new way to split thin leather?

[thekid77]

Hey friends, I love making wallets and recently I have been wanting  to make some horween wallets....as you know the stuff is beautiful....but when it comes to interiors, 2/3oz is usually the thinnest you can find it......I want to get it down to .75mm-.8mm.....trouble is, the Landis splitter I have can split thick stuff to that thin, but it can't take 2/3oz and split it at all.....so I had this idea (probably not original) but I wanted to run it by yall and see what you nthink.....

Take the thin leather, in this instance, 2/3oz horween, and contact cement it to another thicker piece of leather to form a combined thickness (say, 10/12oz) that the splitter can easily feed through......

I haven't tried it yet, but barring a dull splitter blade or poor adhesion with the contact cement, I believe this will work!!

 

Maybe I'm completely out of my mind but I'd love to get some feedback on this idea..what do you guys think?

[RockyAussie]

A thicker piece will enable you to get a thin piece thinner but why would you contact cement it? Would you not have trouble getting it off? Why not just use thicker leather to start with to split? Maybe your last sentence has somethin in it?

[thekid77]

11 minutes ago, RockyAussie said:

A thicker piece will enable you to get a thin piece thinner but why would you contact cement it? Would you not have trouble getting it off? Why not just use thicker leather to start with to split? Maybe your last sentence has somethin in it?

To answer your question, it's because horween is not available in thicknesses of more than 4/5oz not in wallet sized pieces, anyway, (which is still too thin to split reliably with the splitter I have)...

Edited August 6, 2016 by thekid77

[MonicaJacobson]

I've seen horween heavyweight that is supposed to be between 7-10 oz. Sure, it's harder to find, but it's available on Maverick fairly often. 

http://maverickleathercompany.com/product/heavyweight-black-chromexcel-wblack-flesh-side/

[RockyAussie]

I hate to say it but even with my best band knife splitter i have unreliable results if trying to take off any less than .3mm. A bell knife skiver can do pretty good for splitting if you have a good one and know how to set it up well. Failing that maybe consider this alternative below. It is  a Multi tool sander I have modified for heavy sanding purposes mostly. Best of luck.

[thekid77]

15 minutes ago, MonicaJacobson said:

I've seen horween heavyweight that is supposed to be between 7-10 oz. Sure, it's harder to find, but it's available on Maverick fairly often. 

http://maverickleathercompany.com/product/heavyweight-black-chromexcel-wblack-flesh-side/

I am familiar with maverick. They sell mostly horween seconds....and I'm wanting the Dublin or essex and not the chromexcel.......thank you for the input though!!

[thekid77]

7 minutes ago, RockyAussie said:

I hate to say it but even with my best band knife splitter i have unreliable results if trying to take off any less than .3mm. A bell knife skiver can do pretty good for splitting if you have a good one and know how to set it up well. Failing that maybe consider this alternative below. It is  a Multi tool sander I have modified for heavy sanding purposes mostly. Best of luck.

 

18 minutes ago, MonicaJacobson said:

I've seen horween heavyweight that is supposed to be between 7-10 oz. Sure, it's harder to find, but it's available on Maverick fairly often. 

http://maverickleathercompany.com/product/heavyweight-black-chromexcel-wblack-flesh-side/

 

7 minutes ago, RockyAussie said:

I hate to say it but even with my best band knife splitter i have unreliable results if trying to take off any less than .3mm. A bell knife skiver can do pretty good for splitting if you have a good one and know how to set it up well. Failing that maybe consider this alternative below. It is  a Multi tool sander I have modified for heavy sanding purposes mostly. Best of luck.

I'm not trying to take off less than .3mm.....my splitter easily splits off .25mm if I have to.....I am only splitting down to .75-.8mm....

And yes, I've tried sanding.....if the takes forever and you'll get all kinds of stretching and burning going on once you get down to <1mm... :/

I was really hoping just to get moreinput in the method I described than alternative methods.....thank you

[RockyAussie]

Do you have to get the contacted pieces apart after it is split? They would be well pressed together and I would expect a lot of top surface damage.

The site MonicaJacobson mentions advertises the Dublin and Essex as well. Regards Brian

[thekid77]

9 minutes ago, RockyAussie said:

Do you have to get the contacted pieces apart after it is split? They would be well pressed together and I would expect a lot of top surface damage.

The site MonicaJacobson mentions advertises the Dublin and Essex as well. Regards Brian

Brian, no, the purpose is to split off the leather on top (.8mm) of the horween and leave the cemented behind...the purpose of cementing the horween to the thicker piece of leather is just to hold it in pace while a very thin top layer is being split off

[RockyAussie]

Yep that should work fine but don't let the blade get near the glue layer of course. Note: make sure that the to be wasted piece is very even in thickness or your thin piece will vary similarly.Have you tried the thicker piece without glueing? I do that sometimes but with a longer piece due to the top going in faster than the bottom piece.

[thekid77]

2 minutes ago, RockyAussie said:

Yep that should work fine but don't let the blade get near the glue layer of course. Note: make sure that the to be wasted piece is very even in thickness or your thin piece will vary similarly.Have you tried the thicker piece without glueing? I do that sometimes but with a longer piece due to the top going in faster than the bottom piece.

I thought about doing that too....just wasn't sure if the two pieces needed securing w the glue or not

[RockyAussie]

Let us know how you go.

[Ferg]

Glue with gel contact cement not barge or similar. Coat with a thin layer on each piece and let lay for at least an hour before you place the two together.

Roll to make them adhere fully. I agree you may have a problem if the thick piece isn't almost exactly the same thickness throughout.

Ferg