Please Help FAV AV2 Skiver

[Sonya]

Hi All,

My name is Sonya and I'm new to this site and forum.

The company that I work for just purchased a FAV AV2 Skiver. 

We have messed up the original settings on the machine and now I am unable to skive. Originally when we bought the machine it was skiving great. However, when we started using different types of leather, we had to adjust the feed roller, foot pedal etc. Since making these accommodations for the different leathers, we are unable to feed the leather through as well as it's not skiving. When I do get the blade to engage to skive, it eats the leather.

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated! 

Thank you,

Sonya

[jimi]

Hi There, could you send some pictures of the area where the foot and feed wheel are? something like this. jimi.

[Sonya]

Hi Jimi, 

Here is a 2 photos that I hope will help you diagnose. 

Thank you for your attention to this.

 

Best,

Sonya

 

[jimi]

Hi there, possibly looks like your knife is too far from the foot?? you can check the measurements against the list in the picture,  0.3-0.4 for normal leather. you will have to have something to gauge like paper. here is a link to a video explaining how to "0" set the skiver.

 

[Sonya]

Jimi- thank you so much. This video was extremely helpfui. I am now going to use his methods (or yours) to adjust ours.

 

Best Regards,

Sonya

[Sonya]

Hi Jimi,

I was able to fix our problem. It was exactly what the video showed.

 

Again, thank you so much. 

Sonya

[jimi]

Glad to hear Sonya. keep on truckin..

[Sonya]

Hi Jimi,

I'm back to where I was last week. 

I think it has a lot to do with the thick washed lamb that I'm using. It's approximately 1/8" thick while being thick and squishy.... 

I feel like throwing this thing out the window!!!

Best,

Sonya

[gigi]

Is the knife sharp and the edge deburred? It worked last week with the same adjustment and the same leather? Sometimes the knife may seem sharp but it is not sharp enough: the edge should be very well polished.

I've learned from @Trox: If the leather is very delicate you can try using some blue masking tape on the grain side of the leather to make it strong enough to be run through. 

[Sonya]

Hi Gigi,

Thank you for your response.

I have made sure that the knife is extremely sharp and it has been deburred.  I have used blue painters tape in the past. However, it would eventually bunch up the tape with the leather included between the roller wheel and blade. 

I am frustrated to say the least. 

Does anyone know of anyone state side that "may" be willing to do a site visit?

Thank you again,

Sonya

 

38 minutes ago, gigi said:

Is the knife sharp and the edge deburred? It worked last week with the same adjustment and the same leather? Sometimes the knife may seem sharp but it is not sharp enough: the edge should be very well polished.

I've learned from @Trox: If the leather is very delicate you can try using some blue masking tape on the grain side of the leather to make it strong enough to be run through. 

 

Hi Jimi,

I'm back to where I was last week. 

I think it has a lot to do with the thick washed lamb that I'm using. It's approximately 1/8" thick while being thick and squishy.... 

I feel like throwing this thing out the window!!!

Best,

Sonya

[gigi]

You're welcome!  I hope it will work out fine

Other ideas: Using a roller foot instead of a standard one. Check the stone: for very soft leathers should be fine grit (and not very coarse). Check the adjustments once again (according to the leather thickness). Feed wheel tension should be softer for softer leather. Feed wheel should be set parallel to the knife. 

One more video (very useful): 

 

Edited November 7, 2017 by gigi

[Sonya]

Hi Gigi,

Thank you for this video. This was very helpful! In fact, Dan in the video is our leather machinery distributor. 

Are you in the US?

Thanks,

Sonya

Hi Gigi,

Thank you for your response.

I have made sure that the knife is extremely sharp and it has been deburred.  I have used blue painters tape in the past. However, it would eventually bunch up the tape with the leather included between the roller wheel and blade. 

I am frustrated to say the least. 

Does anyone know of anyone state side that "may" be willing to do a site visit?

Thank you again,

Sonya

 

17 hours ago, gigi said:

Is the knife sharp and the edge deburred? It worked last week with the same adjustment and the same leather? Sometimes the knife may seem sharp but it is not sharp enough: the edge should be very well polished.

I've learned from @Trox: If the leather is very delicate you can try using some blue masking tape on the grain side of the leather to make it strong enough to be run through. 

 

Hi Jimi,

I'm back to where I was last week. 

I think it has a lot to do with the thick washed lamb that I'm using. It's approximately 1/8" thick while being thick and squishy.... 

I feel like throwing this thing out the window!!!

Best,

Sonya

[gigi]

Hi Sonya,

We are not in the US anymore.

I am not very experienced with the skiver, only recently acquired a used one (very old model) and now is working fine. With mine I've noticed: almost more important than the adjustments is the sharpening. My husband is sharpening the knife very well and checking the result with a magnifier glass. We've learned about the sharpening from @RockyAussie: "After sharpening very well and deburring you can use a leather that skives nicely and very slowly feed it through. This is a bit like stropping and helps to take away the fine rough edge. This also makes the edge last longer" 

[Sonya]

Gigi,

I work for BMay Bags in Michigan.

We just acquired this used Skiver as well. We've always hand skived smaller projects but are now wanting to skive the thick washed lambs that our designer loves using. 

Thanks for all your help!

Best, 

Sonya

[gigi]

Excellent looking bags!

You're welcome! Hope Brian (RockyAussie) will step in and help some more.

Edited November 8, 2017 by gigi

[jimi]

Hiya sonya, sorry to hear your deja vu  i am also a bit green with the machine. not a lot of hours under me belt. do you have any other feed rollers with the machine? if so maybe you could try a rubber one?? have you tried a roller foot, that might help. i do not know how that lamb is for working with, sorry. if you don´t have any other parts to change and experiment then possibly dan is the man for you? could you send a picture of the material? regards jimi.

[RockyAussie]

Hi Sonya,

I think every ones advice here is correct and well put. The only thing I can offer is that soft and particularly thick soft lambskin is going to be very difficult with even a very well sharpened and well set machine. You could try doing the skives in 2 or more steps. This can take away the rolling/seperating action sometimes The sheep skin has a tendency to squish and act like it has separating layers and the blade then goes where you don't want it too. Myself.... I would not even try without a roller foot. You can see an example of the use of a roller foot on my you tubes as in this link- Hope that helps . I noted that your early pictures show that your setting up was way wrong and I would ask if you could show some pictures close in to where you are now. (distance of the blade edge from the foot and how well you have now sharpened it and also how good is the sharpening stone now. If the sharpening stone is worn down too small may not be good and or if it has too much residue on it would not be good either. Sorry you are a little bit far off to help directly. Brian