No black marks?

Welcome to the forum, Hainsworth!

It sounds like you’ve applied far too much stropping compound to your strops (assuming it’s the WE pastes). You really only need a tiny drop (pea-size) just to cover an entire strop.

Then after a while (say, 10-20 knives) you’ll notice that the strops will sort of start to stick to the edge when moving them. This is the fun part for me, because now they will be quite sticky and have a big polishing effect on the edges.

If this diagnosis is correct, just scrape off the excess compound from your strops with a knife, don’t add any new compound, and try 10 new knives. I’m pretty certain your strops will work very differently from the way they work now.

I had the same problem at first. Then I got some isopropyl alcohol and put it in a spray bottle. I put 3 super tiny dots of the compound on each strop. divide that pea by 3… Then, making sure I had freshly washed hands, I soaked the paddles with the alcohol..then used my finger to distribute the paste evenly rubbing a little as I went..Then the paste about disappears as the alcohol dries. Then use them a bit.

Or, some people will lightly scuff the leather with some fine grit sandpaper and then do the same thing. It really helped mine out.

Now that your strops are loaded with paste I dampen them with rubbing alcohol each time I use them. I just pat them with a paper towel soaked with alcohol. Clay uses a spray bottle to do the same thing. This makes them really stick to the steel.

I you have any paste coming off on the steel it means you still have too much paste. Just keep stropping and cleaning the blade until the execs paste is gone then try some alcohol.