Can I clean paste from a canvas strop?

[pcb01]

Just received (free gift) an antique canvas strop. One side has been obviously pasted, paste grit unknown, probably a couple decades ago. The other side is clean.

I can see using this strop with some paste of known grit, but how do I get whatever is already on there completely off? Or can I?

[mparker762]

You may not be able to get it all off. If it is a sufficiently fine grit paste then this may be ok. A little fine paste is ok for a daily strop - Dovo's white linen paste is slightly abrasive and is definitely intended for use on a daily strop. It just means that you may be able to go 2x longer between honings:biggrin: But if it's a coarse paste then if there's any left on the strop it will scratch the bevel and gradually kill the fine edge of the blade.

But since the strop isn't useful to you as is, it can't hurt to try to remove the paste. I'd try soap and a damp toothbrush first. If two or three rounds of that doesn't work then I'd go with a non-chlorinated version of brake cleaner, such as the one made by Birchwood-Casey (http://www.cabelas.com/prod-1/0059401227800a.shtml) that is intended for cleaning firearms.

What color is the paste? That might give us a hint as to what grit it is. Red, green, black, white, gray?

[pcb01]

It is definitely a white paste. Again, the canvas is pretty old, though in good condition, so the paste might be something put on a couple of decades ago.

[mparker762]

It may be something like the Dovo white paste, in which case I'd leave it on and see how it does. Dovo strops come pre-pasted with this, and my NOS vintage Craftsman strop has something similar on the linen as well.