Leather wrinkling after dying.

[nuki]

Very new here and I appreciate this forum, thanks for all the information!

So I have done googling and searching here but I am not sure how to explain it, but.my leather has wrinkles after dying. I have attempted a few times all using different methods I read about. I am just experimenting at this point and trying to learn from mistakes which there are a lot of. I tried different variations of pretreating with neatsfoot, wetting before dying, full strength, cut, etc. But every time the results are wrinkly/creased/wavy.

I am trying to figure out why this is happening.

Thank you all for your help!

[AzShooter]

You might try a conditioner like Leather Rejuvenater.  I picked some up at Tandy when my leather was cracking.  I first used Neatsfoot Oil and then the Rejuvenater.  Hopefully this will help you.

 

[Dwight]

Couple of questions:

1.  Where did you get the leather?

2.  When you bought it . . .  did it by any chance say "belly leather"?

3.  Were there any other descriptive words about the leather when you got it?

May God bless,

Dwight

[JLSleather]

That's a LEATHER issue, not a dye issue.  Don't give that supplier ANY more of your money.

You want to work with leather, get good leather.  I recommend Cheryl and Carlos at Goliger Leather.  Never got a piece of leather from there that wasn't TOP SHELF... ALWAYS satisfied with what they send.

[nuki]

18 hours ago, Dwight said:

Couple of questions:

1.  Where did you get the leather?

2.  When you bought it . . .  did it by any chance say "belly leather"?

3.  Were there any other descriptive words about the leather when you got it?

May God bless,

Dwight

It was the Tandy heavyweight strips. I've been trying to stay with the same brand tfor consistencies sake since I'm practicing a lot. Plus they're local. 

Thank you for your reply!

 

[AzShooter]

Bring it into your Tandy.  They may just replace the leather for you. Here's a hint, if the manager doesn't help you ask for the district manager's phone number.  Go up the line until you get satisfaction.

Tandy is one of the best companies for taking care of their customers.  

[MtlBiker]

@Niki - I may be experiencing something similar to what you are...  I don't have a lot of experience with leather yet, but I've had no problem dyeing some 5-6 oz veg tan on the few projects I've done.  But I just tried with some 3.5-4 oz veg tan and after cutting out my pattern I used a damp sponge to apply Eco-Flo leather dye... the same dye I've used without problem earlier.  And as the pieces of leather were drying they curled completely out of shape.

Since this hadn't happened before with thicker leather I suspect either bad leather as was suggested to you, or something I did wrong when dyeing thinner veg tan.

 

[Ed in Tx]

7 hours ago, MtlBiker said:

@Niki - I may be experiencing something similar to what you are...  I don't have a lot of experience with leather yet, but I've had no problem dyeing some 5-6 oz veg tan on the few projects I've done.  But I just tried with some 3.5-4 oz veg tan and after cutting out my pattern I used a damp sponge to apply Eco-Flo leather dye... the same dye I've used without problem earlier.  And as the pieces of leather were drying they curled completely out of shape.

Since this hadn't happened before with thicker leather I suspect either bad leather as was suggested to you, or something I did wrong when dyeing thinner veg tan.

 

Having light weight leather curl like that isn't unusual. The easy fix is a light spray of plain water and place the item on a flat surface and cover it with something else flat with a little weight.

I use counter top samples of granite or marble that are about 4" x 6" or even a 12 x 12 marble tile. The other users problem is buying leather from Tandy. As mentioned bellies are not the best part of the hide, the fiber density decreases and you get separation of the upper layer.