Applying compound on a new strop

[Claude]

I bought my stick of Chromium Oxide from Woodcraft.com It's a 1 x 1 x 6 inch (roughly) waxy-like green stick, and is enough to last around 200 years. Just scrub it around on the cardboard like it's a crayon. Total coverage is not necessary, and no need to melt it.

[buckbeans]

The abrasive in wax sticks were designed to apply abrasive to a buffing wheel where the heat of the cloth wheel helped melt the abrasive into the surface. Most of the carvers in the local carving club use ZAM which is a looks like a big chunk of green blackboard chalk. It is perfect for stropping leather glued to a chunk of wood. It was a game changer for me after I joined the club and started using that. It is a lot less messier than using the abrasive "crayons"

[Brian T]

CrOx/AlOx mix is suspended in a waxy carrier to work against rust on fine iron edges.
I found that although leather is flat, it is far too soft in this day and time
to be a practical ground for a strop. Unless you have a very light hand and few strokes.

Instead, some of us have opted for the inner surfaces of cereal box cardboard
attached to flat wood, glass or stone for a strop. No, it never needs to be glued down.
Masking tape is fine and gravity is your friend.

Carving with crooked knives and elbow and D adzes, my strops take the form of all sorts of cylinders as mandrels, even a tennis ball (perfect 7/75). My preference is office filing cards, taped to tubings and honing compound scribbled all over it. Testing edge quality in the wood that I am carving, I'm quite pleased with this.

[Rick Wiebe]

Denim makes a good strop. A piece from an old pair of jeans. Stick it down with double sided carpet tape.

[Steve Reed]

You can buy CrOx from Wood is Good also, along with their strops (I made a ton of them). The ones they sell are from repurposed sneaker material, and is firmer than leather. As far as leather, I like pigskin, as it's usually thinner than cowhide.
Just my $.02, others may differ.
Steve

[Brian T]

I find that white office file cards taped down to a hard surface of any kind, makes a very simple and renewable strop. Flat, rolled, they are all good. CrOx/AlOx industrial stick polish is excellent.

I made a few strops according to Rick Wiebe's instructions. Denim glued on junk baltic birch plywood.
Buttered those with Rick's "White Lightning" honing paste. This is straight white aluminum oxide with a nominal grit particle of 0.25 micron, about 1/2 that of CrOx. For flats and straight edges such as spoke shaves, they are the answer to my needs.