Potential intro to pasted strops

Hello Gents

So I've been and stropping and honing my razor for a little while now and all is well. I've been using a 12k grit natural hone and a leather strop I made myself. However even after the 12k the blade doesn't feel like it cuts my beard as smoothly as it could. I just feel it could cut more smoothly. So would it be better maybe investing in a higher grit hone and using that, or maybe better investing in a pasted strop to get my razor super sharp and extending the life of my edge without returning to the hone.

Cheers.

My opinion would be that if your edge is not as sharp as you would like, the answer is not going higher in grit or even to pastes but lower in grit. That is, your bevel and edge may not be as good as they can be, and therefore further refinement misses the point. At 12K, the edge should require no refinement, and if it is not shaving well at that point perhaps the bevel and edge have not been adequately set. If the bevel and edge are in good shape at 12K, then the blade should shave just fine. I have stones of 16K and 30K grit and rarely, if ever, use them anymore. I find a well-stropped 12K edge does the job for me. If it doesn't, I look to lower grits to fix problems, not higher ones. I've never used and never needed pastes of any kind, just plain leather.

Thanks for the reply.

Personally I think the bevel isn't the issue as I had the razor professionally honed around 4 months ago and only purchased my 12k stone once stropping alone was no longer enough. By no means does it shave badly, the shave is good with no irritation and can pass the hanging hair test anywhere on the blade. I think part of me was just curious if I could get my blade any sharper and smoother than it already is and higher grits seem the way to go. But no means am I shaving with a butter knife here.

In that case some crox on leather may give you what you are looking for.

Try stropping on a few layers of magazine pages. Open a shiny page magazine to about page 40 and go to it with the mag on a flat hard surface. Open it away from you with the open side at the table edge and hold the of the page down. It does not take any pressure to strop that way and it is a good way to clean a blade after honing. I like it when i remember to do it.
~Richard

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Originally Posted by Castel33

In that case some crox on leather may give you what you are looking for.

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Chromium oxide usually is about 0.5 microns.

Ferric oxide (or "jeweller's rouge") is around 0.1 micron.

My rule of thumb is that 15000 "grit" is equivalent to about 1 micron. So, from a 12K-grit stone, either the CrOxide, or the FeOxide, might be an improvement.

. Charles

You should be able to get a great shave off the 8K. If you can't going higher in grits ain't the answer. You need to spend more time with the lower grits not use higher ones as a crutch to attempt a more refined edge.

Once you learn to extract the max from the lower grit then you move on to the higher.

I have shaved off the 8,and 12 and leather, and all with different pastes slurry, dia lapping film also. I have found the slurry on felt bench strop and the crox on linen hanger to be the best feel for me. I guess you can try em all like I did. And see which one works for you. I also finished on dia lapping film (1 micron instead of the 12k). There are so many combinations it could make your head spin. I just got to a point where it started to be like a job, monitoring and keeping track of the feel of the shave etc.