Sharpening with metal polish ... ( Stropping )

O

old4570

Banned By Request
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Jul 28, 2010
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Here is something I have wanted to try for some time ..
Polish is Autosol ... Easily available ..

Is to sharpen a knife ( or strop it ) with metal polish ..
Yeah , I wasn't going to put metal polish on my leather strops , no no no ..
But I did smear some metal polish on some cardboard .. ( Been stropping cardboard recently = It works )

Now with Autosol on cardboard , the effect was ............ powerful !
The knife for the experiment was my new to me Remington 2213 .
It appears to still have it's factory edge .
So a stropping I went .. And quite a bit of black streaking / build up resulted .
And the R2213 got sharper .. Quite a bit sharper !
Just one little issue .. That factory edge might be some what FUBAR .
Cos there were a few spots that did not sharpen ( the FUBAR ? ) ..
But the rest of the blade sharpened really nicely ..
So stropping with metal polish ........... works ! Really well .
And you don't need a lot of polishing compound ... I thought I used just a little , but it was more than I needed ..
But , it works .. Gona have to play more with this ..
 
Autosol is pretty commonly used as a stropping compound, especially with more basic alloys. There isn't really much info out there for abrasive particle size, but I seem to remember something in the 2 or 3 micron range, so it works pretty aggressively. I have a wood backed leather strop with Autosol on it, but don't use it very often these days.
 
chalby said:
Autosol is pretty commonly used as a stropping compound, especially with more basic alloys. There isn't really much info out there for abrasive particle size, but I seem to remember something in the 2 or 3 micron range, so it works pretty aggressively. I have a wood backed leather strop with Autosol on it, but don't use it very often these days.
Click to expand...

I use both Autosol and Tormek PA-70 Honing Compound on linen belts. In "Knife Deburring 6th edition", Vadim Kraichuk indicates that Autosol is in the 3-6 micron range and that the Tormek Honing Compound is probably a bit finer.

-Phil
 
pwest said:
I use both Autosol and Tormek PA-70 Honing Compound on linen belts. In "Knife Deburring 6th edition", Vadim Kraichuk indicates that Autosol is in the 3-6 micron range and that the Tormek Honing Compound is probably a bit finer.

-Phil
Click to expand...
I use PA-70 on leather belts. Works a treat as a finishing touch, even on high-vanadium steels.
 
Flitz or Simichrome on leather has always worked well for me as a final polish. Cleans up the bevels very nicely.
 
I have seen where people have used Valve Grinding compound on leather strops. Have no idea about it's micron range, but whatever works for you is my way of thinking. Humans have been very creative over time and have come up with some brilliant ideas for items we already have that work.
 
^^That’s interesting. My guess is that would be somewhat more aggressive than a polish? Might just have a use for that.
 
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