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How do you remedy contaminated strops?

singularity35

singularity35

Joined
Mar 1, 2010
Messages
10,844
My strops got contaminated when somebody here(at home) stacked them one on top of the other before I was able to put them away. Is there any way to remedy this short of changing the leather? Thanks.
 
6,3,1 micron paste. I'm guessing cross contamination since when they were stacked, they were stacked leather to leather.
 
I've used the WD-40 on a rag or paper towel to wipe off as much as possible. Then, sanded it down to clean, bare leather again. I prefer to wipe it first with the WD-40, to minimize grinding any excess dirt/grit particles into the leather when sanding. No complaints.
 
As others have said, a solvent like WD will work.

Other solvents that also work (that I have used) are alcohol, or lighter fluid.

Most of the compounds I use these days are in a paste form and I have doubts that there would be much if any transfer if someone were to stack up my strops as you report. I used to sweat contamination a lot...but these days I seem to be looking at my edges a lot less and beating the hell out of them a lot more. If you are going for the highest level of polish your mind can comprehend, you probably ought to replace the strops...but you also should never leave them laying out were dust can settle on them. My gut tells me that you are just wanting good performing edges, so simply hit them with a soft rag lightly dampened with a solvent and let air dry;)
 
Thanks for the replies. I was thinking contamination because, I got hazy on the 1u strop instead of getting a more brilliant finish.
 
Personally, I would NOT use WD-40...
Yes, the Stoddard Solvent in it will clean the leather. If you use enough, you can completely remove all traces of the abrasives. BUT... you are putting a LOT of mineral oil onto and into the leather, significantly softening the top surface. This will give you a great strop for convex edges but a really poor one for flat bevels. Remember - for flat bevels, a hard substrate is required.

To clean a strop of contaminants without softening it, use lighter fluid. It's as effective as Stoddard Solvent. Or use Coleman Fuel. Both dry quickly and neither contain oils or will leave a residue behind. Any solvent will dry out the leather, so you will want to use a leather conditioner SPARINGLY to rejuvenate it... 'sparingly' being the operative word!


Stitchawl
 
I cleaned a couple of mine with isopropyl alcohol, wiped on with a paper towel. It did dry the leather, which also 'firmed' it up considerably, compared to prior. I think both strops had previously been loaded with green compound that I'd mixed with mineral oil or WD-40. The one with the mineral-oil-mixed compound on it was noticeably softer, which is why I ended up using the isopropyl alcohol to clean it up. Come to think of it, one of these is a pocket-sized strop block, on which I'm currently using DMT Dia-Paste. It's my current 'favorite' strop. The leather on it is thicker than on my others, but considerably firmer too.

With the WD-40, I've noticed there's not much perceptible softening, if I just wipe the leather with a WD-40 moistened paper towel. This works well enough, if the strop isn't allowed to get too filthy. After sanding them in particular, I've noticed the 'darkening' produced by the WD-40 wipedown doesn't go very deep into the leather. Doesn't take much sanding to get back down to clean, new-looking leather again.
 
One thing to remember about sanding the strop is to use a good quality sandpaper and very light pressure, so as not to get any particles from that paper into the "new" leather. It's a real drag to get mysterious scratches from your strop when you've put down some hours of sanding through the grits to get that mirror shine.
 
That reminds me. Regarding the grit particles from sandpaper, I've used a vacuum cleaner to clean the dust from the leather after sanding. That seems to clean it up well. Another thing that helps, in sort of an odd and indirect way, is to use sandpaper made for wood (the 'garnet' type abrasive), at perhaps a medium-to-fine grit. In that type, the grit particles are large enough, if they do come off the paper, they'll be easily detected by feel on the leather. And the larger particles won't easily embed into it, either, so they're easy to clean off. I've noticed, with sanding leather, the grit of the paper doesn't make as much difference in the finished effect. So long as the pressure is kept light, I get about the same 'nap' in the leather at coarser grit, as from finer grits. The nap of the leather seems to be determined more by the fibers in it, and less by the abrasive grit itself.

And with some modern steels, if the garnet type abrasive does come into contact with the blade, it's less likely to scratch hardened steel, which will sometimes be harder than the abrasive itself. On the Moh's scale, garnet is around 6.5 - 7.5, compared to silicon carbide (wet/dry sandpaper) at around 9+, and hardened steel anywhere from 5.5 - 8 or so.
 
Erdbeereis said:
What grit do you sand with OWE? Great thread by the way. :)

Erd
Click to expand...

The grit standard for the garnet sandpaper is different than for the wet/dry stuff. I have a sheet of it in front of me now; it's labelled as 'FINE-150' (Norton brand). That 'FINE' is still some pretty coarse-feeling stuff. ;)
 
Use rubbing alcohol it seems to dissolve strop compound (at least the stuff i have). DO NOT USE WATER! I made that mistake, it dries out the leather.
 
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