Camera harness thickness

[Affaltar]

Hi everyone. I'm new to leatherworking and I offered my brother a camera harness in exchange for him taking professional photos of my work.

What thickness leather should I use to make it safe for the camera? I have some 2mm chrome tanned leather, I planned to cut it in stripes and sew on all the hardware, leaving just decorative rivets. Would that hold it firm enough? He's sceptical about the strength of it so I told him we can hang it on something and swing from it to make sure camera won't fall of by itself. Will 2mm hold that too? =D

For practice (first project ever) I did some cuffs from 2mm leather and used only quick rivets, after a lot of struggle only thing that failed was D ring from china

[Spyros]

Here's what I've understood so far and someone can correct me if I'm wrong.  It's not just the thickness of the leather, it's also what kind of leather.  1mm kangaroo will probably hold a DSLR with a giant lens just fine, because kangaroo is the strongest leather at this thickness.  Also the very top layer of the leather, the skin, is usually the strongest part, so when talking strength it matters if your leather is full grain (ie it includes the skin) or not.   2mm chrome tan is fine if it's full grain.  Your problem is that chrome tan usually tends to stretch more than veg tan overtime, and that's annoying because camera harnesses are all about fit.  There's a reason they use thicker veg tan or bridle for belts, and it's not just the strength.   You could double up your leather on itself but then you'll probably have to stitch it along the edges, and that's A LOT of stitching.  Would look great though  

Also, be careful how you sew on the hardware, because putting holes across the strap means you're creating weakness points, if the leather is going to fail it will be exactly there.  

For maximum strength attach the hardware like this

or like this

 

But not like this

Bottom line is the camera is not going anywhere, not because of your leather anyway.   But if you want longevity and you want to minimise stretching, use 3-4mm veg tan/bridle/harness leather (You can buy belt blanks from pretty much any leathercraft shop) or double up and stitch your 2mm chrome tan.

IMO anyway  

Edited July 28, 2020 by Spyros

[fredk]

Wot he says

I'll throw in my bit. 

How heavy is a camera and lens? about 2kg? 

I used 2mm chrome tan leather for the guige (the carrying) strap on this shield. The shield weighs about 5kg. The owner has thrown the shield around using the guige strap. The strap has never broken, the brass loops, the snaps nor any of the rivets have come apart or shown signs they want to

If you have doubts; make the strap, hang it by its ends, the ends about 25 cm apart, maybe from hooks in the top of a door frame. Then hang a weight from the centre of the strap. Start with a weight the same as the basic camera and go up to at least twice what it'll be needed to carry, say, about 4kg. I very much doubt if either the leather or fittings will give way under test.

The strap may stretch a bit, some chrome tan is a bit stretchy. The bit I used above is not stretchy at all.

[RockyAussie]

11 hours ago, Affaltar said:

I have some 2mm chrome tanned leather

There are all sorts of leather varieties as to the quality and strength and from my experience with most chrome tanned leathers I would suggest the width would need to be 32mm to 35mm wide at that thickness. Doubled up it may be too thick but you could drop back the width to 20mm if you wanted. I would fully stitch the length to reduce any stretch either way you do it.

[Affaltar]

Thanks all so much! I'll do it wide and stitch the length so it doesn't stretch, and I'll make a small piece first and put it to stress test to see how much it takes to break it

[brainmonster]

I just posted a very similar kind of question. It probably depends on the type of camera. I have a rangefinder film camera that's very light and it came with a strap that is about 1/2" width and about 2mm thickness. The strap is about 60 years old and it's held up, but it's starting to crack near one of the buckle holes.

Most straps that people make themselves seem to be of about 9oz leather, maybe 5/8" width for the strap. See this guy's strap:

https://www.etsy.com/listing/722492659/brown-black-vegetable-tanned-leather

Looks quite nice. Some people have noted that leather camera straps sometime snap after about 5 years, especially around the buckle holes or thinner areas.

If you're leather is 2mm you could just add a little width over 1/2", if you want it to "last forever".

I would recommend vegetable tanned leather also for added safety without chemicals in it.

[fredk]

8 minutes ago, brainmonster said:

. . . Some people have noted that leather camera straps sometime snap after about 5 years, especially around the buckle holes or thinner areas.

I would suggest that those are not leather straps but that artificial stuff passed off as 'real leather'

By chance I was packing away some of my old film camera stuff a couple of weeks ago. I have a leather strap with is now about 45 years old. Its been abused and never cared for. It carried cameras as heavy as 5kg. It carried cameras up skyscrapers and to motor races. The strap shows its age, its looking rough but its not ripped nor showing signs of wanting to break. The strap is about 12mm wide and 3mm thick, with loops and hooks on each end, for quick change of camera bodies at events.