Stiffening the 1211 leather sheath

B

Brad "the butcher"

Joined
Dec 15, 2008
Messages
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Hi everyone

I have had the 1211 stacked leather classic for a few years now but have never really carried or used it much with all the others in the drawer and cabinet. My heavy bowie has seen a lot more use. I have decided to put it into rotation this year.

Went for a nice long dayhike on sunday with it along on my belt. Made a fire for tea and lipton soup to keep the wife happy, it was a little cold and windy at the top of the hill.

I did not feel that the leather sheath was stiff enough, malleable enough to fold at the tip and have it come through the sheath on a fall or sitting down wrong.

So I sat down this afternoon between studies with a tin of sno-seal and went to town on the sheath to make it coir de'boie (misspelled fancy french name for leather armour)

Applied a heavy coat to all areas and slathered the blade to do the inside of the sheath. Then a 1 minute steam bath directly over the kettle spout. I did this 3 times and the leather is darker and a great deal thicker, it will not fold or bend without a good amount of pressure and the edge of the sheath outside the stitching is extremely hard now.
The blade can be drawn and sheathed easier as well, the stacked leather handle won't even take a dent from my thumbnail.

I like it, it feels sturdier and safer, has anyone else done similar?
 
Brad,

You don't happen to have a pictire of the final products do you?

Wonder if that would work on a pair of soulier de boeuf?
 
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I have done the same thing, except I have used Obenauf's Heavy Duty LP. It's a beeswax/propolis product. SNO-SEAL also contains beeswax.
 
I've done this using either sno-seal or Obenhauf's (my preference, it is from Idaho after all) and any controllable heat source (hair dryer, heat gun, oven) but they're all dry heat; curious if steam yields a different result.
 
It sounds like a variation on heating the leather to a temperature below where it will start to break down and dipping it in melted wax, (either paraffin, or Bee's wax or a combination) until it won't take in anymore wax. This has become an alternative for making leather armor. You can also dip leather in boiling water and it will turn shoe sole hard after it dries.
Personally I'm going to try the Obenhauf's on a bad sheath I got in a previous trade, because this does sound promising and less of a chance of a screw up.
 
I heard of the boiling water method to harden leather, so I stuck the handle of my KA-BAR under piping hot (running) water for around a minute. :D

I had previously dyed the handle with Fiebings Leather Dye - Dark Brown.

Once the water evaporated from the leather, the handle started to get quite hard. After 30 minutes it was ready to handle.

The harder leather resists dents better. When it softens up again, I'll repeat the process.
 
I tried impregnating a replacement sheath with Obenhauf's heavy duty LP, (my favorite boot treatment) the other day. I pre-heated the leather under a heat lamp and applied the paste by hand. The first application I used the steam to help the treatment to penetrate the leather. I didn't like the amount of water I was toweling off the sheath so I used the heat lamp to further applications.
After six applications of the Obenhauf's I stopped. While the heavy duty is a paste that when you open the jar seems very much like shoe wax in consistency it also has a lot of oils in the mix. I didn't see the additional applications as making the leather any stiffer and I was beginning to become concerned that the leather was getting saturated with oils. This is not something I believe to be good for leather. At this point the sheath is still stiff enough to function properly for it's designed intent. Also I'm sure it will be repelling water like a piece of rubber for a while now.
As far as stiffening the leather I'm going to explore a different approach.
 
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