Magnetizing a razor blade

[ledow]

Is it possible to magnetize a razor blade by 'stropping it', e.g. against the palm of your hand (some sort of rubbing)...?

If so, exactly what is the mechanism?

[gammaray]

I suspect your hand will drop of if you rub too hard - for which you'll need more than magnetism to put it right.

[Clanad]

Sure... from my days as a Boy Scout leader, we learned that an improvised compass can easily be made from a razor blade and a piece of string (don't know the length). Strop the blade very carefully agaist the palm of your hand (arch the palm to make it tight, suspend the blade from the string and hold it away from anything metallic. It will align itself with the north/south magnetic lines (are there any other kind?). The reason being is that the molecules comprising the metal(s) of the blade are aligned (as least on the surface) by the action of stropping rather than being random...

[maelogman]

Addding to the last, it's possibly to do with the frictional heat generated enabling the particles to move more freely and then aligning with the earth's field as they cool. Same idea is that ships develop quite a strong magnetism with all the hammering and heating as they are built. In both cases it's important to hold the blade (or ship!) at a constant angle to the eareth's field