No wonder leather costs so much. Watching you go through the process has definitely made me more aware of how much effort goes into home-tanning and just how many things can go wrong.
Yeah and why there is so much mechanization in the tanning industry. Fleshing machines, tanning drums, pumps, staking machines, splitters, compression rollers Even so, good leather is expensive and all kinds of things can go wrong, not the least of which is the quality of the hide stock you start with. It also shows the temptation to take short cuts, which is why we have quite a bit of affordable leather that is really crappy.
you heard me telling you to put water in the jar and shake it up to get more of the egg yolks out. also when you rinsed the blender container out that made me happy. i hate it when people waste stuff like that.
This is cool- I didn’t realize you could fat liquor after veg tanning to soften, but it makes sense. Will you still employ your “triple dip”? I know this probably wouldn’t work on cow hides- but would it work on buckskin?
Fat liquoring is commonly used wherever you want skins well lubricated for softening. Not that it can't have other uses, but that is most common I think and that's how I use it. By triple dip, if you mean in and out of the fatliquor three times, no. I just don't think it's necessary. I dried the stuff in twice in the hides I stretched out to dry and once followed by a second dip for the other two. I will also be doing some oiling this morning as I soften them. Probably just light oiling on the grain side. Since veg tan is already so open and different than a skin that is being braintanned, the stuff goes in to the fiber easily, especially on the second dip when it's dry. So you can't really equate the two processes. They are sort of backward of each other, unless the skins are thoroughly pre-smoked for braintanning, which is similar to veg tan followed by oiling.
@@SkillCult did you video any of the softening? Curious to see how you do it. Not that it’s rocket science - I just like seeing the different methods 🤓
What do you think of applying the blended egg-yolk / oil / water mixture from the blender directly to a hide - how would that compare do you think to the fat liquor bath (this video)?
That could be fine. keep the goal in mind, penetration and coating of the fibers. A thick solution on a wet hide might not do that. but it might. More likely if the hide is not saturated. braintanned hides are often treated that way and the material dried in. drying in is a good idea either way. You could also apply it, then throw it in a tub add some warm water and knead it around. I find this works pretty well. You don't need to over fatliqour it. more is not necessarily better. also, at some point if the material is thick, you want to get the surface rinsed off before softening.
I will probably never tan hides but this is really interesting. There used to be a tanning mill in a local town and I had relatives that worked there. My great-uncle gave me a bunch of leather from there. I am sure you thought of this but wouldn't a couple of old washing machines make the process easier? In my town, you can pick them up for free from the local public trash-recycling center. Are you just trying to keep it traditional?
I am not really opposed to using washers. They would only save so much work though. Mechanical fleshing would make a huge difference. So would a mechanical way to shred bark.
anywhere for a few days to a few months. Depends on how well prepared the hide is, what species, how thick, how much you move it, how strong the bark is etc. If you want it to go fast, move it a lot, and keep the strength of the solution high enough.
wow, I really feel a strong urge to source a cattle hide. That's absolutely gorgeous! How did your hands feel after moving the skins around in the fat liquour? I guess it would be great for conditioning the skins on our hands just like it does on leather?
Yep, fatliquor is pretty good on your skin. I think a most hair and skin conditioners are made with emulsification. Having a big chunk of quality veg tan cattle skin to make stuff like sheaths and belts is pretty awesome :)
I don't guess I've ever seen you or anyone else do fatliquor quite like that. I took Woniya's online class and she made something more the consistency of buckskin dressing to use on her bark tan. Is the higher ratio of oil and yolk typical when you fatliquor veg tan or were you just using up what you had on hand? Thanks for the video, always something new and interesting :)
I don't know what you mean by consistency of buckskin dressing. Normally I'd use a lot less eggs, but I just want to move some out of the freezer and all those were already thawed. As far as amount of oil, it's a lot of hides and I don't measure anything and just dumped a bunch in. At some point I thought that was a lot of oil and hoped it wasn't too much. The skins are not in the least greasy though and are nicely lubricated. I'm working on them right now. It is a lot of oil but a lot of it is still in the solution there. I've also tossed in a couple extra hides that were knocking around, and may put even more in still. If you are wondering why it hasn't gone bad, it's the tannin. It still doesn't smell or anything and it must be over a week now.
