Thread: I think I got miself a dud...

Originally Posted by zib

You should have cleaned the leather with saddle soap first, then re conditioned it....
The metal pieces should clean up nicely.....

I used some saddle soap after I sanded it... I'll be giving it a good rub down with some olive oil once it's dry and we'll see how it goes...Hopefully it turns out!

Thanks All!

I'd be very careful as you do this. I was working the same process on a strop that looks almost identicle to this one, and rolling it over to work the oil through it popped, a big crack across the top that goes half way through the leather. There were some cuts in my strop before, but nothing as nasty as the crack I put in it.

I'm going to play around with it to see what I can do, as there's still a good length of leather for stropping purposes. I picked up another strop at an antique store yesterday. It's in much better condition and I'll use it while playing with repairs/restoration on the cracked strop.

Originally Posted by porridgeorange

So I was at the antique store yesterday, went through all 5 floors and couldn't find a darned thing (I was looking for straights and mugs/scuttles). Then out of the corner of my eye I see a strop it looked like trouble but I picked it up. all of a sudden shaving related things started popping up in places I was sure I had looked

Thats sort of like the 'Stalking The Wild Asparagus' (Euell Gibbons) approach. With practice your eyes know where to look and what to look for, and learn to ignore whatever isn't 'wild asparagus'

Asparagus....Yum!

It doesn't look too bad to me, but if all the above advise doesn't work, get a new piece of leather and reuse the hardware and linen parts. You end with a new strop with cool old parts

If you call around local antique shops, you'll be surprised how many have vintage straight razors and boxes to go with em. I noticed they're usually rusted and overpriced, but if you point out the problems and say these go for like $10 bucks on ebay they'll usually negotiate by 50% or more.

Originally Posted by rodb

It doesn't look too bad to me, but if all the above advise doesn't work, get a new piece of leather and reuse the hardware and linen parts. You end with a new strop with cool old parts

I actually got it fixed up nicely. Unfortunately the fold in the leather left pretty deep creases in the front side. If I sanded them completely out there would be very little strop left. So instead I sanded the backside smooth cleaned it with some saddle soap and treated it with oil. It turned out fantastic! I'll post some pics when I get a chance.

Originally Posted by porridgeorange

I actually got it fixed up nicely. Unfortunately the fold in the leather left pretty deep creases in the front side. If I sanded them completely out there would be very little strop left. So instead I sanded the backside smooth cleaned it with some saddle soap and treated it with oil. It turned out fantastic! I'll post some pics when I get a chance.

I'd definitely like to see how it turned out...on both sides.

Thanks,

Originally Posted by porridgeorange

I actually got it fixed up nicely. Unfortunately the fold in the leather left pretty deep creases in the front side. If I sanded them completely out there would be very little strop left. So instead I sanded the backside smooth cleaned it with some saddle soap and treated it with oil. It turned out fantastic! I'll post some pics when I get a chance.

Very cool!! I would like to see the pictures too. I see lots of bad strops in antique stores mostly with deep cuts or bad folds and I've been tempted to try some restores myself.