USe a hanging strop for knives?

[trick420]

Hi everyone,

I'm starting to think about stropping my knives. I've never been one to do that, and I currently just take them to "fine" on my sharpmaker and have been happy with that.

Anyway, I used to be a hardcore straight razor shaver, and I have a really nice top of the line hanging strop for that.

I see that pretty much no one uses a hanging strop on their knives and instead opt for a backed, bench strop charged with compound.

Am I missing something, or is there a reason I don't see others using a hanging strop? In the field I will often take off my leather belt, stand on one end, pull the other taught and stop away on it.

Just curious really. I'm thinking about trying a bench strop soon.

Regards,
Jeff

 

[zyhano]

I think non hanging strops are more of a knife thing. Hanging comes from the str8's.
You could just as well use the hanging strop. The technique is slightly, slightly different, but if you understand the principles, you could go with both.

For me, it's easy to make a strop, but not to make a hanging strop, i need more hardware for that. That's why i opt for a non hanging strop.

I do use normal hanging strops for my straight razor stropping on bare leather.
Just made a benchstone type strop for finishing/polishing with stropping paste 1 micron, to add that step on top of my normal razor honing with jap waterstones.

 

[Jason B.]

I use a old refinished russian strop with canvas back, I use it for touch-up and convex finishing.

Bench strops are used more for knives because its a solid backing and does not flex (as much), a hanging strop can give too much due to the weight of some knives.