What do you use for stropping your Busse knives?

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utmts4me

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What do you use for stropping your Busse knives?

I have always used a Sharpmaker and had good success with it, but I am thinking about a strop for quick and easy maint. on my Busses. Do you use a hanging strop? or a fixed strop mounted on a board? or what? Also I am interested in what brands you have experience with and which you would recommend. And Finally, can someone tell me about loading the strop with paste, I've seen different color pastes mentioned, from what I can tell these correspond to different grits or something? Again, what brands of paste do you like? I've seen someone post that they load their strop with Flitz? Anyway, I am a total newbie when it comes to this strop thing, so please enlighten me :confused:

I really like the idea of spending the whole day beating the holy nuclear crap out of a Busse and then going home and lightly stropping it back to shaving sharp.:D
 
For me, hanging strops have a tendancy to roll the burr at the end of the stroke unless you are very careful. For this reason I prefer a srtop that is horizontal and supported by a material that has some give or cushion to it.

I have a two pieve strop that allows the following options (in order that I use them): Course/rough material charged with Flitz, course material w/o Flitx, course leather, smooth leather. I have also used old belts with the inner (unfinished side) chraged with Flitz) and the outer (finished) side uncharged but roughed up a little bit with sandpaper. For quick, light touch-ups I have also used the backside cardboard on a legal pad, the thigh material of Carhardts (with my thigh in it) and even denim jeans.

Stropping works great, especially with the convex side of Busse knives just remember, the less you let your edge go, the easier it is to keep keen. I light touch up more frequently is easier than a prolonged session with the Sharpmaker and all that goins-ons afetr letting the edge go.
 
My Satin Jack, with the dual-convex edge, has been a pleasure to strop. I've been using an old mouse pad with a piece of 1000 grit 3M wet/dry paper lain on top. This creates an edge with a nice toothy bite to it. If I want a very highly polished edge, I hit it with 2000 grit wet/dry afterward.

This combo is the best thing since peanut butter and jelly. I’m now using it on all of my convex grinds. There’s no mess involved, almost zero expense, and I get great results. You can’t ask for more than that. I highly encourage everybody with a convex ground edge to try this. :D
 
Polishing compounds are generally rated by color, however a lot of them are not suitable for cutting hardened steel and are meant for brass and such. The finest compound is CrO, which is a green, and is 0.5 micron, twice as fine as a 8000 grit waterstone, and leaves a mirror finish. Lee Valley sells 15 and 5 micron SiC sandpaper which work very well for stropping if you want a more aggressive finish, just as Buzzbait described.

-Cliff
 
I just got a double sided leather strop and the green compound Cliff just mentioned yesterday from Lee Valley. It does a fantastic job and, as Cliff stated, it does leave a mirror like finish. I have been sharpening knives for many years and I thought they were sharp before. I don't know what I ever did without using a strop to put the finishing touch on the edge. I have an old Scottish Lass leather and canvas strop I inherited from my dad, but I can't bring myself to use it. The old man used it on me a couple of times as I recall.
John
 
thanks for the info so far you guys. I'd still like to hear what some of you other Busse people are using, both equipment and method. I did a search on BF on strops and found a good bit of info, but I didn't see any posts on stropping from any people I knew to be confirmed INFI-A-HOLICS so that's another reason I asked. I really wanted to find out what Busse knife users were using and how they are doing it with their asymetrical or dual-convex edged knives.

Progunner-thanks for the comment I'm leaning towards ordering that Lee Valley double sided strop that comes with the green Veritas stick, seems like quite a bargain.

Buzzbait-that sounds like a great idea, I've got old mouse pads a plenty still kicking around, I'm going to give that a try before I order anything

Cliff- thanks for the help on the compound and the color thing
Nimrod- I have been wondering about the hanging strops, I think they look cool, thought it might be nice to have one just hanging and ready from the work bench. They have that "Floyd the barber" nostalgia thing goin on, but it doesn't sound like the hanging strop's the way to go. thanks for the input.
 
When I ordered some of the green Veritas honing compound from Lee Valley (which, as noted above, works well), I also got a few of the 0.5 micron honing/polishing sheets. I haven't tried them yet but it is certainly the finest/smoothest "paper" I have ever felt. I'm going to put one on a mousepad and see how it performs.
 
Try http://www.handamerican.com/. They've got some good quality strops, AWESOME smooth butcher's steels, and have some inexpensive stropping leather you can buy if you want to make your own strop. I also personally find their powder CrO compound to work better than Lee Valley's wax-like stick of CrO.

I find that INFI so durable that a few swipes on a smooth steel can restore a razor edge. I only strop when steeling won't do, and only sharpen when stropping is not enough.

By the way, if you get their smooth steel, be sure to wipe it down with oil or Tuf-Cloth. It rusts incredibly fast, but is hardened to Rc 64, hard enough to steel just about any blade (the carbides in the blade will scratch the steel, though!).

Their website is down at the moment for updating, but they're real easy to get a hold of via email. Hope this helps!

