You are a godsend. So much Information. I read your blog the other day and almost cried when you said we need to be sharing information so we can all learn and not just selling information. It's so true and that's how humans did it for centuries. I'm highly grateful for your time and effort
@@SkillCult if people want the surface level cliff notes...they can go elsewhere, or be patient. but you taking the long road, and taking us along, it better prepares people wanting to follow in your footsteps. keep doing it this way.
Just tested out this method on a lamb I slaughtered recently. After just 3 days hair is slipping with ease even though been quite cool here, 5-7 degrees C/40-45 F, so pretty impressed so far. Very useful method for saving the wool for carting and spinning purposes, A very convenient advantage is how easy it is clean the wool when it is attached to the skin.
@@SkillCult I just mean I thought the video was out but my hopes were dashed when I saw my desire for instant gratification was unfounded and impossible.
@@gmoney6198 I've been playing around with when to hit that schedule button. I've tried doing instant premiers, and advertising 24 hours ahead. I might go to just scheduling right before, so the emails go out, about 20min before it starts. Still figuring it all out.
@@SkillCult you are one of the only RUclipsrs I know to use the premier feature, I don't hold it against you and I love your content it just doesn't seem to have a place on this platform. You are totally entitled to try whatever you want obviously it just doesn't make lots of sense.
I would love to ask your advice on which method of tanning I should use on my sheepskins (wool on) in order to use them for clothing garments? Thanks and appreciate your videos and work
The simplest and most bullet proof will probably be alum tanning, aka tawing. I don't tan sheep skins much. They are weak and I usually tan things with the hair off. If these sheep skins keep coming in, I might continue to mess with refining some kind of bark tanning process. I'm not the guy to ask about getting deep into alum tanning or hair on tanning. This video is mostly about removing the wool.
I’ve only been working with hides for a little over a year. I was given some sheep skin to practice on, and they were SO hard to flesh, I made so many holes- they were meat sheep
@@TJHutchExotics So, things that can help with fleshing are drying the skin, partial tanning in bark, putting in alum and salt. You can't dry sheep skin without fleshing, because they are too fatty and thin and will grease burn. Salting some of the moisture out might help too. I juat took off most of the fat and flesh and threw them in lime and tanning solution, the rest will be done gradually as processing progresses.
@@SkillCult I tanned some sheepskins after they had been salted. About 2 - 3 inches of wool on. Some coloured, some white. I used only natural chemicals. Citric acid, salt, washing soda to neutralise and cleanse, and macadamia oil to moisturise. Then after they had very nearly dried, I broke the hide by laying it flat on a table flesh side up, and pushed the hide away from me with the wide end of a pinch bar. Works like magic. The hide comes up supple and super soft and rumply. To smooth and whiten the flesh side, I sprinkled with cornflour and rubbed with fine sandpaper over a cork sanding block. I fluffed out the wool with a dog comb. They are just beautiful! I hope you try out this method Steven, and make a video for us!
Dehairing this hide looks baaaaaaaaaaaaaaad! But seriously Mr Steven,, great vid! I have a deer hide in lime now and looking forward to the tanning process. Didn't have any hide last year and it seemed something was missing in my autumn, cause it was. Kind Thanks and I still have leather samples tanned with different barks to send,,,,,only a year after I intended. A Fine week to you Steven! DaveyJO
To expand on someone else's question re fleece on tanning... There is lacking an idiots guide to sheepskins...and they're a massive waste resource that I for one would jump on had I time to test and refine a process... Alum looked the easy option. Any thoughts @skillcult
it's going to be best to use something to fix the hair, which is alum or tannin. Not that you can't tan them without either, but it's easier and more foolproof. They represent a few challenges, being fatty, not super easy to flesh, and the skins of wool sheep are typically thin and weak too. With alum or bark, you can throw the skin in when just quickly fleshed and get the hair set and make them easier to mess with to get the flesh off later. I have only messed with a few of them, because they don't represent the best skins I can get easily. I'd rather tan deer and goat, but we'll see if this batch of hides changes my mind. I'm not also thinking I might want to make a sheepskin rug. That is some incentive to deal with them I guess lol. Good wool on sheep skin is nice stuff, so that probably is the way to go. I think they are used in book binding too.
