Leather Splitters

[rmr]

After sending in my last post on looking for companies to splitt larger sections of leather- I have been doing some resaerch of leather splitter machines. I know virtually nothing about any of theses. I already have a old osborne type which works grat for lap skiving. I would like a machine that using a hand crank I can splitt sections 8-10" wide down to a thickness I desire.

I see alot written about the Landis and American splitters- but it seems these are all old refurbished. Is there a reputable source out there for these- Im concerned with some of the ones I have seen- look like they have been used hard, rusty and who knows what else wrong. I'm afraid to get one sight unseen than end up spending a small fortune to get iy working with new parts....

I noticed Weaver has one. Does anyone out there have any experience with the weaver product- is it reliable, does it work well...... The one thing I like about the weaver one is its new and I suspect would be easire to get serviced and parts

Thanks Bob R

[bruce johnson]

The Landis, American, and Champions are 6" wide and come from the shoe trade. They are/were used for splitting and leveling soles. The Weaver has an 8" blade and costs $1895. The wider handwheel or motorized fixed blade splitters are going to cost some bucks. One guy used to charge $200 per inch of blade for the ones he refurbishes. You get to the wider widths and a bandknife splitter starts to look more attractive too. There is a guy around Harrison ID that makes or used to make a wider handcrank splitter. His name escapes me right now, but I want to say it was 12" wide. There was one someplace on a used board for $2500 a while back. Artisan sells a motorized 18" wide fixed blade splitter for a little over $2000 too.

[cem]

I'm about to get my Weaver I hope sometime this week ordered it last week. So I can let you know how it goes once I get it but I do think there are few others here that do have one as well. I was going to get it last year but things cropped up and I thought maybe a decent old one would surface but that wasn't case, the refurbishment people either didn't get back to me even after a few emails, were nearly as expensive as the Weaver or just wouldn't send to me in Australia and I couldn't get hold of the guy in Harrison, I think someone here said that he wasn't making them anymore. You probably won't have some of these problems if your in the US, but like you I was worried about trying to get parts for one of the old ones anyway so I thought the Weaver would be my best bet in the end.

If your budget can go over what the Weaver costs there are few more options of a new one, I contacted Cambell-Bosworth and they deal with a company in Italy I think, they still makes new ones but the six inch is the same price as the Weaver and I couldn't go any higher than that and I needed an eight inch I think their eight inch was around $2500 USD.

I don't think anyone makes a new 10 inch hand crank though so if your wanting that size motorised is going to be your only option either like Bruce said the Artisan (I may of got one of these but I just don't have the room to store it) or there is a German company that makes a 15 inch but I can't find their website at the moment and I think they were about $3500 USD.

Hope this is of some help

Cheers,

Clair