The more I sharpen, the more I'm preferring to keep it really simple. And, I do mean really simple.
Lately, I've actually just been using 400 grit sandpaper followed by the strop. The sandpaper cuts very fast, but leaves a very smooth, polished finish - especially as it wears, and then employing somewhat vigorous stropping as Paul Sellers demonstrates, I can get an extremely keen edge without going to any finer grits before-hand.
I'm really liking sandpaper. Especially because there's a whole bin full of the stuff on sale at Dirt Cheap currently
But, I've found that with sharpening, the finer the stone you use, the more difficult and time consuming it becomes to free-hand it. When I move to say, a 2000 grit stone, it becomes very difficult indeed because it's difficult to work the back down to the edge, and if you just try to work the edge, it's easy to adopt too high an angle. With lower grits, though, you can very easily keep the back down whilst getting to the edge, just sharpening free hand and making a slightly cambered bevel.
But more importantly, I don't see the need to go anymore than about 400 -- at least, not with sandpaper. Now, my coarser (cheap) diamond stones of comparable grit leave a much coarser, scratched up surface in comparison, which would take a lot more to polish out on the strop. So, I'm actually preferring sandpaper! I just tape it to a known flat surface (I use my desk usually, which I've checked with a straight edge), use it dry, and it works wonderfully. I do sometimes follow up with a higher grit, but I don't think it's necessary at all. I don't use a lubricant because I find it makes the paper weak, and I just don't like the extra mess it entails.
What I am amazed by is just how far you can go with the strop. It seems that you can stop at even a fairly coarse grit and carry it the rest of the way on the strop without much trouble, which really begs the question: why fool around with all of the finer grits in-between?
As a little aside, I had posted a thread about having trouble with stropping before. It turns out, it was in fact the compound I was using; the compound was very wet and loose, and didn't stick to the strop. This much movement allowed it to just instantly roll my edge any time I used it. I've since switched to the Green Chromium Oxide compound that I see everyone else use, and no more trouble! In fact, stropping is extremely easy. I can go quite vigorously without rolling my edge - though, I am pretty careful on the back of my chisels. I put leather on one side of my strop, and MDF on the other; I put it in the vise, and use the leather side on the bevel of my chisel, stropping about 50-60 times, fairly vigorously, and then work the back much more gently on the MDF side, and then a few very light passes on the leather side. This gives me a razor sharp edge, and is pretty easy to do; I haven't yet had any more problems with rolling my edge.
So, anyway! That's my current method. Quick, simple, and gets me very sharp tools with the least amount of hassle.
Do any of you have similar "very simple" methods?