This was an informative and entertaining video for me. Thank you for sharing it. The camera angle was perfect for a casual tanning lesson. Did you achieve it through POV glasses or a chest-mounted camera rig? It was good to be reminded about tossing a freshly skinned hide into a tannin solution as a short term means of preservation and as a method to set hair. So to was the tip about lime pasting just the flesh side. One of the bigger difficulties I had when tanning pig skins was the hairs breaking off flush with the skin rather than being pulled out. In hindsight, I should have used the blunter back edge of my fleshing knife for removing hair, but doing a lime pasting would have helped as well. It's been several years since I've tanned a hide and videos like this help keep me refreshed.
Hey dude, nice to see you around. I use the sony x3000, head mounted on a headaband thing. It's a little tricky getting the angle right and keeping it, but when it works, it does exactly what it was designed for. One thing that can help for pigs is deep fleshing by scraping at higher angles with a sharp tool. more like shaving it, but more like the way a cabinet scraper works. You end up cutting a lot of the hair roots and the hair comes out easier. but yeah, dull tools for dehairing across the board. And using them backwards, to drag the hair out.
Great video, thanks Steven First time I hear of the liming without soaking trick. I might give it a try. I have plenty sheepskins available, and always figured it's useless to dehair them since there are goats in the world, but if the skin is worth anything without the hair it looks like a good way to approach it, especially for skins with bald spots or very filthy wool, and wool-on tanning is really quite a hassle tanning hair-on sheepskin in a tannin bath works fine for me, but people don't seem to like the discoloration. works great for black sheep though. btw I've had thin skins disintegrating completely in lime baths in a week. always in hot weather if I remember correctly. Very inspiring content. I'm looking forward to see what becomes of those skins! Nimrod
"always figured it's useless to dehair them since there are goats in the world" Yeah, my sentiment exactly lol. I was wondering about dyeing the wool black with iron and tannin. Or some other color, other than that weak off-pink from tan bark. I don't recall that kind of damage to hides in lime. It is actually more soluble when cold, so that might be a clue.
Lime is self regulating, so you can't use too much. I actually never measure it. You can use too little of course. It also depends on what form of lime. Lime putty is stronger than dry hydrated lime. If you add 1 pint of dry lime hydrate to a bucket for one skin, that should be enough.
Thanks! Very interesting indeed. But the tanning process is supposed to happen under constant movement, not flipping the skin once a week :D That made me laugh though. We have a big ol barrel with a small motor rotating the whole solution while switched on. (Back in the days it would've been kids)
yeah, I'm not a big fan of suppose to's :) It is remarkable how much procrastinating we can get away with veg tanning, but More's better. I could only introduce occasional stirring if I were using any power because I'm on solar. I'll probably just keep being a flake and having my act together just enough to make things turn out okay lol.
@@SkillCult well, you know, if I'd be in your position I'd not be much better. I have to store those skins in large open containers with stirring equipment next to it otherwise I'd just forget. I don't think connecting it to the solar system would pay off. Maybe I'd have a round drum to put the skins in and attach a mechanism on top to stirr it, like those manual laundry machines. It's more inviting to just give it a spin when you come by and you could put a lid on top
Tanning 4 deer skins now soaking in wood ash..any reason you use lime over wood ash? Should the skins be hair down or up..like does it penetrate the flesh or grain side easier.? Love ur channel man
Wood ash is fine, but it's not very predictable. You can't effectively measure it's strength and it's highly variable. Usually everything penetrates the flesh side easier since the fiber structure is much looser. But the lime is mostly affecting the hair roots, and probably working more than not from the hair side down into the hair roots. Either way, you don't need to worry about it in solutions.
