Thread: Buffed surface for leather. DIY?

I bought a few of the horse butt strips from Hand American. Enough to hopefully make a strop or two for myself and maybe an extra. Of course there is the "smooth side" and the "rough side".

I'm assuming the "rough" side is the side used when horsehide is buffed with a velvet finish?

I've never tried a pumice stone as it would seem to be that I would not get a perfectly even buffed surface. I recall someone had used a wood plane to shave off a small amount of the surface to get such a finish.

My ultimate question is, since I'm not going to go into the strop business....can such a nice velvet even finish be attained by using home tools or is such a finish achieved only by skilled artisans like Tony?

I could fashion these few strops using the smooth side to strop, but I have a buffed horsehide strop from Kenrup and I'm addicted to the velvet finish for stropping.

Thanks

Chris L

Since you are not going into the strop business, I let you know. It is the smooth side that is made into the suede side in reality it is technically making it "corrected leather", I use a sander with 150 grit paper to smooth out the leather and to raise a nap for the suede. Splitting the leather or making true suede is taking off the epidermis side of the leather and just leaving the dermis and hypodermis. I wouldn't want to risk horsehide to a hand plane to split it. I would use a regular skiverner to shave off the rough side. You can press the off side to smooth it out, skivening is hard work.

Originally Posted by Chrisl

I bought a few of the horse butt strips from Hand American. Enough to hopefully make a strop or two for myself and maybe an extra. Of course there is the "smooth side" and the "rough side".

I'm assuming the "rough" side is the side used when horsehide is buffed with a velvet finish?

I've never tried a pumice stone as it would seem to be that I would not get a perfectly even buffed surface. I recall someone had used a wood plane to shave off a small amount of the surface to get such a finish.

My ultimate question is, since I'm not going to go into the strop business....can such a nice velvet even finish be attained by using home tools or is such a finish achieved only by skilled artisans like Tony?

I could fashion these few strops using the smooth side to strop, but I have a buffed horsehide strop from Kenrup and I'm addicted to the velvet finish for stropping.

Thanks

Chris L

Originally Posted by Kenrup

Since you are not going into the strop business, I let you know. It is the smooth side that is made into the suede side in reality it is technically making it "corrected leather", I use a sander with 150 grit paper to smooth out the leather and to raise a nap for the suede. Splitting the leather or making true suede is taking off the epidermis side of the leather and just leaving the dermis and hypodermis. I wouldn't want to risk horsehide to a hand plane to split it. I would use a regular skiverner to shave off the rough side. You can press the off side to smooth it out, skivening is hard work.

Thanks for the info, Ken. I appreciate your willingness to share it. Rest assured I will not be going into the strop business. I ordered two horse butt strips from Hand American (I didn't realize they were approx 5' long) and was given three due to a huge delay from order placed to order received. I'd say it's enough leather though to possibly make 7-8 strops 2.5" wide x 24" long.

I tried an experiment tonight in the workshop which gave me a new found respect for you and for Tony. From the time I started cutting one 2.5"x24" piece of horse butt and a piece of the nice Hand American stropping felt to the same size and finished my experiment.......3 1/2 hours and I'm not done with the first strop!

Here's my experiment. I took 400 grit sandpaper dry and put it on a 10" flat sanding block. I decided to sand the "flesh" side and the "grain" side of the same strip. Tons of sanding all by hand; literally hours worth. Now, the grain side is beautiful and silky smooth. And, the flesh side has a uniform light nap almost identical to the nubuck type finish my old Dovo Xtra wide strop did. Velvety. That strip of leather is thin, but with the stropping felt strip to be able to be grasped together with the leather and act as a backing when not in use for added support when using the leather, I'm sure it will work fine.

I don't know if that was the "right" way to do it and it was very labor intensive, but the end result in texture and uniformity is just what I was looking for.

I'll post pics when it's all finished under the strop area.

Thanks again, Ken.

Chris L

Your welcome, I look forward to seeing your prize!