Any ideas for leather handle treatment??

B

Blades

Joined
Oct 5, 1998
Messages
3,151
Need alittle help. I'm cleaning and sharpening an old knife for some friends. It has a stacked leather handle. What can I use on the leather?? It is dried out and needs to be treated with something, or maybe it doesn't. I'm not sure either way, thats why I'm asking.
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Thanks for the help.


Blades
 
I'd use either leatherfat or leatherwax. If you use the fat, apply a good coat and let it be until the leather can't soak more of it - then gently buff by hand using a rag ( or that ugly tie you got for x-mas - at least I did ).This should be done whenever the leather looks like it needs it. If you plan on glueing the leather, that has to be done before applying the fat.
 
First off, do you/they care about the color?
If you do, then I would use some lexol leather conditioner, or some bick 4. Both will renew the leather and make it resist water without darkening it any.Just soak as much in as you can.
If you don't care about color. I would use neatsfoot oil. This would be a more long term fix. It is made out of the natural oils that are in leather to begin with. Its pretty thin and will really penetrate the handle. I put it on my work boots to make them more water proof and it lasts about a year.
Both ways will soften the handle and make it more grippy than dried out slippery leather.Leaving it dry will lead to it cracking and falling apart too.

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Fix it right the first time, use Baling Wire !
 
Blades,

I just made a handle that was part leather, part antler. I used Kiwi Camp Dry to finish the handle and the sheath. The Camp Dry is mostly natural beeswax with some lanolin. I picked it up at Walmart after reading about a leather treatment that can be made from either beeswax and parafin or beeswax and neatsfoot oil.(I guess I was too lazy to melt and mix the other stuff.
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The directions call for you to heat the leather item you are treating. This will open the pores and allow the treatment to penetrate more deeply. The Camp Dry does darken the leather some. So far it seems to have worked as well as any of the other wax-based leather finishes I have used. If the knife is used often, the owner will want to reapply the Camp Dry every few months.

Good luck and have fun!
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Travis Autry
My knives are just like rabbits---they keep multiplying!!
 
Strip or sand(lightly!) to remove crud, then apply or dip handle in Thompsons water seal. worked wonders on my Kabar!

-Redleg out.

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"Blessed is the Lord my rock, who trains my hands for war, and my fingers for battle..." excerpted from Psalms 144.
 
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