30
Aug
After being honed the razor seldom needs any stropping on the canvas. Good quality full-length leather strop.
Stropping is the final treatment to a sharpened edge and the strop surface should be as smooth and flat as possible primed with a fine abrasive.
Leather strop vs honing steel. Leather strop and honing steel are both used in the process of sharpening blades. Honing steel sharpens dulled and deformed blades due to constant use. A leather strop refines an already sharp blade to remove bur and is used after honing.
They dont finish like a leather strop though which normally finishes much finer and more polished depending on the stropping compound or silicate content of the strop youre using. So you can use both depending on the composition of the steel which defines how long the super-finehighly-polished edge from the strop would last. As for actually using the strop the process is similar to that of using the honing steel.
The knife should be held with the spine facing outwards in the direction the knife will be moved with the edge touching the leather at a maximum of a 45 degree angle. Like with honing the knife should then be slid across the strop in a sweeping motion. The knife knut will use first a ceramic rod or stone followed by 2000-4000 grit polishing tapes followed by 6000 grit compound on a rough leather strop 9000 grit silicon carbide compound on a smooth leather strop then 11000 grit aluminum oxide followed by 1 micron diamond paste on a smooth leather strop followed by 60000 grit chromium.
Honing is the process of sharpening on a sharpening stone or sharpening systemStropping is when we want to get an even sharper edge by removing the wire edgeburr or stropping can be taken to the next level with abrasive compounds to refine the edge further. Good quality full-length leather strop. Sharpening steel usually handheld its important to note here that sharpening steels are honing rods and dont take anything off your cutting edge.
Stropping pad usually leather on a plank or bat but can be made from various low-abrasive materials for on-the-go honing. Steeling is using a steel to realign the edge of the blade for when the edge rolls over. I think honing means the same thing.
Sharpening is using an abrasive to remove material from the edge to set a new edge. Stropping is like sharpening but using very fine abrasive compounds on leather or wood to polish the edge and maintain the edge. The harder the blade is the more a traditional steel will just mess up the edge.
The ceramic rod is like using a 1200 grit ceramic stoneits justround. BTW hone is usually a term for edge leading. Dont do that on leather.
Strop is edge trailing done on stone andor leather. They are often glued to a piece of wood for stability but the iconic straight razor strop you see in old barber shops have a metal hook and swivel instead pictured on the right. Strops are similar to honing steels in that they do not sharpen the knife they merely remove burrs.
Stropping after honing is different than pre shave stropping. 10-15 laps down and back is one lap linen. Keep more tension on the strop than you think you need.
Go SLOW early on and pay close attention at the turns. Thats where youre most likely to slice that beautiful new strop. A strop is a surface that is used after the finest stone for the final stage of sharpening.
The function of a strop is to polish the edge and work off any burr left behind by sharpening stones. Although other materials are used strops are most often made of leather. Both suede and smooth leathers technically known as flesh side and grain side are used.
At least the 14 chisel. The basic leatherworking kit from Tandy Leather includes a strop mounted on a non-slip back and a jewelers rouge stick. You can get the rouge from several leather supply companies but since Im within walking distance 2 miles of a Tandy retail store I go there.
They have sales on them about three times a year. If you have tools made of different metals you would probably need these two strop pastes as the white one works better with hard metals while the green one works best on stainless steel platinum and chrome. In a word this leather honing kit is very effective.
One thing to remember about stropping is that hard steel doesnt respond very well to stropping on the plain leather. Again were talking about the steel above 62-63HRC. For those cases use borosilicate or ceramic rods.
Other than that stropping is more effective for the blades below 62HRC. Regular honing returns the teeth to their optimal position. Hone your workhorse knives like your chefs knife or paring knife prior to each use.
Its an easy and quick process that will only add a minute to your food prep. Youll need a honing steel also known as a knife sharpening steel. In this video knife maker Walter Sorrells discusses sharpening knives including both honing and stropping.
Four keys to sharpeningMore atTactix Armory. Leather has two sides the grain smooth side and the flesh rough side. Stropping is the final treatment to a sharpened edge and the strop surface should be as smooth and flat as possible primed with a fine abrasive.
I and all the seriously sharp people I know strop on the grain side of leather. Stropping a blade on a clean without abrasive substrate achieves FOUR results. 1 REALIGNING THE EDGE Although a straight razor is made of hardened steel the edge is flexible and malleable.
Below is an example of a relatively large ding in the edge. I received this blade from a custom razor maker with this defect. After being honed the razor seldom needs any stropping on the canvas.
Instead the honed razor is stropped directly over the surface of the leather strop. The time to use the canvas strop is when the razor develops a worn edge from continued use. The effect of the canvas strop is similar to mild honing.