What is good strop belt?

[grepper]

I don’t know what a white surface conditioning belt would be.  True Scotch-Brite belts only come in blue, brown, gray and maroon.  Not all manufacturers of surface conditioning belts use the same color scheme.

The 3M web site is really slow.  It has always been slow and is still slow. Really odd for a big company like 3M.  Wait for it to load and sort by color.

https://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/company-us/a...352&rt=rud

The one I have is blue, and when I got it was sold as very fine.  I don’t know if it’s a true Scotch-Brite or just some other generic surface conditioning belt.  I’ve had it for years and don’t remember where I got it.

[Ken S]

Grepper,

I have two Scotch Brite belts. The first was part of an order from Tru Grit, which included my Surgi Sharp belt. The second was an add on to a cubitron order from the place you recommended near Cincinnati, Ohio. I think the name was the Hughes Company. I would recommend either place. I have not used the leather belt yet. I really like the Scotch Brite. I also bought two coarser Scotch Brite belts, which I rarely need. The blue/green extra fine belt gets lots of use. I even cleaned it once in water with dish detergent.

Ken

[DanielRJackson]

Grepper,
Are the belts you recommended Micro-Mesh? The grade numbers line up; I'm curious if the supplier has a source for bulk rolls and is making off-brand belts.

Worksharp includes the MicroMesh 12000 for a finishing belt with the 1x18 "blade grinder," I don't have extensive experience with it but I'm happy with it for knife sharpening. (Previous belt setup was a 2x72 with 3M belts.) 
Worksharp has stopped selling leather, started selling a set of plain 3M belts with CrO2 and FeO2 compound sticks. 

I have hanging razor strops with CrO2 and .25um diamond so I'm not looking for compound belts, but I'm curious about the characteristics you all like in a final belt. Is the flesh-side leather belt acting like a muslin buff, soft and non-abrasive but with a lot of grab?

[grepper]

Mr. Jackson, welcome to the Exchange.  

I don't know for sure if those are Micro-Mesh or not.  They may be as I have some Micro-Mesh but don't remember exactly where I got them.

I'm not the best source of info when it comes to compounds or using super fine belts.  I enjoy a toothy edge and generally finish with 150-180 grit.  I use the rough side of a Surgi-Sharp leather belt for deburring.  I put some oil on it when it was new a year or two ago and around the same time a bit of Tormek honing compound to do some polishing but have not since then.  So basically it's just a plain leather belt with a bit of oil to keep it soft and keep the dust down.

I'd just contact wherever you are looking at belts and ask them any questions you may have.  Three good places are:

http://supergrit.com/products/products_belts
http://econabrasives.com/abrasive-belts/...belts.html
https://trugrit.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=198

Econ and some of the other ones will make any size belt you wish.  

I try to do as little work as possible on the leather belt because it can smooth the toothy edge that delivers unto me such great joy.  I've seen under the microscope where too much leather actually looks like it burnished the edge.

Those super fine belts from Econ are very, very fine.  With the finest it's difficult to tell by feeling them that there is actually abrasive present.  The film and the Micro-Mesh cellulose belts are the finest grit belts I've found. `

[EOU]

We're in league with Ken and the finest grade Scotch Brite belt available if we're talking about quickly dispatching a burr from an edge while preserving tooth. Mainly though, we just wanted to second Grepper's welcome and give DanielRJackson a tip of the hat and thank him for his posts.

[dkrank]

I get my belts from Red Label Abrasives. I don't necessarily know if they're the most affordable, but I think the prices are fair, the belts are very durable, and the support team is solid (likely because they're a smaller family-owned business). Here is the link for their stropping belt in case you'd like to check them out: https://www.redlabelabrasives.com/produc...h-compound