@@glennwilck5459 it can be stronger actually, but more often weaker. It is not really possible to make lime solutions so strong that they ruin the hide rapidly. It will only dissolve to so high a strength. Of course potassium and sodium hydroxides also have limited solubility, but can be made strong enough to ruin the skin. But usually you'll have the opposite problem and often even a batter consistency of any given woodash is not strong enough, so you have to extract and concentrate, either by cooking the liquid down or using the same liquid to leach out two batches of acid. And since it contains more than one hydroxide, probably all three, you can't just measure the specific gravity. Like I said, it's inconvenient and inconsistent and hard to measure by simple means. I think learning your ashes locally and doing the same thing over and over would yield more predictable and reliable results, but age is also a factor...
@@SkillCult thanks..yes this will be my third year with ashes I try to get them fresh out of the stoves. I did ruin one hide last year that I soaked too long and the grain just fell off so easy but the skin also tore very easily. I just try and check them every day and see if hair will slip.. usually about a week. I think I'm getting the feel for it. Soo what if I dressed some hides with eggs but they didn't soften very good like still pretty hard in spots..should I just redress them and resoften? Or will they never resoften?
I have a question and hope you see it. Is there anyway you can test tannin levels without buying a testing kit? I read that commercial tanners use chestnut if I remember correctly at 30% tannin concentrate. I wanted to start testing different batches but the only kit I found was $175
there is actually something called a barkometer. It's just a regular blown glass hydrometer, but graduated for tannin content. You should be able to find one.
@@VanSantHaus www.carltonglass.com/product/barkometer/ kind of expensive. but I found that in a few minutes. Maybe look some more. Also, if you can find a conversion chart, you can use any hydrometer. they have ones for saline and sugar and just regular specific gravity I guess.
You can use other oak barks. Leaves will probably work if you use enough and they have not been rained on, but boil them, then use the water to boil several batches of new leaves to get the concentration up. Better to find some bark
This area is a long time sheep growing region and I've been offered sheep skins and wool too many times to remember. So I don't really see it as super valuable :)
Hey, I am tanning sheepskin hides for 1 year now with alum and salt etc. I am interested in making some leather and I have been trying with 3 lamb hides for now and it is a disaster. I have tried lime soaking with various lime quantity and the hair is not coming off but the skin breaks apart idk why. Last time was only 100g of garden lime for 30l of warm water. I've soaked it for 2 days and the skin is so damages that I can't do anything but throw my hard work. If you all have advises I am taking it, i want to make great stuffs with my handmade leather... I should specify that I am using only natural products, Thanks
Sounds like the wrong kind of lime. Most agricultural limes are ground up dolomite, a limestone containing a lot of magnesium. Using that is pretty much like soaking in plain water. If it is warm, the hide and water could spoil pretty fast. If you are regularly seeing damage to the hide in just a couple of days, that seems too fast, as even plain water soaking should not usually do that. As long as the water is not hot, or kept too warm. For tanning, what you need is hydrated lime. I have a video that explains it. Depending on where you live the name can be different. In the U.S. it is called type S or hydrated lime, or masons lime, or builders lime. Chemical name is calcium hydroxide. ruclips.net/video/2B3y6iZPCzY/видео.html If you can get the right lime, and watch this whole series, you should be able to produce good leather pretty quickly. Once you do it and watch again, you'll understand it all better. Good luck, you'll figure it out :)
@@SkillCult wow first of all I need the thank you because I didn't expect any answer and this fast! I am French I live in France and it was hard for me to get what hydralized lime is, I mean what equivalent I can find in France. Maybe it is the wrong lime that I am getting since beggining. For this I will try to get the exact product that you're mentioning. Here in France Taning is a lost knowledge that is why I am managing to make it survive. We will have Taning industries but most of the hide are send to China to be cleaned and fleshed before... What a waste... Anyway, thank you I will be looking forward your videos.
