Thread: Poor Man's Linen

After many frustrating attempts to try to get linen to make a linen strop to leave at my girlfriend's house, I decided to try it the DIY way. What you see here is a piece of denim glued with RTV adhesive to a scrap strip of plastic. After it cures, I will trim it to within 1/2" of the sides (leaving enough length to sew around a pair of D-rings), then I will fold the edges over and glue them down to the back. This should provide me with an even surface and edges free of bumps, stitches, etc.

A couple possible improvements to the process:

(1) I think RTV might not be the right glue to use. It's messy and viscous and has seeped through the fabric a little, near the top and bottom. Spray adhesive might be a better choice.

(2) Heavy canvas would probably be better than old denim.

(3) This might be the wrong kind of plastic to use. I'm not sure but I think it's Teflon. Even though I roughed it up with sandpaper, IDK if the glue is going to stick. It might have been better to use some scrap linoleum flooring, or a strip of that rubber bordering stuff they glue to the edges of the drywall in offices.

Anyway, hope this gets you thinking. If anyone wants to chime in with suggestions for glue, please do. The ideal glue would be thin, flexible when dry, and tenacious.

Happy Stropping,
-Johnny

You can use both cotton and canvas for a strop. Denim is made of cotton so that should do the trick as good as any piece of cotton fabric.

Inventive spirit!!!
Do you have a theater stage supplier in your area?
They have linen belts for a low price.

Just seen a german address where they sell 7 cm wide for 1.99 Euro per meter.
4 cm wide is 1.35 Euro per meter.
(Sorry for not having converted. Its CHEAP!!!)

@Olivia: I do have a theater hardware supplier a few doors down from where I work! I'm going to ask them on Monday.

@Kees: I've been told that denim does work well but wears out quickly. Maybe an old canvas tarp would be more durable.

McMaster-Carr also sells heavy cotton webbing 2" wide, if you don't mind olive drab (I'm guessing it's military surplus). I've also heard automotive seatbelt webbing works pretty well too, and that stuff is readily available. Maybe one day if the Spirit moves me I'll buy 10 feet of webbing and a pack of 10 D-rings from McMaster-Carr, make 5 strops, keep 1 and sell the other 4. Good winter project, eh?

Brilliant!

This is starting to look promising, tho next time I will use contact cement and a wider strip of plastic.

The finished product. Not too shabby, eh?

Nice, i am thinking about making myself a strop setup. I have a bunch of leatherworking tools and hardware and can work with leather but I need to figure out a way to replace the linen, this is a great idea. I didn't think about using something as a backing to increase the strength of the fabric.

Originally Posted by Kees

You can use both cotton and canvas for a strop. Denim is made of cotton so that should do the trick as good as any piece of cotton fabric.

Linen is a specific type of fiber (from flax), so is cotton (from cotton). Canvas is a type of cloth, specifically one with a heavy plain weave, but it can be made from any one of a number of fibers including cotton, linen, wool, or various synthetics.

Denim is a specific type of cotton cloth, specifically it is a twill weave with one set of threads in color and the other white. Traditionally, the colored threads are blue. The name itself comes from a town in France where it was first made (and it was all blue at the time).

Most cloth strops I have seen use some type of plain weave fabric, either a canvas or a something with a finer weave not all are linen, in fact I would guess that most are not. This is not to say twill weave won't work, it will be interesting to see.

Originally Posted by Johnny J

I've been told that denim does work well but wears out quickly. Maybe an old canvas tarp would be more durable...I've also heard automotive seatbelt webbing works pretty well too

So far, it seems to be working as advertised. If even seatbelt webbing work, I'm going to guess the weave doesn't matter all that much. It will probably wear out fast as advertised too, but if it does, I'll just make myself another $5 strop