Is this proper stropping technique?

[SolingenPreferred]

I ran across this video on Youtube, and it seems to me that this barber's stropping technique leaves a lot to be desired. It appears he is rolling the razor under instead of over, and basically scraping off the teeth he just got through making with his hone. From the difficulty he has shaving, it also doesn't appear that the razor ended up being very sharp. I always thought the razor was rolled over on the spine instead of the edge of the blade. I am not an expert by any means, so I would appreciate someone else's opinion who strops and hones regularly.

SolingenPreferred

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXM5I9Q1F6E&feature=related

 

[jkh]

You are correct. He is flipping the about the edge rather than the spine, this is a no-no. Technically, it isn't "incorrect", but you run the risk of damaging the edge.

 

[Fnord5]

Egads!
not only improper stropping, but that honing was downright painful to watch.

 

[NYC-shaver]

Looks like he isn't keeping the spine on the strop. I would think that would roll the edge.

 

[mdunn]

yah, thats the 'wipe the edge off' method of stropping

 

[leighton]

I cried.

 

[Luc]

He...








Inconceivable

 

[huracan]

I smiled at the dynamics of what happens after the *ahem* hone & strop lesson, it reminds me of some of the guys I used to hang out with back in school.

On the one hand a barber taking a horribly prepared razor to shave a guy with a tattoo on the back of his head; but this dude is not going to be the one to complain lest he be called a wussy by everybody inside the shop.

 

[leighton]

I smiled at the dynamics of what happens after the *ahem* hone & strop lesson, it reminds me of some of the guys I used to hang out with back in school.

On the one hand a barber taking a horribly prepared razor to shave a guy with a tattoo on the back of his head; but this dude is not going to be the one to complain lest he be called a wussy by everybody inside the shop.

Exactly! Its like a straight shave is some sort of right of passage. Its gotta hurt!

 

[tpoof]

Wonder how much of that is going on...

 

[PaulX608]

I don't know how he thinks that's good. He could have shaved that guy's whole head in that time with a sharp razor. Poor misguided fellow!

 

[SavantStrike]

By doing it this way, he gets to scare the customer with the noise as the edge gets violently rolled off the strop.

He also forgot to wipe off the honing oil before stropping.. you can see the nice stain it made on the strop, too .

 

[Fnord5]

By doing it this way, he gets to scare the customer with the noise as the edge gets violently rolled off the strop.

He also forgot to wipe off the honing oil before stropping.. you can see the nice stain it made on the strop, too .

$20 says it wasn't sanitized either.

 

[SavantStrike]

$20 says it wasn't sanitized either.

Yeah. There's that too...

Although honestly, the disposable blade ones need to be sanitized as well. I just don't think I'd want to go to that barber, period .

 

[Kees]

I like that shaver with a pull string.

 

[SolingenPreferred]

Exactly! Its like a straight shave is some sort of right of passage. Its gotta hurt!

This video reminded me of why I severely curtailed my trips to the barber shop for a shave. You would think the advent of disposable blade straight razors would have solved the problem, but that doesn't seem to be the case. A good barbershop shave is still very hard to find.

SolingenPreferred

 

[lirijavdekje]

Indeed, it is increasingly difficult to find a reasonably priced barbershop where something other than a shavette is used.

 

[SavantStrike]

Glad this post got dredged up again.

Looking at the video again, during the barber's "honing," there are several times when there is an air gap clearly visible between the blade and the hone, especially towards the heel. This guy is NOT keeping the blade flat on the hone. Of course, he's also simply rubbing the blade around in a circle, and he's even rubbing it in a circle backwards. Then again, he's also doing it on what appears to be a fairly coarse hone.

 

[CraigJ]

Did you see the way the guy was wincing as he got his shave?

This guy was stropping way too slowly. There was an experiment done a while back about slow vs. fast stropping. Some of the experimenters literally had to stop the experiment because the slow stropping made shaving too painful. They all agreed that slow stropping was as bad idea.

Also I am amazed that the strop did not have a million dings from the way he started his stroke. When the blade makes contact with the leather make sure it touches spine first.

The saddest part about this is that it looked to be a trainig "how to" video.

Nice Filarmonica though.

 

[Deftim13]

That almost looked like oil on that stone. Bet that tattoo on his head hurt lest then that shave