Does a decorative stitchline reduce durability?

[LMullins]

I'm talking to another person about how a decorative stitch line would be more detrimental to leather durability on a single layer 13oz belt than just to have a single strip of leather without any stitching. 
 

My reasoning is that adding an unnecessary stitchline is just adding a perforation to the leather and allowing greater water instrustion to the leather along with dirt and grit, whereas an unbroken strip wouldn't allow for this.

Is there any resources on this to verify the validity of this claim? I've seen this during repair work many times, enough to see that adding unnecessary holes doesn't increase the strength. But I have never seen that a single of layer benefits from breaking the grain of the leather without reason. Would love to hear it discussed 

[chuck123wapati]

11 hours ago, LMullins said:

Is there any resources on this to verify the validity of this claim? 

yeah go get a roll of tp and ask him to explain why it has perforations every four inches.

 

Edited Monday at 06:19 PM by Northmount
Removed extra redundant quote

[BlackDragon]

It's going to depend on a few factors really.

If the holes run vertically you are weakening the belt because of the direction of force applied to the belt. Like in Chuck's scenario of pulling on a piece of toilet paper.

Horizontally, the force wont have as much as an impact on the holes because the force is distributed across more leather. 

When it comes to stitches that run diagonally it's going to depend on the size of the holes and the distance between the holes. If you have big or small holes close together you will have a weak belt. 

And of coarse it's going to depend on how much force is applied to the belt. A dress belt with small holes somewhat close together will be weak but if it's just for looks you arent going to tighten it very much.

[kgg]

22 hours ago, LMullins said:

I'm talking to another person about how a decorative stitch line would be more detrimental to leather durability on a single layer 13oz belt than just to have a single strip of leather without any stitching. 

I think that a properly sized thread and a sensible stitch length would actually strengthen and increase the life of a belt.

My Thoughts are:

i) A 5 or 6 spi stitch line along the outer edges about 3/16 or 1/4" inch in from the edge would add strength and help prevent the belt from deforming. A decorative pattern in the center of the belt would also increase the strength and help prevent deforming. @Dwight posted a very nice photo of a belt that is about 15 oz that has both edge and a decorative pattern that is 20 plus years old. 

 

ii) Proper thread sizing in combination with a correctly sized needle for what the belts intended use needs to be selected. An example would be V138 has a breaking strength of 22lbs while V207 has a breaking strength of 32 and V277 breaks at about 45 lbs. 

iii) Thread maybe an important factor as the strength of the leather has many factors that contribute to the quality / strength of the leather. Is it Veg Tan or Chrome Tan, the dyeing process, the actual location it came from on the animal (shoulder, stomach, butt, etc) and the tanning company doing the actual tanning process.

kgg
 

Edited Tuesday at 04:57 AM by kgg

[LMullins]

20 hours ago, kgg said:

I think that a properly sized thread and a sensible stitch length would actually strengthen and increase the life of a belt.

My Thoughts are:

i) A 5 or 6 spi stitch line along the outer edges about 3/16 or 1/4" inch in from the edge would add strength and help prevent the belt from deforming. A decorative pattern in the center of the belt would also increase the strength and help prevent deforming. @Dwight posted a very nice photo of a belt that is about 15 oz that has both edge and a decorative pattern that is 20 plus years old. 

 

ii) Proper thread sizing in combination with a correctly sized needle for what the belts intended use needs to be selected. An example would be V138 has a breaking strength of 22lbs while V207 has a breaking strength of 32 and V277 breaks at about 45 lbs. 

iii) Thread maybe an important factor as the strength of the leather has many factors that contribute to the quality / strength of the leather. Is it Veg Tan or Chrome Tan, the dyeing process, the actual location it came from on the animal (shoulder, stomach, butt, etc) and the tanning company doing the actual tanning process.

kgg
 

Thank you for the insight, I always know when I see a notification from "kgg", it's gonna be worth reading.

 

it is interesting though because my initial thoughts would be that stitching allows for greater weather/dirt/grime intrusion and could weaken over time in hard wear conditions like construction and such.

[Handstitched]

After all the years of hand stitching and machine stitching belts and other items, I have never had one break as a result of perforations in the leather. Interesting topic too   

HS

[TomE]

I agree with @Handstitched that stitching is usually not the weak link. Most horse tack that I’ve repaired has broken where the leather wraps around hardware, or cheap hardware breaks. The stitching is in tact. That said, I don’t stitch across the width of a strap.