@@SkillCultsorry I wasn't clear but you answered my question, thanks. It's been a minute, I'll go back and look at your and Tamara's book about the buckskin dressing. That's crazy that small amount of tannin has preserved 15 gallons of weak mayonnaise in the heat I'm sure you're getting.
@@quintond.7888 somewhere in the buckskin book I talk about tannin preserving brain solutions, which I had just figured out while writing the book. You can also use the smoking skirts soaked in there to preserve them.
So do you only use egg yolks say for brain tanning a hide, or is it okay to use the whole egg.. yolk and whites? Cause I always use the whole egg and wondered
I've only used the yolks and they aren't hard to separate. I don't think there is anything useful in the whites, but otherwise, if it works I guess you could tell me if it matters :)
@@SkillCult well I still have a hard time getting the hides to come out buttery soft so idk really..I'm doing some with just yolks and olive oil now so hoping maybe it will make them softer this time around! Do you think putting hides in the eggs dry is worth the trouble or is damping back and wringing the way to go..also why don't you ever do any braintan videos?
@@glennwilck5459 Putting the skins in dry can make a big difference. You have to get oil in the hide somehow. There are other ways to do it, but if you are using a solution and the skin is full of water when you put it in the solution, there is going to be less penetration. It isn't necessary if you are doing other stuff, but I think a good approach is to put it in once, dry them hanging without rinsing, then put back dry to soak. You can repeat that if you want, drying in and resoaking, but once dry is probably good enough, though the richness of the fat liquor must be a factor. You can also add a little more oil as you finish the skins. And some skins will just not want to be buttery soft. Skins have different characters and everything from age, diet, species, variety, health, season, beamhouse operations (or lack of), water, tanning material, and tanning method can have its effect. AFTER all that, we have lubrication and working. But if you want them very soft, making sure the fibers are well, deeply and evenly lubed with a light oil and then working a lot will get you as far as you can get. Cabling can be used to really work the skins up hard if you are trying to break them to a maximum degree. I just don't braintan anymore. I'm more intersested in veg tanning and barely find time for that.
Interesting. I wonder if soy lecithin would be a viable substitute to eggs in this process? I like using it for braintan since it doesn't seem to gunk up as much as egg yolks. One drawback is cost and availability. Eggs are more or less free and available if you raise your own.
Lots of people use lecithin for softening braintan. I don't usually use stuff I can't make or gather. Closest is probably iron for dyeing, or vegetable oils. It works, just not my style and eggs are cheap and ubiquitous.
3 роки тому
That could help on making vegan leather... Oh, wait!
I'm using tan oak, but it has a pretty limited range. there are oaks everywhere that are preferred for tanning. You can probably get away with any oak, but look for what people used in your area. I have a video on that ua-cam.com/video/gbD2h3g0_Nc/v-deo.html
@@rayflowers9097 I'm not really familiar, but if it is in an arid area, look for a plant called sand dock or tanners dock, aka Canaigre. also, if there is mesquite, check out the info on mesquite in my blog post linked in the video on tanning materials. That's what comes to mind immediately, you may also have a species of sumac there.
No wonder leather costs so much. Watching you go through the process has definitely made me more aware of how much effort goes into home-tanning and just how many things can go wrong.
Yeah and why there is so much mechanization in the tanning industry. Fleshing machines, tanning drums, pumps, staking machines, splitters, compression rollers Even so, good leather is expensive and all kinds of things can go wrong, not the least of which is the quality of the hide stock you start with. It also shows the temptation to take short cuts, which is why we have quite a bit of affordable leather that is really crappy.
Nothing like a skillcult Saturday morning
you heard me telling you to put water in the jar and shake it up to get more of the egg yolks out. also when you rinsed the blender container out that made me happy. i hate it when people waste stuff like that.
