Recommend a Leather Strop

To be honest with ya I've only used the 10k polish. And I charge only aobut 1/3 of the top leather. It is messy even doing it with saliva and fingers man, so beware and rapidly wash your hands after. I am no expert by any means. But this works for my purposes (mostly small folders)

What situations would I use the lower grits on the rough leather for? Please I have searched the forums too and nobody really went too in depth when it came to stropping in this manner, with these types of dry polishes. I would like to read much more on this method. If I remember Hand-American had some literature, but it isnt on their website. THey have stuff there now, but it was different a few years ago. They had like 15 pages fo stuff if I remember very in depth. Anyway, please get back to me with any info. Thanks for the time.

JC
 
To get the green stuff to stick to the smooth leather, just sand the leather with a medium grit paper. I used 280 emery paper, and it works perfectly. The compound stays in place and the there's no oil to deal with. Sand just enough to slightly roughen the surface, nothing more.
 
I just wanted to thank everyone who replied to my original inquiry regarding Leather Strops.

Also, I purchased one of the double-sided jobs from Lee Valley Tools and can say I am very happy with it! So nice for occasional touch-ups to keep that hair-popping edge on my EDC's.
 
I ordered the double-sided strop with the compound from Lee Valley today. Another step in the learning process. Also, I believe the only real way to maintain the convex edges on some of my knives. At the very least, I'm sure it will provide many hours of entertainment "tweaking" up all my knives.:cool:
 
For those of you who strop what kind of edge do you like? I have found if I strop I get a very polished edge, great for push cutts but that is about it. I find I like a edge that has some bite to it. Maybe I am stropping wrong but I really don't like the results I get by doing it.
 
Results Report: Two Weeks Later

Well, after using my Lee Valley double-sided strop for a few weeks, I can honestly say I don't know how I got along before without it!

You see I'm a sharpness-freak. Before using a strop I could get a pretty knives pretty sharp; but never could get that hair-popping edge that's good for push-cuts and precision work. Now with the leather strop, I can get the edge I want!

Now, I still leave some of my knives unstropped, preferring (as DB above referred to) the "micro-serrated"--or whatever you want to call it--of an unpolished edge. But for my EDC pocket knife, I like the hair-popping scary, factory-type edge for my everyday cutting tasks.

Thanks again everyone who responded with leather strop recommendations!
 
I own a couple of different strops. I own the handamerican made strop, and it works good. I think it is just easier to load a strop up with rouge than with the powders that are supplied with the handamerican set. Green, red, or white rouge is the same thing that most of the mag polishes are made of. I can not remember the grits of the polish, but green followed by white will do the trick.

But the best strop that I have used is a hanging leather belt strop just like the barbers used in the past. You just attached one end of the strop to something that was fixed, and then pulled the strop tight, and then went to stropping. It is very important to keep the strop taught because if you do not the edge will roll. All that was used on the strop was a strop oil...kind of like a vaseline squeezed out of a tube. What I got was amazing results. You could actually shave with this type of edge. Now whether or not it would be good for any other type of cutting, that would be anybodys guess.
Big D1
 
Originally posted by guncollector
Results Report: Two Weeks Later

Well, after using my Lee Valley double-sided strop for a few weeks, I can honestly say I don't know how I got along before without it!
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guncollector - I received one of these for my birthday recently, but have not successfully applied the green stick yet. How did you do it?

Thanks,

Matthew
 
Starfish queried:
...but have not successfully applied the green stick yet. How did you do it?
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Star-

Nothing really scientific about the way I applied the polish (green stick). I used it sort of like a crayon, applying it in light strokes at a 45-degree angle to the length of the strop. Works for me. :)
 
hd2k_va :

[PC-10]

The set comes with 220, 400, 800 and 10K compounds. Why do you need four compounds?
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Same reason that you just don't have an x-coarse hone and an x-fine one. The inbetween grades speed up the honing process after you have finishing shaping and start to polish. It also allows you to leave the edge at different levels of finish.

-Cliff
 
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