Over on the Neander forum here, we've had about 1000 discussions on stropping. But I want to share what is working for me as a beginning chip carver, just to get it into the archives to help the next person.
This week I bought a copy of Dennis Moor's chip carving workbook. Very good book for the beginner - honestly, I was surprised to found it more helpful than Barton's. Anyway, Moor says to make a strop of 2 pieces of leather, each about 12" long. Glued one with the rough side facing out and applied Lee Valley green compound. Glued the other smooth side out and kept it plain (no compound).
After honing the edge on ceramic stones, I stropped the blade about 15 strokes on each side, on the rough side of that strop. Then I repeated it on the smooth side. The result was able to slice a credit card receipt in half by simply touching the edge to the paper. On basswood, I get very smooth cuts even across the grain. I still want that kit that mychipcarving.com sells, but this is still a notable improvement in my knife edge.
(When I stropped a plane iron this way, just now, I easily pulled shavings that were 0.002" thick. And I think I could have done better if I'd played with the adjusting wheel a little more.)
Fred
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