Stropping advice

I recently started doing 25 linen/25 leather before each shave. I've been doing this for about a month now. Compared to the previous year, where I stropped ~60 on leather before each shave, the last month has been more consistently smooth and close on each shave, with different razors, honed and finished on different stone sets.

That's not to say that one is better than the other, nor to imply that I have some method or science behind the switch. To me, it feels as though the current method is giving a light refresh and smoothing before each shave, where the leather alone just kept smoothing an increasingly dull edge.

That might be all in my head. I'm perfectly willing to accept that. Since comfort is a personal perception, I'm willing to accept that the difference in comfort may be entirely psychosomatic. It works for me...

I have tried a number of stropping routines and settled on the following. I do 30/30 cotton then linen on a TomoNagura strop followed by 30 on Kanayama Llama #80000 after my shave. Before a shave I do 100 on a Tony Miller Heirloom Old Number 2. This gives me the best edge, shave in and shave out. I have never had to reset a bevel or refresh a razor with this routine. All my razors are of Swedish steel which means the blades are very hard and the extra stropping just works for me. The one thing to remember is that if your technique is correct, you can't over strop a razor in my experience.

I usually do 30 on linen, 50~60 on leather

I've varied my routine up the last couple of months and have come back to 30 linen/100 leather. I have a material for sails made into a strop by a buddy. It's got CRox one on side that I use for that "in between honing" refresh. The back side of this strop is post shave about 10 laps to clean/dry the blade.

I've had the same routine for years -

30 on linen
60-70 on leather

This is the same regardless of the strop. The only variation I use is for my kamisori, which I usually strop less, as the blade is small and in contact with the leather all the time.

When I'm done, I do 25 on linen and 30 on leather.