Members silverwingit Posted March 30, 2015 Members Report Posted March 30, 2015 I bow to Kid and anyone else who can skive a large area evenly! I'm sorry to say that after ruining a good amount of leather, I bit the bullet and bought a Heritage splitter/skiver. Costly but effective solution if you plan on doing much of this. Michelle Quote
Members blueblazer Posted April 1, 2015 Members Report Posted April 1, 2015 At some point I saw theKid's post about using the safety beveler and I've since gotten not terrible at this method. After finishing up with the safety beveler, I hit up some hot spots with a dremel to sand down some spots and run the entire piece of leather against some sandpaper then slick down the grain for waxier stuff or glue on my liner for drier stuff. I must have missed the note about stropping, Kid, how do you strop your safety beveler blades? I've been experimenting with snapping various razor blades I have around to fit the safety beveler in an effort to find a replacement for injector blades. Quote
Members thekid77 Posted April 1, 2015 Members Report Posted April 1, 2015 At some point I saw theKid's post about using the safety beveler and I've since gotten not terrible at this method. After finishing up with the safety beveler, I hit up some hot spots with a dremel to sand down some spots and run the entire piece of leather against some sandpaper then slick down the grain for waxier stuff or glue on my liner for drier stuff. I must have missed the note about stropping, Kid, how do you strop your safety beveler blades? I've been experimenting with snapping various razor blades I have around to fit the safety beveler in an effort to find a replacement for injector blades. hey Blue, to strop the blades get yourself a 1" wide strip of leather and secure it to something hard and flat (flesh side facing up)....rub green polishing compound onto the flesh side of the leather....all you have to do from here is lightly strop the safety beveler in between every 5-10 cuts and you'll get a lot more life out of your blades.... hope this helps!! Quote
Pip Posted April 7, 2015 Report Posted April 7, 2015 hey Tiara, I make bifold wallets and regularly skive 3-4oz leather down to about 2-3oz with the Tandy safety beveler.... a few tips that might help... -start off with a fresh blade and have a thick strip of leather loaded with green polishing compound on it (I will strop gently in between every 5-10 cuts with the safety beveler)--you will greatly extend the life of your blades, and the beveler will cut like butter... -skive on a smooth, clean surface like glass or marble Great advice, stropped the living daylights out of a new blade, so much cleaner and easier -I start by beveling down the outer perimeter of the piece of leather first....for example, if I had a 3x5" piece of leather that I needed to skive down, I would bevel the edge of one side first down to the thickness that I want.... -then, I would bevel the other three sides... -finally, begin to bevel the inside in thin sweeping passes (the beveler is slightly curved so it will create ridges in between cuts--go back later and get rid of the ridges by lightly cutting them away with the beveler as well)... -the beveler, when skiving the insides, should only cut as deeply as the sides are beveled.....that is the benefit of beveling around the edges first....for some reason, the beveled edges act as a guide for the beveler when you are making the cuts..... hope this helps!!! Quote
Members SantaFeMarie Posted April 8, 2015 Members Report Posted April 8, 2015 Kid, thanks for that information, very helpful. Do you wet the leather? Quote
Members thekid77 Posted April 9, 2015 Members Report Posted April 9, 2015 Kid, thanks for that information, very helpful. Do you wet the leather? no need to wet the leather, but do make sure that you skive with fresh blades.......those little injector razor blades are cheap and material is not.....the goal is a nice smooth skive actually, one thing though......if the leather you are trying to skive has a really fuzzy flesh side, this can make skiving evenly difficult.......you can apply some gum trag to the flesh side and take a roller or anything and slick down the leather. let it dry completely.....then come back and skive and this will make things easier.... ***one caveat: if you are applying gum trag to a piece of leather that you have not yet dyed, be very careful not to get any on the grain (smooth) side or it will resist the dye in the spot where the gum trag touched.....hope this helps :D Quote
Matt T Posted April 9, 2015 Report Posted April 9, 2015 Best way to skive is with a skiving machine, especially if you ever need to skive chrome leather.. You can get one on Ebay for 1k. Quote Leathercraft supplies
Members thekid77 Posted April 9, 2015 Members Report Posted April 9, 2015 Best way to skive is with a skiving machine, especially if you ever need to skive chrome leather.. You can get one on Ebay for 1k. agreed, but i'm a poor ex-college student.....i'll stick with the safety beveler for now LOL Quote
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