deboardp

Just for the record, i didn't stay at the Holiday Inn last night either. Haha. So I'll cook with the macadamia nut oil, leave it out of my conditioner recipe. That leaves the beeswax and the Lanolin, and if it needs to be thinned I can reheat and use several drops of NFO. I have 2 quarts of the stuff, pure NFO, not the compound. @chuck123wapati uses it, so that's good enough for me. I don't know how much beeswax to use, or why it is used in a stuffing recipe, and apparently I'll never know why, but if the sandals look nice, smell nice, are a pleasure to handle, then I resolve to be happy about it. (Well, and if people want a pair!) I could use the tallow, too, and I will ruminate on that thought.

I hope the IT fellow can clean up the mess above. I don't dare try.

dikman, first I apologize for being undiplomatic with my response. To explain, I responded to what you said by noting the difference between pork lard being out in the elements, exposed to heat and light, and pork lard being in a container refrigerated. I pointed out that the former is exposed to air, and the latter, not so much, but still exposed to air somewhat. I assumed you knew that oxidation is one of the factors involved in the deterioration of leather, but it seems I am wrong, because you said it is irrelevant. (I just read an article that says that there are two main factors involved in the degradation of leather: oxidation and hydrolysis. Both processes dismantle the chemical and physical bonds of the collagen fibers of leather.) To me, my question seems relevant. Do conditioners minimize oxidation (and hydrolysis) of leather? If so, which ingredients do it better than others? Is there a best combination? I don't see anything wrong with this question. To me, it seems to be basic. I want my custom leather sandals to last for decades, not years. I also want the straps and the topsole to be pliable, form to the feet, resist degradation. I want my conditioner to essentially prepare them for life on someone's feet. So when you suggested I watch my pork lard in a tin can at room temperature for an indefinite amount of time, well, it was offensive. To me, It was offensive. Probably nobody else would be offended by having a reasonable question ignored, but I am always offended a little when someone ignores my question. Not knowing you, and not wanting folks here to think poorly of me, I should have answered diplomatically, after I cooled off a bit. I apologize, I'm a bit uncouth. I don't know how to get to the second half of your comment without losing this, so I'll submit this and go back and submit for the second half. Editing now. You said, "By asking you to do it, why not? You have the pork fat so your experience with it would provide all of us with valuable first-hand information, no different to what others do on here when trying something out. As to whether "stuffed leather" has air in it, I have no idea as it seems pretty irrelevant to me. I don't understand why you appear to be attacking me over this, if you want to use pork fat on your leather that's your business it doesn't bother me, I'm merely pointing out that what I've read so far about rendered pork fat gives me cause for concern about using it to treat leather. " Now that I'm cool, I see your point. It's a good one. I also now share this concern. If it goes rancid in a can (protected from air) at room temperature, what will it do in a body-heated pair of sandals? Will it stink them up? I'm now leaning toward my plan B recipe of lanolin, beeswax, and macadamia nut oil, because there's no connection to recently deceased animals. The sheep doesn't die when its lanolin is harvested, and it's sitting happily in a pail in the corner of my shop, on the floor behind the sewing machine. If I have wasted money by buying tallow and lard, that's fine. I'm learning in the process of trying to think through all the information I've been exposed to. (I can't say ...all the information I've gathered... because almost nothing sticks.) Thankfully, the basic principles seems to stick, sometimes.

It's no wonder that people seem to use what works for them and stay out of the discussion of what is the best conditioner. It's not possible for an acceptable consensus to be made! Personally, my cognitive and memory functions are far too compromised for me to figure out, for example, what are the basic guiding principles for choosing the ingredients for my leather conditioner. Does leather need to breathe? Does it need to be watered? Does it need to be lubricated? I think if someone makes a stand on any of those questions and says yes it does, or no it doesn't, someone else will immediately say the opposite.

I won't use mineral oil in my conditioner because it is occlusive - it traps water in leather, which makes the leather rot.

