Strop Care

Use a straight. You know it makes sense.
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drmoss_ca
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Strop Care

Post by drmoss_ca »

I came across this link the other day, which is a Japanese site selling Kanayama strops. If you read down the page, there are instructions both for pre-treating the canvas strop (which are extensive - repeat three times!) and for care of the cordovan strop itself. It seems Mr Naomi is strongly against putting any kind of oil or dressing on a strop, as it attracts dust. But the thing that caught my eye was the recommendation to clean the strop with lukewarm water on a cloth rubbing it in until the water soaks nearly through, then letting it dry naturally. This makes it shiny and smooth (well, that's what their English was intended to convey).
That's pretty much the last way I would treat leather that I wanted to keep shiny and smooth, but I suspect they know what they are doing and have been doing it successfully for a long time. I hope it will be a long time before I need to do it to the Kanayama strop I am to receive next week, but I am intrigued. I have a well-used and rather old Miller latigo that has been stripped with GooGone and used dry since. I may give this a whirl. And, no doubt will be performing extensive laundry processes on the canvas strop that comes with the 80000. (What about the suede strop? Does it need no care?)
"Je n'ai pas besoin de cette hypothèse."
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Re: Strop Care

Post by brothers »

Very interesting. If I ever run out of strops I would love to have one of these. As I read the instructions, I didn't understand one step in preparing the canvas: Wrapping by Nagura to polish the surface of the canvas strop. If I understand correctly, Nagura is a soft stone that excels in preparing slurry on stones. I believe he is recommending that the user should rub the Nagura slurry stone vigorously on the canvas (as if it were a stone) before finally rinsing, etc. Would this be accurate?
Gary

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drmoss_ca
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Re: Strop Care

Post by drmoss_ca »

I was wondering if 'nagura' is being used in the actual Japanese sense of 'correcting' rather than to a nagura stone. Rubbing slurry into the strop sounds like a bad idea - if you don't remove every last grain you could scratch up your blade with something coarse.
"Je n'ai pas besoin de cette hypothèse."
Pierre-Simon de Laplace
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