Pasting a damaged strop?

[U2Bono269]

As you might notice from my sudden spate of new topics here, I'm quite busy in my new shaving hobby. I have a poor man's strop that had to be replaced because of wrinkles in the leather. I still have it and would like to do something with it. I think it's a good candidate to turn into a pasted strop, but I'm not sure if it's a good idea.

The strop has some wrinkles that are a little rough, and 3 or 4 nicks. Only one of them is noticable to the touch.

If I were to slather some paste on this, will the paste cover up the imperfections? If not, should I sand the leather to get a more uniform pasting surface?

[nun2sharp]

Those wrinkles could be whats killing your edge.

[U2Bono269]

no Larry sent me a replacement. I've been using the new one and it's been great. But I don't want to waste the wrinkeld leather if I don't have to.

[nun2sharp]

If the surface is wrinkled I would use it for something other than a strop.

[U2Bono269]

Ok. It has about 6 inches of smooth leather left. The top half is wrinkled and there are some cuts on the bottom (my first few tries were terrible). I might turn it into a small paddle strop one day using the good leather. I'll hang it up in the meantime. Maybe if my strop restore works out I'll use the good poor man's for paste.

[nun2sharp]

I like the paddle strop idea, but why pastes?

[U2Bono269]

I'd like to have a small pasted strop because I want to maintain the keenest edge I can. With my wire-forest of a beard, I think that's important. One of the reasons (besides financial) that I've switched to straights is that other razors are dulled sometimes midway through a shave. So I just think it's important to make sure my razor is as sharp as I can keep it.