Stropping the tip

[Bear]

I've added a leather strop to my sharpening gear, and it's improved my edges a lot. But I have some difficulty stropping the very tip of a blade without scoring the leather.

Is this going to ruin the strop? How do I avoid scratching or cutting the leather? Is it just a matter of careful manipulation, or is there some trick?

Bear

 

[gud4u]

Start by stropping with a point-trailing motion. Adjust until you can see the spine at the blade-tip 'engraving' the leather, but not cutting or tearing the leather. Yes - it's manipulation.

I use the little Spyderco DoubleStuff stone hand-held to carefully complete sharpening of the bevels at the blade-tip, checking for completion by newsprint-draw-cuts. After that, it should only take a few passes on each tip-bevel with the strop to polish the bevels.

Hope this helps!

 

[Daniel Koster]

might give you some relief if you saw my strops.....all beat to heck, cut up, sliced, pieces missing, etc.

Don't worry about the strop - worry about the stropping...


The point where the knife meets the strop should always be traveling perpendicular to the edge.

Take a hard look at that last sentence and read it over and over again while looking at the tip and if you will stick to it, you'll be fine.

 

[HoB]

I like that sentence. Had to think about it for a moment but once you get it, its to the point (no pun intended ). Works for the Sharpmaker aswell, only the motion is reversed (against the edge).