Should I change my compound?

Rouge is not for polishing steel and to use the word rouge in the first place is wrong. Red rouge is for the final finishing of NON-FERROUS metals, its not even considered a polishing compound.
 
knifenut1013 said:
Rouge is not for polishing steel and to use the word rouge in the first place is wrong. Red rouge is for the final finishing of NON-FERROUS metals, its not even considered a polishing compound.
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Perhaps there's a terminology problem here ... I've always assumed that red rouge contains the same oxide of iron as used for crocus cloth. Not so?

.
 
Knifenut-
Sorry, but you are completely wrong again.
Red rouge/crocus has been used for polishing knife blades for centuries.
There may be better modern polishes that work more aggressively, but red rouge still works.
 
knifenut1013 said:
Rouge is not for polishing steel and to use the word rouge in the first place is wrong. Red rouge is for the final finishing of NON-FERROUS metals, its not even considered a polishing compound.
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Sorry, but I have to disagree with parts of what you have said. While red rouge IS for made for use on non-ferrous metals, it IS the final polish used for gold,silver, and platinum jewelery as every jewelery maker will tell you.

Stitchawl
 
Dog of War said:
Perhaps there's a terminology problem here ... I've always assumed that red rouge contains the same oxide of iron as used for crocus cloth. Not so?
.
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IS so. :thumbup:
Quite right, guy, on all accounts. 'Crocus Cloth' Definition: An iron-oxide coated abrasive cloth, used as a polishing agent after most of the work has been done with emery or aluminum oxide. (http://composite.about.com/library/glossary/c/bldef-c1372.htm)

Iron Oxide is the same mineral that is used to make red jeweler's rouge. Chemically, Fe2O3. Rust. (Think about this... we spend time and money trying to get rid of rust, then we go out and pay money to purchase the damn stuff!)

As for your other post;
When you said; It struck me that there might not be anything here that we're really disagreeing on -- just takes a while online like this to get the details of everyone's opinions.

You got that part right too! :thumbup:

One of the biggest problems with using a written forum is that there is no 'body language' to help in the communication. Body language is thought to make up more than 90% of the comprehension factor when people are speaking together. We can try to emulate that using 'bold,' 'italics,' and 'underlining,' but it just not the same. Smilies help, but not enough.

The only point I was making was that it is a waste of money to pay for good quality leather then cover it up with compound! Any smooth firm sub surface will work perfectly well (if not better) and if one chooses to use a telephone book for that sub surface, even gets delivered free to your door every year!

When I look back and think about it, I realize it was HandAmerican that gave me the idea that I should be using compounds on my strops. I went looking for good strop leather and discovered their site. Besides strops, they were selling all sorts of compounds and I went wild ordering everything they had thinking 'hey, a strop company must know what works best!' I should have been thinking 'hey, a retail sales company wants to make money.'

Compounds work, and when used correctly, work well. Good quality strops work well, and when used correctly, work well. It would have been nice if HandAmerican told me I didn't need to put the compound on the strops. It didn't hurt anything (other than my wallet) that I did put compound on the strops, but it slowed down the learning curve considerably! :o

Somebody also needs to let people know that strops for straight razors and strops for knives are two different things. Yes, one can use the same strop for both... But for the best edge, razors should be stropped on a hanging strop (it curves just a bit while stropping a convex micro-edge on the razor,) while knives and chisels should be stropped on a flat mounted strop resulting in a straight bevel.

For many years I used Greadgrandpa's hanging strop on my knives and was quite satisfied with the edges I got. It works. But I can get better edges now that I use a bench mounted flat strop.

Stitchawl
 
Knifenut
Why must you be so hard headed?
I can truthfully say that as a jeweler and a knifemaker, I have used red rouge to polish steel hundreds of times. It is a recommended finish polish for precious metals because of the fineness of cut. It leaves a brilliant finish. It also leaves a brilliant finish on steel.
BTW- jeweler's rouge does not "stain gold."
Red rouge (iron oxide) got the nickname "jeweler's rouge" because jeweler's faces were often stained with it from polishing.
 