@@SpellsofLal One time a French woman came over here to learn braintanning. Her name is Sylvie Beries, but I'm not sure if that spelling is correct. She may have published some papers in french on tanning through an institute of paleotechnology or something like that. I know she made a video about tanning reindeer skin in Siberia. You may be able to buy quicklime there, which is the first stage of lime. It boils when you add it to water, and can cause fires if not handled carefully, so it is not sold to just anybody here. If you watch my videos on burning lime, you will understand lime better. ruclips.net/p/PL60FnyEY-eJBTMfy9Bl5QRmBKUAvLLCwp There are small traditional tanneries starting right now. It is becoming a movement, as it should. follow these guys on instagram and you'll find more. @bioleder_pelz_organic_leather @thebushtannery @7leaguesleather @lottasgarfveri @traditional_tanners @billytannery and follow me @ skillcult :)
A bit late to the party but all alkaline solutions attacks keratin, bases dissolve hair, that's why sodium hydroxide is used in shower drains not sulfuric acid, it breaks down hair quite readily.
yes, exactly. While it's slow to really damage hair thoroughly, it's bad enough that you don't want to soak wool you're going to keep in it. It does mess up the skin too, but much more slowly. It's a matter of concentration too. the concentrations used in tanning affect keratin quick enough, but not so hot as to destroy the skin. If you get a solution that is too strong, the skin will be ruined overnight.
@@SkillCult I'm going to try the lime paste method with the icelandic lambs I'm parting out right now. Shearing them is like a MMA match, if I can get the fleece off of them without second cuts it increases the value of the fleece. Sheep are easier to handle when they are dead. When I get the first one done I'll let you know how the fleece turns out urn out .
@@guyspencer4322 Cool, I'm curious how it works for you. If you have a lot, you might try laying them flesh to flesh and stacking instead of folding. I found that I had to wet the flesh side a couple of times, so maybe check it after a day or two and then again after a while. I have a video on types of lime for tanning, if you need that information. Look forward to hearing results.
Why? I'm trying post on a schedule anyway, so I just tell people ahead of time and they can show up and hang out, or not. I would probably post a little earlier if it weren't for premier feature, but not much else would be different.
It only seems awful because we as a culture have been trained to always get everything immediately when we want it, and we feel upset if we have to wait for something. I personally think it is great, because hanging out on premiere chat is always fun and interesting.
@@mihacurk i agree. back in the day before shows being posted on streaming platforms a whole season at once and you end up spending a whole night running through it we used to wait to watch the new episode of our favourite tv series for a whole week. Now we are used to consuming the product as soon as it is ready so some people are getting frustrated that a new video is ready but he has to wait for the premier. The live chat function is the best feature about youtube premier, i hope i will be free today. I am sure the guy is complaining more as a joke not as a serious criticism.
No it's annoying because you get a notification and go to watch the video and it's not available and so you go back to your life and just forget about it and look back and you've missed ever premiere video because you checked on it when it was announced before it was watchable it's just a stupid bad system
You are a godsend. So much Information. I read your blog the other day and almost cried when you said we need to be sharing information so we can all learn and not just selling information. It's so true and that's how humans did it for centuries. I'm highly grateful for your time and effort
Omg! A sheep skin! Great vid, thanks! Nothing else like this out there
I am waiting.
SEE! just like in the slate roof, you're explaining so much! I always wondered WHY you used limewater to dehair a hide! now I know! easy SUB from me!
I rarely give the dummy version :) Some people like it, some complain. Can't make everyone happy.
@@SkillCult if people want the surface level cliff notes...they can go elsewhere, or be patient. but you taking the long road, and taking us along, it better prepares people wanting to follow in your footsteps. keep doing it this way.
whats the pros and cons of tanning with bark compared to a simple tanning solution?
