Length of leather for braiding

[ebdavison]

I am going to be making a braided belt for my daughter.  I am thinking of making this flat 6-strand braid.  I have the Encyclopedia of Braiding by Bruce Grant but I cannot find anything that really addresses the length of the strands in order to come out to a proper length. 

Can anyone provide some guidance or rule of thumb formulas for determine the length of the strands?

Thanks in advance

[Dwight]

If you don't get a good answer, . . . one of my tried and true answer finders on stuff like this is model building.

Build a 12 inch long scale model of it, . . . with true scaled thickness and widths, . . . then measure the pieces, . . . multiply it by the scale, . . . and you'll have it.

May God bless,

Dwight

[roo4u]

i usually go 1.5 times the desired length.  so say 30 inches 6 strand...i need 6 strings 45 inches long plus a little bit for finishing.  now if your doubling your strings back like he shows for an aussie style belt it would be 3 strands each 90 inches long.  hope that makes sense.

[ebdavison]

Yes, I was thinking of the aussie style belt like on plate 35 (page 100-101).  So I will try this with double length and see how it goes ... Thank you very much!