Dog of War said:
Actually I've thought a lot about this sort of thing lately, just in a slightly different context: that being, how can a ceramic rod sharpener like a Sharpmaker or Crocksticks, improve the edge of steels with high vanadium carbide content, when vanadium carbide is harder than the aluminum oxide ceramic of the rods? I'm no materials engineer or scientist, but my uneducated wager is that, in both cases, we see some improvement to our edges because both red rouge and aluminum oxide are harder than the actual steel matrix/substrate. The hard carbides aren't being affected at all, unless maybe a few fall or tear lose as the steel around them is removed.
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You know... That makes perfect sense to me! There really isn't much carbide in hard steel. Just a few percent, if that much. Most of the metal is still steel/iron, etc. (I know diddly about metalurgy.) Metal is certainly being removed with ceramics, and can clearly be seen streaking the rods.

Here is another thought. (And I have no real reason to think it is so...) Many compounds oxidize very quickly. Oils, in fact, begin to oxidize the moment they are exposed to air, especially vegetable oils. I wonder if metals do this too, and the primary action that we see when using red rouge might be simply removal of this oxidation? Obviously, as Bil DeShiv says, red rouge will cut eventually (speeded up by a power buffing wheel to remove the 'eventually' part,) but could that bright finish be partly responsible to oxidation removal? Hmmmmm.... :confused:


Stitchawl
 
If I'm hard headed they you are being close minded, I show you links of proof and you still try and tell me I'm wrong, basically the same story every time I post about sharpening.

I don't like to argue with other professionals but what you say makes me look like a fool.



I try and give information that contains the most truth and fact, and if possible pictures and personal experience. I never said it couldn't polish steel I just said it was not made to do so, so IMO its the wrong tool for the job. The logic of "it'll work" just does not cut it for me.
 
Here is something to think about-
How do hardened knives get dull cutting soft things? How does soft leather sharpen a knife?
You can certainly strop with red rouge. In THEORY, it will give you a finer edge than chromium oxide. Why doesn't someone just try it?
 
"I don't like to argue with other professionals but what you say makes me look like a fool.
"

What I say doesn't make you look like a fool. Are you perhaps a Democrat?
Again-iron oxide red rouge has been used for polishing steel for centuries. Because certain compounds are not marketed toward polishing steel means nothing. If you have a sharpening service, why don't you just try it?
 
Bill DeShivs said:
"I don't like to argue with other professionals but what you say makes me look like a fool.
"

What I say doesn't make you look like a fool. Are you perhaps a Democrat?
Again-iron oxide red rouge has been used for polishing steel for centuries. Because certain compounds are not marketed toward polishing steel means nothing. If you have a sharpening service, why don't you just try it?
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Because I use diamond compound and its far superior.
 
How do you know, if you haven't tried it? And, why would you want to argue about it?
 
I've tried it along with many, many other compounds and of all the compounds I have used diamond compounds work the best, fastest and produce edges many times sharper. Come on, are you really going to try and compare red rouge to diamond compound :rolleyes:

again
The logic of "it'll work" just does not cut it for me.
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My strop came in today great leather.
Only a small leather dot on it (small indent won't affect stropping!)
I must say taken my edge far beyond what my compounded strop can.
I may try diamond pastes see if that takes me even farther :P.
I finally got it to shave without touching skin (and my arm hair is short and extremely small so it can't grab).
 
As I said before-grit is grit. If the rouge grit is smaller than the diamond particles, it will produce a smoother, sharper edge. Diamonds will cut much faster. As a matter of fact, nothing will produce a brighter cut than a diamond. But diamond particles are simply very hard grit, and the fineness of grit is what will produce the sharpest edge.
 
And you can get diamond compound in 1/10 micron, that's 200,000 mesh.
 
Bill DeShivs said:
Here is something to think about-
How do hardened knives get dull cutting soft things? How does soft leather sharpen a knife?
You can certainly strop with red rouge. In THEORY, it will give you a finer edge than chromium oxide. Why doesn't someone just try it?
Click to expand...


All those smooth pebbles on the bottom of the stream were polished by water. It just took hundreds of thousands of years to do so. Water is soft but persistent.

Red rouge will work on a strop. It will just take a really, really, really long time to get the wanted results...

... UNLESS YOU USE A POWERED STROP.

A powered belt strop will give, in one minute's time, the same effect as several days of hand stropping. Several minutes of stropping on a powered belt will result in the same effect of weeks of stropping.

A minute or two on a powered strop with red rouge... a minute or two on a hand strop with diamond compound.... I doubt the difference can be seen or felt by the average user.

How many of us have or use powered strops?

Stitchawl
 
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