Question on making a paddle strop?

Hello everyone,

I want to make a paddle strop two sided with one side with CrOx. I have been doing a lot of searching through the old threads but there are a few things I'm not so sure about. So I have a few questions that I hope some experienced people would be willing to answer.

What I have: So I bought some maple 2'x3"x3/4" from lowes (I picked up the straightest one I could find), and 3"x50" cow leather from tandy's. I am planning on flatting the maple using my granite tile with wet/dry sandpaper.

The problem is my leather is a little warped in spots.

So my questions are mainly in regards to prepping the leather.

How do I remove these warped areas, do I massage in mineral/neats oil on it to remove the warps? and do I put it on both sides? but would this inhibit me from gluing the leather onto the paddle? And would the oil prevent the CrOx from sticking?

Or should I just glue the leather to the paddle and then sand the leather flat w/ 800 girt wet/dry?

Thanks in advance,

Dave

How warped are we talking here? We might need photo's

Usually just gluing it to the paddle would be enough to flatten it, unless it was really bad. You are right about not wanting to make the leather oily before you try to glue it.

You might be able to flatten the leather by making it very slightly damp with a spray bottle and then pressing it between something flat and smooth?

Be sure to use a J-roller so you can squeeze the air out between the leather and paddle. It helps keep it nice and flat too. You may want to round the long edges of the paddle to make sure that the edges of the leather aren't higher than the middle. Make sure the side you glue to the paddle is smooth too. You can cut off any hanging strings. If you don't it can make bumps on the surface of the leather.