Strange grey spots on new veg tan?

[Northmount]

On 11/4/2024 at 5:09 PM, greygeist3191 said:

Maybe High iron in your water? 

I've seen this comment before, but after thinking about it a little that doesn't make sense.  If so the whole piece should turn blue/black as the iron would be equally dissolved through out the water, not in little globs (unless old pipes with rusty scale flaking off).

[Yukonrookie]

5 hours ago, Northmount said:

I've seen this comment before, but after thinking about it a little that doesn't make sense.  If so the whole piece should turn blue/black as the iron would be equally dissolved through out the water, not in little globs (unless old pipes with rusty scale flaking off).

Yup, sounds logical. These spots look “embedded” into the leather. The supplier, who is also the tannery, are actually going to do some tests at the warehouse. Spot testing this whole batch that my double butts came from. At least thats how I understood them. All this makes me feel pretty good about them. It sounds like they’re doing due diligence and don’t want to replace my leather with still contaminated stuff. Or send it to anyone else. I will reveal their name after they finished things on their end. This is my first time ordering from them and I don’t want to give them a bad rep. Especially not until they did their thing with this. Also they claim this has never happened to them before and I believe them, as I don’t know of anything to think otherwise. 
 

My first complaint with this leather, before I noticed the first spots, was how dry it was and how difficult it carved. It felt almost like my swivel knife was going through tough rubber. And yeah, it was super dry. Needed more water than anything I had used before. Which, to be fair, isn’t a lot. But I have tried stuff from Tandy stuff through a few Italian tanneries to Hermann oak and nothing carved or stamped even nearly this bad. Plus it deforms horribly. A couple layers of blue masking tape and a layer of good packing tape and it still deformed quite a bit. This is 9/10oz mins you

 

[leatherman64]

As an FYI normally if you use Bee Natural Pro Carve in your water you case with, it will eliminate that reaction before it happens.  It will not remove it once there, but if you are keeping that hide then its worth a try to salvage the leather.  

[bladegrinder]

So, what company was it?

[Yukonrookie]

First of, sorry for the late response. I was in the hospital and wasn’t on here much.

On 11/14/2024 at 2:25 PM, leatherman64 said:

As an FYI normally if you use Bee Natural Pro Carve in your water you case with, it will eliminate that reaction before it happens

That’s very interesting. I should try that out then. Thanks for the info.

On 11/14/2024 at 7:13 PM, bladegrinder said:

So, what company was it?

It was buyleatheronline, but they were absolutely great about. After informing them of my issue they sent me a new piece right away. Although only after they made tests at the tannery to see if a whole batch got contaminated or if it was just my piece. It turned out that it must’ve been an isolated incident cause their tests came back positive. The new piece they sent me is great and I’m allowed to keep the contaminated piece here. I’ll give that pro carve solution a try and see if I can salvage it that way.

I was gonna (and am still going to) post a positive review one here. Where would be the appropriate sub forum to post it?

[Yukonrookie]

Thanks for all the responses guys and sorry for being lates responding at times. I’m dealing with health issues and when I’m in the hospital I slack off on emails and messages. I just got back today though and actually sitting at my leather work bench crafting away on a sheath. My 3rd sheath so far. Also I got a hide of Wickett and Craig Skirting and using it for the first time. I like it a lot. Actually prefer it over the A grade HO tooling. I really like how the russet burnishes when tooling. I wish it was a little stiffer. I read that when ordering directly from W&C they offer pressing to desired temper. Anyone know anything about that?

Thanks again folks

[fredk]

If its iron contamination, the only way I can see that sort of spread is if some one used an angle grinder near the leather allowing the 'sparks' to land on it. The 'sparks' ain't sparks but very tiny pieces of hot metal

[Yukonrookie]

1 minute ago, fredk said:

If its iron contamination, the only way I can see that sort of spread is if some one used an angle grinder near the leather allowing the 'sparks' to land on it. The 'sparks' ain't sparks but very tiny pieces of hot metal

Yeah, could be some kind of metal work near the tanning or processing area of some sort? Very strange. Could it even be something completely different? Not metal but other type of oxidation of some sort? Couldn’t be mold cause the leather was new and I got to work on the day of arrival, or could it?. I didn’t even fully case it, but rather used the sponge method, the first piece I worked on wasn’t large and I was eager to try out the leather and new tools. Granted the 10oz leather was “thirsty” and I did wet it with the sponge more than I normally would have. Anyway, as soon as the leather got its colour back some the first spots started to show. Later on I sponged it a bit more and even more spots were showing. Very strange. I really wish I got a definitive diagnosis but that might not be the case. Mostly out of curiosity. Of course, should I ever get spots like this again in a completely different piece of leather, I’d know the fault lies in my end. Can’t see how that could be though.

On 11/14/2024 at 2:25 PM, leatherman64 said:

As an FYI normally if you use Bee Natural Pro Carve in your water you case with, it will eliminate that reaction before it happens.  It will not remove it once there, but if you are keeping that hide then it’s worth a try to salvage the leather.  

Do you know if Eco flow easy carve has similar properties in it that give the same effect? Bee natural Pro carve is a bit harder to get in my region.

[fredk]

5 hours ago, Yukonrookie said:

. . . I wish it was a little stiffer. I read that when ordering directly from W&C they offer pressing to desired temper. Anyone know anything about that?

a. I don't know anything about W&C

b. you can stiffen up modest size pieces of leather yourself. By soaking in warm water then drying fairly quickly between two heavy boards*. Cover the boards in absorbent clean white paper. Your only limit is the size of the boards

* or light thin boards with weights placed on them

[Yukonrookie]

18 hours ago, fredk said:

b. you can stiffen up modest size pieces of leather yourself. By soaking in warm water then drying fairly quickly between two heavy boards*. Cover the boards in absorbent clean white paper. Your only limit is the size of the boards

* or light thin boards with weights placed on them

Thanks. That’s a good, quick and easy idea. Have you ever stiffened with an oven? Or the “flash boil” method? Like for holsters, for example.