Question about leather

I have tooled leather for almost 40 years. I am trying to grasp your question. Look in your yellow pages for “Tandy Leather Co.”. The people that work at those places have the answers. They can sell you what you need and show you how to use it. I can tell you what to buy, but it would be at Tandy. Yes, the original Tandy did own Radio Shack. Hope this helped a little.

-- Odie, Confucius say, "He who laughs at one's self is BUTT of joke".

I’m not an expert, by any means, but just a thought. To really age and distress it, maybe scar it up, get it wet, and dry it really fast until it cracks.

Oh, Hi, Dan.
First I need to know what kind of leather you have. Then I need to know what you are going to do with it after it is distressed. Is it going in a gain in the frame? or applied over the frame? Are you using it to hang the frame? There are lots of way to age leather. The trick is to make it look old with out loseing any of the strength if the strength is needed. There are antique compounds available from suppliers, Tandy being one. Some of the holster makers use a con-glomeration of tobacco juice, dirt, grease, etc. to age and color the leather. Try some gel stain and wipe it off. Many stains for wood will work on leather. If your leather is really old, it will be a problem to work with. Leather can go to seed as it ages. Then it is stiff and hard. Comes from the stuffing drying out. I’ll help you all I can. If you need send a PM with your E-Mail address. Hope this helps.

-- Thos. Angle, Owyhee Design, Oregon

Leather trivia.

leather is made much like veneers where the pelt/skin is shaved into very thin sheets. The top sheet with all the insect bites, cuts, bumps, scars etc is most often the “most expensive”. .............the bottom skin is made into “Suede”.

Shoe polish, a socks full of nails, nuts and bolts, a hammer and anything used to make wood look “distressed”.....in other words, beat the sh&%$ out of it, then polish it.

Good luck

-- http://www.furnituremann.ca/

Sorry, Roman,
Most leather is only split once. The top grain is the best with one smooth side and one rough side. How the leather was tanned will determine its use. Oak tanned leather is called Skirting. Carving , tooling, holster, molding leather are all versions of Skirting. The various weights are derived by splitting. Harness leather is skirting with different stuffing. American made bridle leather is the same. However English and French bridle leather are tanned with different eliqsirs, usually based on Sumac. The bottom split is called “Split” and is usually retanned in to a softer type of leather. Splits are of very little use for outside applications because they soak water like a sponge. There are several other ways to tan leather with Chromium salts and Alum. These produce the soft leather used in upholstery and apparell. I don’t even know all the different methods used to tan leather. Oak tannage goes back to about the time of Moses.

Suede is not a split; it is buffed lambskin. There is a soft type of leather that is similar to suede made from cowhide called Nu-buck. If you can find a copy of Siegel’s of California’s older catalog, there are very good discriptions of all the various types and tannages of leather from all over the world.

-- Thos. Angle, Owyhee Design, Oregon

I stand corrected and thank you albeit the people who work at “Tandy” told me the above info.

The older I get the more I realize the less I know!

Cheers

-- http://www.furnituremann.ca/

It has been my experience that there are a lot of nice people at Tandy stores. They mean well but sometimes are not the most experienced. Believe me, I still have much to learn about wood and leather. I guess that’s the fun of it.

-- Thos. Angle, Owyhee Design, Oregon

and I was told that deer hide is not considered leather; it’s a chamois … and all this time I thought I was doing leather work

-- "Functional WoodArt" by Debbie, Canada (http://www.execulink.com/~yohan)

”Some of the holster makers use a con-glomeration of tobacco juice, dirt, grease, etc. to age and color the leather.”

I think I feel my lunch coming back up…

-- Women love me.....trees fear me

I don’t know who told you that, Debbie, but I consider deer skin a leather because it is tanned. Chamois I understand is the hide of a particlular deer, the Chamois. Three terms that do mean different things in the industry are; hide, skin, side. There are a lot of others as well.

-- Thos. Angle, Owyhee Design, Oregon

Wow, I learn new stuff all the time. Here is a pic of a Chamois. Wikipedia says it is a type of goat. Looks like an elk thing to me. I just thought Chamois was soft cow skin. (Sorry for the digress, Dan)

I love this place,
Steve

-- Stevethepeeve -- I'm no rocket surgeon