SUP

I think you get a cheaper version on Temu as well. Around the same price as aliexpress.

Will do. I got them for $2. My dog loves them... will probably chew them before I can do anything with them. She keeps eyeing them. Thank you @fredk and @bladegrinder.

@bladegrinder Both of them? The white has such long hair!

Dogs have individual personalities which are as unique as us humans, don't they? My dog loves ice and carrots and chomps up both, leaving nothing for me to find. The only thing she doesn't like is her kibble - no matter which I get her. So now I make her food - everyone laughs about it - I spend more time making her food than I ever have spent on making ours! My cats were the same - one loved mushrooms more than chicken and another had to have sliced tomatoes for breakfast year in, year out all her life. Also sweet corn soup and papaya! The same cat loved an Indian fast food called Sevpuri so much, it was the only time she ate from my plate when I was distracted. The dish is vegan - not that I knew it then!

The back of the same furs. The brown patch on the white one is where my dog found it and licked it. Caught her just in time!

I got these two furs for a couple of dollars yesterday. They are glossy and appear clean. I am completely clueless about furs and would love to know what animals they come from. Before I think of using them, I would like to give them a light cleaning. How can I do that? I would appreciate any help with this. The backs of the furs is posted in the next post.

Standing on one leg? The left on odd hours.... Absolutely necessary.

I always use Vinegaroon and always rinse in plain running water each time I dip it in Vinegaroon. Soaking leather that turns grey instead of black, in strong tea helps but I always rinse in running water after soaking the leather in tea and again, rinse very well after the Vinegaroon treatment because otherwise, loose tannins that remain on the leather get dyed black and rub off or run when wet. I keep the wet leather on paper towels and rinse until the water draining on the towels is not dark. Whether using tea or not, I always rinse well in running water and never eve user baking soda. This is because the pH of vinegar is about 2.5 and that of water is neutral at about 7, so rinsing really well in running water keeps the pH at around 5, which is ideal for leather. Using baking soda raises the pH too much and alkalinity is really bad for leather. Vinegaroon always collects rust over time since most white vinegar is only 5% concentration of Acetic acid and the rest is water. So any extra iron in the mixture that does not form iron acetate forms rust. Straining helps. I rarely do that either - too lazy - I just wash the leather well after a dip, to remove the rust. It is better I strain it actually. After a good wash, the vinegar smell dissipates and is gone in a day or so. Never had a problem with it.

Frankly, @1985, I don't give a hoot about people questioning me or saying anything at all about what I am doing. I just answer them as I am answering you and have answered others in the past. At least I am questioning and not just blindly accepting what people have said over 100s of years. The world has come a long way in those 100s of years - I like to be open to new ideas, try them and if they don't work? Fine. If they do, something new learnt. Beyond that, I'm doing this for me and anyone else who is interested.

Those are so beautiful! I would not feel like using them.

@1985 Our experiment is for the ordinary person who wonders what to use, not something I plan to publish in a journal. I am pretty familiar with how to conduct scientific experiments - having a background in research, among other things. Scientific experiments, if done truly scientifically, select very narrow aims or become too generalized to reach true scientific conclusions. But then, half the time, so called 'scientific conclusions' have such narrow limits that they are not of much use to the layman. The entire process, if I want to go down that path, will be much more complicated than what you are describing. It also cannot be done by one person or even 2 or 3 people; it will require a team of people over decades. Otherwise it would be pointless. Unless I want a good part of it to be theory - information from people - which is so much all word-of-mouth - "I heard from this old saddler" and, "My grandfather used this" and so on. Nothing wrong with that, but is that the only thing? That is, in fact, what I am questioning and the reason why we are doing this informal experiment. For me, the question started with wondering why people said mineral oil, indeed any petroleum products, are bad for leather, while at the same time, in ignorance, praising several products which are full of them. I decided to check if it is true and we just added a few more oils for comparison and as a matter of further curiosity. @fredk, @chuck123wapati and I are testing several oils on veg-tanned leathers. One of these days, I plan to expand to other leathers as well. But this is a fun, informal experiment. I, for one, am not interested in setting this up as a formal experiment, contacting tanneries and so on. You have evidently given this a lot of thought. If you want to set up a more scientific experiment, go right ahead. It will be interesting to learn more about it.