You sir are a goldmine of info.
That sheepskin leather looks wonderful
Just wait til it's done ;)
Nice vlog, thank you.
great vid as always i missed the premier sadly
I've really been enjoying this series. Cool stuff
Thanks, very helpful video!
Nice looking material!
This is cool- I didn’t realize you could fat liquor after veg tanning to soften, but it makes sense. Will you still employ your “triple dip”?
I know this probably wouldn’t work on cow hides- but would it work on buckskin?
Fat liquoring is commonly used wherever you want skins well lubricated for softening. Not that it can't have other uses, but that is most common I think and that's how I use it. By triple dip, if you mean in and out of the fatliquor three times, no. I just don't think it's necessary. I dried the stuff in twice in the hides I stretched out to dry and once followed by a second dip for the other two. I will also be doing some oiling this morning as I soften them. Probably just light oiling on the grain side. Since veg tan is already so open and different than a skin that is being braintanned, the stuff goes in to the fiber easily, especially on the second dip when it's dry. So you can't really equate the two processes. They are sort of backward of each other, unless the skins are thoroughly pre-smoked for braintanning, which is similar to veg tan followed by oiling.
@@SkillCult did you video any of the softening? Curious to see how you do it. Not that it’s rocket science - I just like seeing the different methods 🤓
What do you think of applying the blended egg-yolk / oil / water mixture from the blender directly to a hide - how would that compare do you think to the fat liquor bath (this video)?
That could be fine. keep the goal in mind, penetration and coating of the fibers. A thick solution on a wet hide might not do that. but it might. More likely if the hide is not saturated. braintanned hides are often treated that way and the material dried in. drying in is a good idea either way. You could also apply it, then throw it in a tub add some warm water and knead it around. I find this works pretty well. You don't need to over fatliqour it. more is not necessarily better. also, at some point if the material is thick, you want to get the surface rinsed off before softening.
I will probably never tan hides but this is really interesting. There used to be a tanning mill in a local town and I had relatives that worked there. My great-uncle gave me a bunch of leather from there. I am sure you thought of this but wouldn't a couple of old washing machines make the process easier? In my town, you can pick them up for free from the local public trash-recycling center. Are you just trying to keep it traditional?
I am not really opposed to using washers. They would only save so much work though. Mechanical fleshing would make a huge difference. So would a mechanical way to shred bark.
@@SkillCult It would not be hard to build a bark shredder. Need rotating drums with teeth. Actually, You can buy a wood chipper.
How long do you have to soak the hide in the tree barks solution?
anywhere for a few days to a few months. Depends on how well prepared the hide is, what species, how thick, how much you move it, how strong the bark is etc. If you want it to go fast, move it a lot, and keep the strength of the solution high enough.
wow, I really feel a strong urge to source a cattle hide. That's absolutely gorgeous! How did your hands feel after moving the skins around in the fat liquour? I guess it would be great for conditioning the skins on our hands just like it does on leather?
Yep, fatliquor is pretty good on your skin. I think a most hair and skin conditioners are made with emulsification. Having a big chunk of quality veg tan cattle skin to make stuff like sheaths and belts is pretty awesome :)
Do you think you could patch your board with maybe epoxy or another filler that is more suitable for "xyz" reasons?
No, I just need to make a new one. that wood is trashed and there is nothing special about it.
@@SkillCult you must run a similar philosophy; "as long as it's an inconvenience it will eventually get done"
I don't guess I've ever seen you or anyone else do fatliquor quite like that. I took Woniya's online class and she made something more the consistency of buckskin dressing to use on her bark tan. Is the higher ratio of oil and yolk typical when you fatliquor veg tan or were you just using up what you had on hand? Thanks for the video, always something new and interesting :)
I don't know what you mean by consistency of buckskin dressing. Normally I'd use a lot less eggs, but I just want to move some out of the freezer and all those were already thawed. As far as amount of oil, it's a lot of hides and I don't measure anything and just dumped a bunch in. At some point I thought that was a lot of oil and hoped it wasn't too much. The skins are not in the least greasy though and are nicely lubricated. I'm working on them right now. It is a lot of oil but a lot of it is still in the solution there. I've also tossed in a couple extra hides that were knocking around, and may put even more in still. If you are wondering why it hasn't gone bad, it's the tannin. It still doesn't smell or anything and it must be over a week now.