Well, it may not be great, I don't know, but this is what Carl Friedrik has to say about it: https://www.carlfriedrik.com/magazine/best-oil-for-leather "In our test, we applied baby oil (which is perfumed mineral oil) to a leather wallet and, as expected, a sheen quickly developed. The leather also became softer. While these are both welcome traits, the long-term effects of using mineral oil are extremely detrimental to leather. Unlike natural oils, mineral oil is occlusive, meaning it forms a protective layer over surfaces that it comes into contact with and prevents moisture from escaping. When moisture becomes trapped within leather, dry rot sets in and this accelerates the deterioration of the fibres. So while mineral oil might appear a practical, inexpensive solution for leather care, the reality is more nuanced. Loss of colour and reduced durability are two common effects of frequent use."

@Aven, @chuck123wapatiand @Mablung, I ordered that Tandy Pro Knife pictured a few posts above and will see if it will work for me. If not I'll try either that 1.5 mm set, or the 3 mm set, as that is the thickness of my 7/8 ounce leather. I just need a U- gouge but apparently they are sold only in a set with five other tools, which I don't need.

Why would I want to store it at room temperature?? And why are you asking me to do this instead of answering my valid observation and question to you, that stuffed leather doesn't have air inside it? That stored fat in the fridge or freezer is different from fats inside leather due to the absence of air? What do you think of that? I'm planning to render the pork leaf fat in the oven but I need to buy a crock pot. I guess I will try the recipe that Oz Black posted here years ago, which includes beef tallow, Beeswax, pork lard, and lanolin. When my skinny knives arrive, for cutting out the corners of my strap slots, I'll finish the sandals for my feet and stuff the leathers with the concoction. I'll see what all the fuss is about. Neither the tallow nor the lard now smell, but the wax and the Lanolin definitely smell positively nice. I'll add just a bit of macadamia nut oil, so it's a softer paste. @fredk ten years! It should be noted that both tallow and lard can be made from either leaf fat, which is the white fat that surrounds the kidneys of cow and pig, or from the fat attached to skeletal muscle and skin. With the advances in chemistry of fossil fuels, maybe it's time for me to consider possibly using some of those fossil fuel byproducts. How is it even possible that in 2023 leather workers don't have definitive answers to the question of what is the best leather conditioner for sandals???

Both the fridge and the freezer have something in them that leather does not have in it, and that something is what causes fats to go rancid. Air. Isn't that what causes fats to "go bad"? I mean, the old saddler's formulas used this stuff, and the people who had saddles were people of at least some substance, probably with some degree of intelligence. Would they buy saddles that smelled rotten?

My straps are 3mm thick, so the corners are half circles of 3mm diameter. I'm trying to learn the language of wood carving tools to understand which one i need.

Oh! So they're thin! I'll look! Thank you!

I think a lathe gouge will be too thick behind the cutting edge. I need the cutting edge to be super thin. That straight blade in the knife pictured above, might be perfect. I'll grind some off the back so I can carve out the leather bits in the corners that the round knife can't get. But I'll look anyway.

I read somewhere that leaf fat is the fat surrounding the kidneys, and it's creamier and smoother than fats found on other parts of the body.

I read somewhere that leaf fat is the fat surrounding the kidneys, and it's creamier and smoother than fats found on other parts of the body. I do intend to render it. It's not in a usable form. Here's a procedure how to do it, With amounts to use and equipment. Here

This might work. I can grind some of the back off so i can cut in the corners.

3/4" slots are 13/16", not 11/16".

Those two slots took me an hour to cut, with half the time devoted to clearing out the corners with tools not suited to the purpose.

Oblong punches cut by blunt force, straight down into and through the leather. I want a 45 degree slope through the leather. Also i want the slots to be parallel to the tracing of the foot. And all my slots are odd sizes. This one is a curved, sloped, 1-7/8" wide slot, another is curved, sloped, 1", and the 3/4" slots are actually 13/16", so the straps will be snug in the 3/4" buckles. I hope to improve my cutting skills! This first pair is for me. These slots are sloppy.

