Make a strop - Part 1

So last night whilst sitting in front of the boob tube I decided to try my hand at stropping. Used Autosol metal polish - all I had handy at the time - and grabbed my 16. Man big mistake. After watching YouTube vids and reading dozens of posts around here over the week, I still used WAY too much pressure. Ended up rounding the edge off to about the sharpness of a butter knife. I mean the spine edge of a butter knife. Oh well, broke out the Lansky and reprofiled the edge, and started round 2 with the strop. This time used LIGHT even pressure, and really paid attention to the angle when drawing the knife across. Much better results this time. Definitely sharper than using the Lansky stones alone - shaves arm hairs easier than before, and the bevel is a lot smoother and shinier than when I started. Still not the fabled razor sharp slicing thru newspaper though. Still have a ton to learn about stropping, and sharpening in general, but this project was a good start in my journey. Need to get some bench stones to learn on, as well as some proper polishing compounds. Keep learning...
 
tueller said:
Is holding a precise angle less important with a strop than with stones because the leather has give? Or am I over simplifying it? I find that my technique with a strop is faster and a little sloppy compared to how careful I am when using stones. Just wandering if I should correct that.
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I've found that going slower and lighter with the strop gives me a much better edge. I think the strop may be a little more forgiving, but I do try to maintain the same angle.

From watching the Balanced Strop videos, it seems that some grits, not too coarse, not too fine, are more forgiving of sloppy and fast technique.
 
Great thread, so much usefull info.
Here's my homemade strops and a closup of the edge it produced:

Strops_00.JPG


Esee5_edge_00.JPG
 
Great thread. Think I am going to dig my strop out and give it a whirl. You see... I've had one for a couple years and never used it. Mine is a store bought one that my brother in law gave me along with his favorite compound.
 
Finally got around to testing my new strop with autosol. I never knew some polishing compound could make such a difference.
I'm pretty sure there's more hair on my shop floor than my arms right now :D
 
I have completely bald arms right now. The missus has said things about it. It's ridiculous. But my knives, they are SHARP!
 
Ok, so I have an old peice of leather I was going to use....but my roomie hid it well apparently. So I broke down and ordered a strop and some compound last week. So the compound came in yesterday, and I found the old peice of leather. I was so excited I just layed the leather flat on the counter and loaded it with the compound that had just come in and....oh...my....goodness. I have finally acheived scary sharp....like cutting circles in paper...my arms have no hair now...I'm just floored at how easy and effective using a strop is. Years of sharpening fustration out the window. So here is a quick pic of the finished product.
IMG_35051_zpsc00b135f.jpg
 
NikkiR said:
Ok, so I have an old peice of leather I was going to use....but my roomie hid it well apparently. So I broke down and ordered a strop and some compound last week. So the compound came in yesterday, and I found the old peice of leather. I was so excited I just layed the leather flat on the counter and loaded it with the compound that had just come in and....oh...my....goodness. I have finally acheived scary sharp....like cutting circles in paper...my arms have no hair now...I'm just floored at how easy and effective using a strop is. Years of sharpening fustration out the window. So here is a quick pic of the finished product.
IMG_35051_zpsc00b135f.jpg
Click to expand...

Told ya.
 
Great thread!

For a while I used a thrift store belt with green compound. I just laid it out on a workbench. I used this technique for a while.

A few months ago I bought a cutting board at a thrift store. I looked for one with a comfortable-feeling handle. On my table saw I cut it to the width of the belt and glued the belt on. It works really well. I don't sharpen knives on stones/devices too often - just strop regularly.

I like the paint stick idea a lot. I'm going to Lowe's tomorrow.

Thanks for all the tips, everyone.
 
Aikiguy said:
So last night whilst sitting in front of the boob tube I decided to try my hand at stropping. Used Autosol metal polish - all I had handy at the time - and grabbed my 16. Man big mistake. After watching YouTube vids and reading dozens of posts around here over the week, I still used WAY too much pressure. Ended up rounding the edge off to about the sharpness of a butter knife. I mean the spine edge of a butter knife. Oh well, broke out the Lansky and reprofiled the edge, and started round 2 with the strop. This time used LIGHT even pressure, and really paid attention to the angle when drawing the knife across. Much better results this time. Definitely sharper than using the Lansky stones alone - shaves arm hairs easier than before, and the bevel is a lot smoother and shinier than when I started. Still not the fabled razor sharp slicing thru newspaper though. Still have a ton to learn about stropping, and sharpening in general, but this project was a good start in my journey. Need to get some bench stones to learn on, as well as some proper polishing compounds. Keep learning...
Click to expand...

Excellent tip here: If you run out of butter knives in the kitchen....just do this and whalla!!

seriously though...glad you got it worked out. I suck at stropping, so I can't knock you for it.
 
NathanJ said:
Woah, mirror finish! Looks great and I bet it slices very nicely.
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Thank you sir!
And yes, it slices pretty good (a thinner blade will win though), and I can shave my face with it Dundee style :D
 
Okay, just tried stropping my BK10 with slow, light strokes (I basically let the weight of the knife do the work) for about 2 mins, and wow, what a difference! It sliced through two pieces of paper like hot butter, and popped the hair on my arms and upper thighs right off, without the dry skin that builds up to a powder. The edge isn't mirror finish yet, but it will do for now, this is the first time I've had real success with it, I think I was using too much pressure before.
 
Very useful thread DerekH. This is encouraging me to hone (or strop is the better term for this thread I suppose!) my stropping skills. I am of the camp that regularly uses my denim pant leg that is ever present when I have my blades out it seems and strop with very light pressure on the top of my thigh. It always helps before I get to my workbench where I have the stones and leather strops.
 
Thanks for the how-to Derek!

I made my own strop as described in this thread using an old belt of mine. Using sanding block I went about sanding the black finish off the leather but after quite a bit of sanding there are still some low spots on the strop. I used the inside face of the belt, for what that's worth. I'm guessing with some years of use the belt was stretched a bit unevenly, creating these low spots. Or maybe i need to put more elbow into it until the leather cleans up 100%? I'm just curious if you experienced stroppers think the low spots in the leather will effect the functionality of my strop? I'm a total newb that is still researching sharpening in general and stropping in particular. Here's a pic of my strop so you can see the low spots I'm talking about.

Strop.JPG
 
Nah man, don't worry about it. You are putting a knife edge, a solid thing, against something squishy, the leather, so dips and bowls in it aren't going to be the end of the world. Now, if you want to sand past the holes that is fine, by all means, but it shouldn't negatively impact anything if you don't. I say load it up with compound and then get to stroppin!
 
Man, I've never even heard of stropping. Seems like a good way to finish off your edge though. Obviously it works if you went through all this trouble just to make one.
 
Per Jerry Fisk, National Living Treasure #23 of 23, and the only one that is a knife maker, a knife is "sharp" when you can drop a piece of cigarette paper and slice it in half cleanly by swiping the knife through the falling paper. Strops are the best method I have so far found to get a knife to that level of sharpness.
 
DerekH said:
Nah man, don't worry about it. You are putting a knife edge, a solid thing, against something squishy, the leather, so dips and bowls in it aren't going to be the end of the world. Now, if you want to sand past the holes that is fine, by all means, but it shouldn't negatively impact anything if you don't. I say load it up with compound and then get to stroppin!
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Cool, thanks man.
 
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