~SteelDriver
 
I'm also pleased with my Handamerican hone, but you can also make a backed strop with a piece of wood and a slab of leather on top.
In the field I just use a small ceramic triangle stone, but at home the deep, thick (furry side up) leather gets some 220 SiC then I use the green stuff as Cliff stated for final touch up.

I have also used 2-300 grit papers on meat packing foam with good success. A final strop on my dirty work jeans and she's good to go:)
 
buzzbait, if you want a really toothy edge, drag that blade lightly over a mouse pad covered with 600 grit after a smoother strop or abrasive paper.
 
Could someone give me lots more details on the mechanics? What angle to hold the knife to the strop? How long of strokes are we talking about? Anything else a newbie stropper needs to know?
 
You hold the blade at an angle so that the actual edge hits the strop. Most strops have some give to them, so you don't have to be that critical, however if you hold the blade too low you will just hit the shoulder of the bevel and not notice any change in sharpness. Just make a small mark on the edge which you can use to confirm it is getting buffed. As for the length of the stroke, as long as you can, to speed the process up.

-Cliff
 
Okay. Here’s how I strop my dual-convex Satin Jack.

1. I place the mouse mat on a flat surface, and lay the wet/dry on top of it.

2. Then I lay one side of the blade on the wet/dry, so that the flat area directly before the convex edge is touching the paper.

3. Stropping is done in the opposite direction, in comparison to sharpening a v-grind on a stone. You drag the blade along the strop instead of pushing the blade into the strop. So I begin my stropping motion, and rotate the blade slightly as I go, so that the convex edge always maintains contact with the wet/dry paper.

4. I stop rotating the blade when I get to the very edge. The very edge produces a slight increase in drag. The key is to create as little drag as possible at the edge of the blade, while still maintaining contact with the wet/dry paper.

5. Each pass of the blade along the strop is as identical as possible. Assuming that you don’t have a large burr on the edge of the blade, you don’t have to alternate sides on each stroke. You can just do 10 strokes on one side, and then 10 on the other. If you do have a noticeable burr on the edge, you’ll want to alternate sides as soon as the burr folds over to the other side.

Angle is important. Control is important. Consistency is important. The pressure applied to the blade is not very important, as the grit of the paper should be doing the work. Go at the speed you feel is comfortable. Use whatever length stroke you feel comfortable with, as long as you can maintain control throughout the entire stroke.

The cool thing about mouse pads and wet/dry paper is that they are so compact and light in weight. They take up very little room in a pack, and are quite easy to use in the field.
 
For a strop I use a chunk of old belt held with hand clamps to a pull-out cutting board from my kitchen counter. I charge the belt with some of the green compound that the others mentioned.

The gang has already given really good advice & info, so here's a few links to some of the Lee Valley products mentioned:
 
Thanks very much everyone!

I think I have the info I need to stay on top of my Busse edges. I too like to touch up frequently rather than have to get serious with a badly neglected edge.

One last question from me. I want to make sure I'm correct in my assumption here. the strokes on the strop, I am clear on the direction in relation to the edge (pulling or dragging away from the edge) but do you still move the blade in a slicing motion from hilt to tip? or do you stay on one section of the blade for the entire stroke and work your way out to the tip stroke by stroke?
 
I also want to thank you for being so kindly and generous with information about stropping. And I also wonder about whether one should move the blade in a slicing motion or stay on one section of the blade for the entire stroke.

Thanks, again.

Mike
 
You DO NOT use a slicing motion, such as you would on a SharpMaker. The proper motion is 90 degrees off from that. You pick a section of the blade and pull it across the strop. Then move on to the next section of blade.
 
I recently found the Dui Buoi or Two Oxen Kitchen knives made in Italy.
I bought my wife a really nice set and along with it, and the point of this post, a fantastic smooth steel!!!!!!!
The steel is a wide, fairly thin (about 3/16" at the top.) convexed shape itself that runs from about 1 3/8" at the top to 1 5/16" at the bottom that's nicely rounded off.
The steel is hardchromed and 66 Rc.
This is the steel that I have wanted all my life and could never find before.
Who would'a thunk it would be found among kitchen knives? :)

You can find them here. Wayne was very nice to deal with as well which is always a plus in my book.......
http://www.twoxen.it/bin/x.cgi/pager/main/5hastee/6327-96-6567193174
The current prices are a just a little more than what the website says, but still dayumed chaeap IMO.

By the way, these are the absolute best kitchen knives for the money in my book. All I have had to do is steel a couple of them before use. The rest have been more than adequate right outta the box!!!!!!!:)
I'm not affilated in any way with this company or Wayne except as a satisfied customer and a newly made friend.
 
Thanks for that link Yvsa:D

Cliff brought up a great trick to see if your edge is riding the strop or rod properly.:cool:
I have used a wide black Sharpie to cover the entire ground portion of the edge and this allows you to easily see (and learn;)) how and where to position your edge as you're working on it.
It was a big help in understanding what the heck I was doing:)
 
I went down to my local hardware store to buy some 3M wet/dry paper in 1000 and 2000 grit, and the highest grit they had was 600. I called around to nearby hardware stores with the same results. Does any one have a good online source for super fine grit wet/dry 3M paper??
 
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