@@SkillCultsorry I wasn't clear but you answered my question, thanks. It's been a minute, I'll go back and look at your and Tamara's book about the buckskin dressing. That's crazy that small amount of tannin has preserved 15 gallons of weak mayonnaise in the heat I'm sure you're getting.
@@quintond.7888 somewhere in the buckskin book I talk about tannin preserving brain solutions, which I had just figured out while writing the book. You can also use the smoking skirts soaked in there to preserve them.
So do you only use egg yolks say for brain tanning a hide, or is it okay to use the whole egg.. yolk and whites? Cause I always use the whole egg and wondered
I've only used the yolks and they aren't hard to separate. I don't think there is anything useful in the whites, but otherwise, if it works I guess you could tell me if it matters :)
@@SkillCult well I still have a hard time getting the hides to come out buttery soft so idk really..I'm doing some with just yolks and olive oil now so hoping maybe it will make them softer this time around! Do you think putting hides in the eggs dry is worth the trouble or is damping back and wringing the way to go..also why don't you ever do any braintan videos?
@@glennwilck5459 Putting the skins in dry can make a big difference. You have to get oil in the hide somehow. There are other ways to do it, but if you are using a solution and the skin is full of water when you put it in the solution, there is going to be less penetration. It isn't necessary if you are doing other stuff, but I think a good approach is to put it in once, dry them hanging without rinsing, then put back dry to soak. You can repeat that if you want, drying in and resoaking, but once dry is probably good enough, though the richness of the fat liquor must be a factor. You can also add a little more oil as you finish the skins. And some skins will just not want to be buttery soft. Skins have different characters and everything from age, diet, species, variety, health, season, beamhouse operations (or lack of), water, tanning material, and tanning method can have its effect. AFTER all that, we have lubrication and working. But if you want them very soft, making sure the fibers are well, deeply and evenly lubed with a light oil and then working a lot will get you as far as you can get. Cabling can be used to really work the skins up hard if you are trying to break them to a maximum degree. I just don't braintan anymore. I'm more intersested in veg tanning and barely find time for that.
👀 I might taste my liquor 😂
you'll probably only do it once ;)
Interesting. I wonder if soy lecithin would be a viable substitute to eggs in this process? I like using it for braintan since it doesn't seem to gunk up as much as egg yolks. One drawback is cost and availability. Eggs are more or less free and available if you raise your own.
I use soy lecithin as a substitute for eggs for softening bark tans.
Lots of people use lecithin for softening braintan. I don't usually use stuff I can't make or gather. Closest is probably iron for dyeing, or vegetable oils. It works, just not my style and eggs are cheap and ubiquitous.
That could help on making vegan leather... Oh, wait!
@ haha :D
@ Resists tempation to continue vegan jokes...
Sent you an insta DM regarding the last scions sent out. Much appreciated!
What kind of oak are you using for your liquor?
I'm using tan oak, but it has a pretty limited range. there are oaks everywhere that are preferred for tanning. You can probably get away with any oak, but look for what people used in your area. I have a video on that ua-cam.com/video/gbD2h3g0_Nc/v-deo.html
@@SkillCult thanks bud I'll follow up on that if I'm able to start anything. I'll always give credit where it's due.
@@rayflowers9097 Where region are you in?
@@SkillCult Houston tx to refine your question some if that helps
@@rayflowers9097 I'm not really familiar, but if it is in an arid area, look for a plant called sand dock or tanners dock, aka Canaigre. also, if there is mesquite, check out the info on mesquite in my blog post linked in the video on tanning materials. That's what comes to mind immediately, you may also have a species of sumac there.