@Handstitched, have you tried giving her plain pieces of ice? My dog loves to crunch on them in summer. It's a game for her to chase it around on the floor.

This is a bit of extra work, but since I'm pretty much a newbie, anything that I hand stitch, I first roughly tack into place. Once I'm certain it all fits, I do my saddle-stitching. In the long run, saves me time.

Those bags are nice - the color combinations too. If the yellow leather was plain, it would have been a different matter but this has some sort of pattern on it. You could make handbags, highlighting the pattern on that leather. Put some light lining to give it shape and add a contrasting leather - the blue or brown both look nice. Simple handbags with a strap and a zipper. So many other things as well - sets maybe, of smaller items like a cosmetics bag for women and a pocket set for knife or comb, etc. for men - if you can work fast - a 'his and hers' set for Valentines day and so on.

@1985That's great. You've found a technique that you like, to care for your leather strops. Perhaps you could explain that in a different thread so that others interested in the same could learn from your experience. Cocoa butter is always organic, isn't it? It cannot help itself. Absolutely. I completely agree. However, this thread is to learn about the effects of different oils on leathers. One of the things I am watching for, is to see how long the leathers can go before needing to be oiled, and if I delay, how long before damage becomes evident. Hopefully, we will learn something.

Crazy horse can be chrome tanned or veg-tanned, it appears. @AWORKOFMARC you need to determine that first. Chrome-tanned does not shrink or warp in boiling water - one of the ways to determine if a piece of leather is veg-tanned or chrome-tanned. You could try on a small sliver of the leather. See here:

Soaking should work. Routinely done when molding leather, is it not? But will not boiling water shrivel or shrink it like it does all veg-tanned leathers?

@Glocker21, @DJole, Pretty bags. A bit different, both, but that's nice.

Anti-tetanus first! and Band-aids. For cutting, a plain Stanley knife works best for me. Of course, round knives work well too and a whole slew of other items, but you can get those over time. A Stanley knife or something similar, is something we all usually have at home and the blades are easily replaceable and inexpensive, so that we always have a very sharp edge which is vital. An Xacto knife is good too but the heft of a Stanley knife is nice when cutting leather of some thickness. Rotary cutters are convenient as well but you need a bit of practice. The blade on mine actually broke when using an ordinary steel ruler with it! A thicker ruler is because, at least for me, an ordinary metal ruler I run over with the knife and damage the blade. Could cause serious cuts as well. A self healing mat of course. I think Owden has a set of 3 sizes for less than $20.00 on Amazon. These are smaller sizes - A2, A3 and A4 if I am not mistaken. As you tan you own leather, you probably have larger leathers, in which, these might not suffice. AN L-shaped knife helps as well. if using lighter or softer leather something to keep the leather in place as you cut. Anything heavy will do. I use pieces of marble and a steel anvil and anything else at hand, as long as it does not stain. All that, at least, just for cutting.

@Wepster Yes. It is. Thank you. Similarly, when beeswax is melted with two other immiscible fats and warmed and stirred well, it is possible the fats form tiny droplets that get coated or mixed with the beeswax which, as the mixture cools, solidifies and prevents the other two fats from reforming larger and larger drops and ultimately separating. At least, I think that is probably what happens. If I am wrong, please correct me.

@Littlef exactly. Beeswax probably helps the miscibility, if olive oil and tallow don't mix. Anyway, I don't know why I did not remember earlier that all oils and fats do not necessarily mix just because they are all lipids. Anyway, two oils together without a chemical reaction.. probably an oil-in-oil emulsion. The beeswax probably helped to stabilize it.

You mean versus a nut oil? No idea.

That's just too bad.

Oh Wow! I hope your grand-parents at least got a good price for that land.

Greek fire. Used in warfare at sea, is it not? Oil on water, as it were. Wonder how and how much they refined the oil before using it.