Cutting Wet Leather??

[Leather20]

Hi! I'm kinda new to leathercraft and I have a big project coming up. I need to be able to see a rough shape of my leather folded where it should be before I cut and my leather is really stiff, can I case the leather and that cut it? Or is there a way to soften the leather? I can't use oil because I have to case it to stamp it later.

[Rahere]

Draft it in cardboard and use that as a template. Never cut cased leather, because it stretches and your nice straight lines will turn out to be indented curves.

[Dwight]

I have successfully cut wet leather . . . just make sure the edge will somehow not make any super difference.

That would be if that edge were sewn over another . . . or braided . . . or sanded . . . 

But the best idea is to make a template . . . get your size and dimensions that way  . . . it's good and good for you.

May God bless,

Dwight

[zuludog]

Yes, make a mock - up from cardboard or thin card like breakfast cereal packets; tape/glue/staple the pieces together. This will show you -

What the finished article will look like, and the sequence of construction

Then you can make patterns/templates from flat card and fiddle about with these to make the best use of your leather

[Rahere]

I'm applying KISS because he's a beginner, bruv.

Other useful techniques are to raid the haberdashery, for some of their special markers which fade in the light or wash out (test them on a scrap corner first), or to use a scratcher awl to mark out. L20'll be needing that to lay his tooling out anyway, before going in with the knife and punches, so he might as well start there!

[Leather20]

23 hours ago, Rahere said:

Draft it in cardboard and use that as a template. Never cut cased leather, because it stretches and your nice straight lines will turn out to be indented curves.

I've drafted on cardboard before however I've had issues with it fitting things properly. How can I make sure it fits? Leather bends differently than cardboard.

[Rahere]

It depends whether these are static folds or active ones.

By that, I mean we often put a fold in and glue it down, or fix it in some way: That's going nowhere, it's static.
However, talking of a folder, I suspect you're talking a cover or something, which'll be forever folded open and closed, active.

To deal with the first, you'll likely thin out the inside of the crease line to a width of roughly twice the thickness of the leather using a plough, or skiver, so when you fold the flesh sides together, you have a good surface over that part of the join: there's a sticky on here for the raw ends, although many would simply cut them as two parths and treat all the sides, si it looks consistent.

The second deals with an issue called, in sewing, "turn of the cloth", where you have to take the thickness of the leather into account. It you thin it down too much, the weight of the surfaces could tear them away, but at the same time you're dealing with a fairly thick piece, it sounds like. I'd suggest thinning the fold down still, maybe to 2-3mm, and getting some neats foot oil into it from the inside, although it could likely discolour the surface. Another approach would be to use a different, softer leather completely for the hinge, sewn both sides, so your thick tooling surfaces are like the end boards of a hardback book, and the contrast like the spine. Skive the edge of it down to a millimeter (I'd go less, but it's good exercise in presision cutting - the idea of a skife (OK, I'm old school) Is to shave razor thins away, not huge chunks, which make even slopes hard. Then glue, clamp and, when dry, sew,.

Of course, there's nothing stopping you gluing or taping your cardboard to thinkness! Double-sided carpet tape's cheap. In a way, what gives is we tend to think automatically in 3 dimensions, from experience.

Edited August 22, 2020 by Rahere

[Leather20]

1 hour ago, Rahere said:

It depends whether these are static folds or active ones.

By that, I mean we often put a fold in and glue it down, or fix it in some way: That's going nowhere, it's static.
However, talking of a folder, I suspect you're talking a cover or something, which'll be forever folded open and closed, active.

To deal with the first, you'll likely thin out the inside of the crease line to a width of roughly twice the thickness of the leather using a plough, or skiver, so when you fold the flesh sides together, you have a good surface over that part of the join: there's a sticky on here for the raw ends, although many would simply cut them as two parths and treat all the sides, si it looks consistent.

The second deals with an issue called, in sewing, "turn of the cloth", where you have to take the thickness of the leather into account. It you thin it down too much, the weight of the surfaces could tear them away, but at the same time you're dealing with a fairly thick piece, it sounds like. I'd suggest thinning the fold down still, maybe to 2-3mm, and getting some neats foot oil into it from the inside, although it could likely discolour the surface. Another approach would be to use a different, softer leather completely for the hinge, sewn both sides, so your thick tooling surfaces are like the end boards of a hardback book, and the contrast like the spine. Skive the edge of it down to a millimeter (I'd go less, but it's good exercise in presision cutting - the idea of a skife (OK, I'm old school) Is to shave razor thins away, not huge chunks, which make even slopes hard. Then glue, clamp and, when dry, sew,.

Of course, there's nothing stopping you gluing or taping your cardboard to thinkness! Double-sided carpet tape's cheap. In a way, what gives is we tend to think automatically in 3 dimensions, from experience.

Thanks, I'm trying to make a phone holster. I made one and I did it by eyeing the leather and how it bends first. Then I took measurements and then I made a pattern. It came out well (See picture). I'm making a different style with slightly heavier leather which seems extremely stiff so I'm not even sure how well it will form. I also haven't used a skiver before (I don't have one) but I have a V-cutter for folds. It doesn't cut uniformly (not sure if that is my technique or a problem with the V-cutter) so I don't use it very often. I just try to do as much by wet forming as I can.

[RockyAussie]

9 hours ago, Leather20 said:

Leather bends differently than cardboard.

Very true and not all leathers will bend the same either due sometimes from what part of the hide it is cut from and a whole lot of other things. One rule I almost always do is to cut myself a strip about 3/4" to an inch wide from the same leather and place it over the curves and  trim to size. That gives me a ruler measurement to go from then which I normally just put into my cad program to finish the rest of the design.

[Rahere]

With the exception of the strap, those are static folds, so go for it. In my day, it was a scientific calculator! Slow and steady is the secret, and keep the machine in a plastic pouch to keep all water out!

What you use to cut with is almost immaterial at this point, I'd just go for light shaves, though.

Edited August 23, 2020 by Rahere

[Rahere]

One thought on the stitching. Where you have a single "mouth" like that, there's slighlty more strain on the top ends of the stitching, so start a short distance down and sew up to the corner, before reversing, oversewing those few stitches and then continuing normally.

As far as the V-cutter's concerned, if it's not cutting evenly, it needs sharpening.