04-03-2007, 02:33 AM
Slave,
I used basic soak and mold method below. The leather did not fall apart when wet, it just became more flexible. Once it dried, it is much harder and held it's shape well. I would imagine painting it with some ancient equivalent of water proofing would be ideal.
There's multiple was to shape and harden leather so it keeps it's shape; this site has pretty much all of them:
[url:tt9xd80u]http://www.personal.utulsa.edu/~marc-carlson/leather/hl.html[/url]
I used basic soak and mold method below. The leather did not fall apart when wet, it just became more flexible. Once it dried, it is much harder and held it's shape well. I would imagine painting it with some ancient equivalent of water proofing would be ideal.
Quote:The first, and the easiest, is to soak the leather in cold water (as long as you want to, suggestions range from 15 minutes to 12 hours or longer) then form it and let it dry. This may not seem all that great, but if you've seen a vambrace after it's been sweated into after a summer, you know it can harden up quite a bit. If you tool the leather while it is wet, you will make it even harder.
Soaking leather to make it harder is really more appropriate for vegetable tanned leather.
Some people have suggested soaking the leather in lye or urine, but I have no idea if these actually work any differently than using normal water.
There's multiple was to shape and harden leather so it keeps it's shape; this site has pretty much all of them:
[url:tt9xd80u]http://www.personal.utulsa.edu/~marc-carlson/leather/hl.html[/url]
Vale!
Antonivs Marivs Congianocvs
aka_ANTH0NY_C0NGIAN0
My ancient coin collection:
[url:3lgwsbe7]http://www.congiano.com/MyCoins/index.htm[/url]
Antonivs Marivs Congianocvs
aka_ANTH0NY_C0NGIAN0
My ancient coin collection:
[url:3lgwsbe7]http://www.congiano.com/MyCoins/index.htm[/url]