Thread: When is it time to Strop?

Originally Posted by Jmlaviol

Yeah its a dovo.. got the set off of amazon. Comes with some soap, a shitty brush and a strop. There is a place down the street the sharpens razor and knives, anxious to bring it into him and hone it, then again I think JeffR is right about the honing aspect, maybe just stropping it several laps before my next shave is legit. The strop has both a black and brown side.

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If that is the exact set up you have that you linked to I would say that someone put together a kit and it is likely the razor was not professionally honed but has a factory edge. I would suggest having it professionally honed and not by the guy down the street who does knives and also straight razors. Those are two entirely different things. There are plenty of vendors here who have a known good reputation for the quality of their edges.

Your comment about the brush suggests to me that you are having trouble getting a good lather. That is usually down to poor technique and a poor lather can contribute to a poor shave.

For the strop, you first strop on the non leather piece and then on the smooth finished side of the leather piece. If the strop is less than 3 inches wide you will have to do X strokes while you are stropping in order to cover the full length of the blade. If you have not stropped a razor before and your technique is poor you will dull the razor and or cut/nick your strop too.

If you have no experience with a straight razor there is a lot to learn and a good start would be reading the shave wiki here in the library section first Straight Razor Place Wiki - Straight Razor Place Wiki . There is good advice there and a lot of answers to questions too.

Bob

Stay in touch and let us know how it goes . . . It sounds like you're in for some adventure!