Thread: Home Made Dbl Sided Paddle Wool Felt and Balsa Wood Strop

Hi All,

Relative Newbie to straight razor shaving. Months of reading and watching videos on everything having to do with straight razors and then adding to my knowledge on wet honing (already own and use a set of Norton 4000 - 8000 grt), I thought I would post my latest project and get your professional feedback on it. Go ahead, I can take the criticism so tear it apart if you must (lol). I needed more of course after the 8000 hone and I am inpatient waiting for a Japanese 12,000 grt wet stone I ordered from Japan so I thought I would make this while I wait. Right now trying it dry but I will be trying it with .5 diamond paste/spray and .5 Chromium Oxide paste.

Here is what I did: I went to AC Moore Crafts and picked up the paddle (could have made it in my wood shop but saved time), 9X12 Wool Felt with sticky backing, 1/8"X3'X36" of balsa, and a small pkg of 1/4 offsets used for picture frames so that I can remove the balsa at any time without having to glue it down which is what other guys were struggling with. I sanded down the paddle's handle area starting with 100 going up to 600 grt but left the wood raw. No need to finish it but you certainly could. I cut the felt once for a strip and peeled off the sticky back and after prepping the wood surface, adhered it to the paddle. It did not need to go all the way to the end. As for the balsa, the width was perfect. All I had to do was make one cut with an axacto knife, scoring LIGHTLY along a straight edge leaving enough room for the offsets. I then predrilled the holes for the offsets and using my own 1/8" wood screws, I HAND tightened them (go easy here or you may crack the balsa). Of course I couldn't wait to try it and that day a razor showed up from ebay that needed honing, then onto my Dbl sided paddle strop DRY and super light strokes (20 each side), then onto my Tony Miller strop linen (30) then leather (50) and SHAVE TEST. She was pretty good....not perfect better than the others enough so that after shaving, I took all my other newly purchased razors to the paddle then back to the TM strop! Cant wait to shave again! I just refinished my bathroom myself and took some pics I will post to show the strop there and how I hang them. Thanks for reading all of this. Sorry its so long - its my first post.