If I can't find a1/8" diameter circle knife, I can make do with a 1/8" wide knife, sort of like a chisel, but knife-thin. So I can cut leather at the corners of the slots. I guess I can live with square corners. Would rather not, as debris could enter that tiny gap.

OK so I had burnished those straps in the previous post. Today I cut some slots in one of the topsoles and realized I need a couple tools, for the ends of the slots, which probably need to be rounded to match the burnished strap edges. So that would be a circle knife, sort of like a round punch, but very thin like my round knife's thinness, because a typical punch spreads the leather, and I don't want to do that. A half-circle knife would be better, with diameter of 1/8", because I want to carefully cut the slot ends out. . It probably does not exist since slot punches always go straight down and through a leather topsole. But I'm doing 45 degrees, to set the angle for the strap going under the edge of the foot. The strap will lay flatter and be more comfortable if the slot is angled. Anyways here's a picture. Maybe you can understand what I'm setting. The slots are rough because I was using my round knife and removing leather from the two ends of the slots is difficult withOUT a circle knife.

I've been thawing the pork leaf fat and smelled it. It has almost no smell at all, maybe only a couple molecules that remind me of smoked pig hocks. It's pure white, rough textured. The plastic 2 lb container says it is "pork leaf fat, refined", whatever that means. I think it needs to be melted in order to be rendered, but that's a guess. The second delivery is Wagyu Beef Tallow from South Chicago Packing. It is white and looks super saturated, dense looking. Like the pork leaf fat it has maybe one molecule per inhalation that suggests beef source, but neuter of these very slight smells was unpleasant. In fact I had to inhale deep and concentrate and think, is that a smell? This particular tallow reminds me of Crisco. The first one I bought, in a14 oz glass jar is Fatworks Pure Tallow, Organic Cooking Oil, a yellow solid that smells like hamburger run off. I question whether this one is derived from leaf fat of the animal. I don't plan to use it. I'm making progress on a pair of sandals for myself. I'm using some processes I didn't use 50 years ago, so despite having a list of ten people who want a pair, I'm making mine first, to make sure I've got a handle on those processes. Burnishing, 45 degree slots rather than straight through at 90, middle with channels cut out, machine stitching, stuffing with fats, lanolin and wax, gluing the gum rubber on the bottom without stitches or tacks... The third product that came is the Norwegian cod liver oil, processes to remind impurities and the smell. It has maybe one molecule of fish smell, and that's debatable. Essentially free of smell. The three of them actually. I had to be really nosey to smell anything. Just stick my nose in it, practically. OK, I'm off to update my sandal progress in that other thread in the Show Off forum. Check it out! I'll make a list of who sells these odor free products when I find one of the three invoices.

I read somewhere that oils and fats go rancid when they are exposed to air. But if they are inside a piece of leather, there's no air in there. Also historically, FOR CENTURIES, fats in the form of tallow and lard have been stuffed into leather used by saddlers. If their saddles stank of dead meat, for sure the ladies would have said something, if the men didn't. One saddler said that cod liver oil rubbed onto fat- stuffed leather restores the smell of leather. I had quoted that a fellow said his leather stank after he used lard, but he had made a false statement about something else, so I no longer believe anything he has to say, about anything. Therfore I'm inclined to use the pork leaf fat that was delivered just now. I think I have to render it myself. I'll investigate that situation later, while it thaws.

I don't remember if I mentioned here at leatherworker.net that the VA approved my claim for disability compensation for acquiring disabling diseases due to herbicide exposure, but they did, about December 13th. I won't be homeless again, which at 77 is a matter of survival. I also don't have to make sandals now, but I want to, having spent the last 16 months setting up my shop, and today I am at this stage where the topsoles and straps for my very first pair since the 70's are cut and beveled. After I click send I'm going to burnish the strap edges with trag and start on the strap slots. I'm not using a punch for that, but will use my round knife and tiny circle punches and will make the slots 45 degrees rather than 90. I'll stitch on either side of the slots to strengthen the glue bond between top and midsoles. Progress!

Yeah, that one.