard company the ones that make leather conditioners and they recommended their Leather dressing for antiques which I used with great results. You can check out their website I think their dressing is better that Neatsfoot oil. Hope this helps.