Hello all.
Today I used Pete's leather and made my first strop. I have posted about Pete before. He's a saddlemaker here on the big island of hawaii.
I cut it down to 2 3/4 by 24 inches. It is very thick leather, a quarter inch.
It's so thick that I took a piece of another thinner leather as the foldover to hold the D ring. I had a thin strop that i had sliced with the razor so I sacrificed four inches of that.
The D ring was 2 1/2 inches across, slightly smaller than the strop leather. But I like 2 3/4 inches on my strop, and I can't find D rings larger than 2 1/2. So I just used my quarter inch punch to punch holes at each side and allow the D ring to fit just fine. It actually made everything a more snug and secure fit.
Then I punched three holes in all pieces of the leather.
The chicago screws are one quarter inch in diameter.
The female side of the chicago screw has four sharp barbs that sink into the leather and prevent it from spinning.
Although I had plenty of spare leather and spare D rings, I chose to leave the bottom bare. A barber end. The reason for this is that I like some convexity in my strops. I always slide my cupped hand down the strop once before shaving. As well as giving a slight touch of oil it maintains a very slight convexity. On store bought strops I use my grip just above the bottom hardware to maintain a slight convexity. I was never gripping the bottom hardware anyway.
I chose not to bother with a swivel. The D ring lines up on the wall hook naturally by itself and I like the simplicity of that. In fact, when I stropped with it, this system lined up better than my old strop with a swivel. The swivel just allowed the top of the strop to swivel away from the angle I was holding at the bottom ,inducing a twist. With just the D ring, that twist was gone and it turned straight to follow my hand. Much better.
The store bought strop that I sacrificed for this project, was one that I sliced. At the upper right. And it was the one with the swivel. I suspect that slice was because the swivel allowed the top half to twist away from me. At least I choose to blame the swivel, not my inattention.
I don't like swivels and I don't like bottom hardware. So that makes strop making pretty simple. Just a 2 1/2 inch d ring and three of the quarter inch chicago screws.
If I happen to slice this baby with my razor, I'll just swap the hardware to the other end and move the slice to the bottom outside.
Anyway, I stropped and shaved with it and it went well. It was flat, taught, fit my Bismark razor perfectly, and did the job just fine. A very happy morning.
Photos below. Have a look.
Today I used Pete's leather and made my first strop. I have posted about Pete before. He's a saddlemaker here on the big island of hawaii.
I cut it down to 2 3/4 by 24 inches. It is very thick leather, a quarter inch.
It's so thick that I took a piece of another thinner leather as the foldover to hold the D ring. I had a thin strop that i had sliced with the razor so I sacrificed four inches of that.
The D ring was 2 1/2 inches across, slightly smaller than the strop leather. But I like 2 3/4 inches on my strop, and I can't find D rings larger than 2 1/2. So I just used my quarter inch punch to punch holes at each side and allow the D ring to fit just fine. It actually made everything a more snug and secure fit.
Then I punched three holes in all pieces of the leather.
The chicago screws are one quarter inch in diameter.
The female side of the chicago screw has four sharp barbs that sink into the leather and prevent it from spinning.
Although I had plenty of spare leather and spare D rings, I chose to leave the bottom bare. A barber end. The reason for this is that I like some convexity in my strops. I always slide my cupped hand down the strop once before shaving. As well as giving a slight touch of oil it maintains a very slight convexity. On store bought strops I use my grip just above the bottom hardware to maintain a slight convexity. I was never gripping the bottom hardware anyway.
I chose not to bother with a swivel. The D ring lines up on the wall hook naturally by itself and I like the simplicity of that. In fact, when I stropped with it, this system lined up better than my old strop with a swivel. The swivel just allowed the top of the strop to swivel away from the angle I was holding at the bottom ,inducing a twist. With just the D ring, that twist was gone and it turned straight to follow my hand. Much better.
The store bought strop that I sacrificed for this project, was one that I sliced. At the upper right. And it was the one with the swivel. I suspect that slice was because the swivel allowed the top half to twist away from me. At least I choose to blame the swivel, not my inattention.
I don't like swivels and I don't like bottom hardware. So that makes strop making pretty simple. Just a 2 1/2 inch d ring and three of the quarter inch chicago screws.
If I happen to slice this baby with my razor, I'll just swap the hardware to the other end and move the slice to the bottom outside.
Anyway, I stropped and shaved with it and it went well. It was flat, taught, fit my Bismark razor perfectly, and did the job just fine. A very happy morning.
Photos below. Have a look.