Just tested out this method on a lamb I slaughtered recently. After just 3 days hair is slipping with ease even though been quite cool here, 5-7 degrees C/40-45 F, so pretty impressed so far. Very useful method for saving the wool for carting and spinning purposes, A very convenient advantage is how easy it is clean the wool when it is attached to the skin.
thanks for the feedback. Seems to work well!
Oooooh, yay. Thank you for guiding me to this video. Ok, if I already salted the hide can I still do this process after I wash the salt off?
Yeah, no problem. just wash most of it out and start. You'll be rinsing it many times before it's done.
Another great video, good job!
The premier got my hopes up
I hope that's good? :)
@@SkillCult I just mean I thought the video was out but my hopes were dashed when I saw my desire for instant gratification was unfounded and impossible.
@@gmoney6198 I've been playing around with when to hit that schedule button. I've tried doing instant premiers, and advertising 24 hours ahead. I might go to just scheduling right before, so the emails go out, about 20min before it starts. Still figuring it all out.
@@SkillCult you are one of the only RUclipsrs I know to use the premier feature, I don't hold it against you and I love your content it just doesn't seem to have a place on this platform. You are totally entitled to try whatever you want obviously it just doesn't make lots of sense.
I would love to ask your advice on which method of tanning I should use on my sheepskins (wool on) in order to use them for clothing garments? Thanks and appreciate your videos and work
The simplest and most bullet proof will probably be alum tanning, aka tawing. I don't tan sheep skins much. They are weak and I usually tan things with the hair off. If these sheep skins keep coming in, I might continue to mess with refining some kind of bark tanning process. I'm not the guy to ask about getting deep into alum tanning or hair on tanning. This video is mostly about removing the wool.
I’ve only been working with hides for a little over a year. I was given some sheep skin to practice on, and they were SO hard to flesh, I made so many holes- they were meat sheep
@@TJHutchExotics So, things that can help with fleshing are drying the skin, partial tanning in bark, putting in alum and salt. You can't dry sheep skin without fleshing, because they are too fatty and thin and will grease burn. Salting some of the moisture out might help too. I juat took off most of the fat and flesh and threw them in lime and tanning solution, the rest will be done gradually as processing progresses.
@@SkillCult I tanned some sheepskins after they had been salted. About 2 - 3 inches of wool on. Some coloured, some white.
I used only natural chemicals. Citric acid, salt, washing soda to neutralise and cleanse, and macadamia oil to moisturise.
Then after they had very nearly dried, I broke the hide by laying it flat on a table flesh side up, and pushed the hide away from me with the wide end of a pinch bar. Works like magic. The hide comes up supple and super soft and rumply.
To smooth and whiten the flesh side, I sprinkled with cornflour and rubbed with fine sandpaper over a cork sanding block.
I fluffed out the wool with a dog comb. They are just beautiful!
I hope you try out this method Steven, and make a video for us!
Dehairing this hide looks baaaaaaaaaaaaaaad! But seriously Mr Steven,, great vid! I have a deer hide in lime now and looking forward to the tanning process. Didn't have any hide last year and it seemed something was missing in my autumn, cause it was. Kind Thanks and I still have leather samples tanned with different barks to send,,,,,only a year after I intended. A Fine week to you Steven! DaveyJO
What looks bad is that nasty dirty wool.. I kept about half of it.
Awesome
To expand on someone else's question re fleece on tanning... There is lacking an idiots guide to sheepskins...and they're a massive waste resource that I for one would jump on had I time to test and refine a process... Alum looked the easy option. Any thoughts @skillcult
it's going to be best to use something to fix the hair, which is alum or tannin. Not that you can't tan them without either, but it's easier and more foolproof. They represent a few challenges, being fatty, not super easy to flesh, and the skins of wool sheep are typically thin and weak too. With alum or bark, you can throw the skin in when just quickly fleshed and get the hair set and make them easier to mess with to get the flesh off later. I have only messed with a few of them, because they don't represent the best skins I can get easily. I'd rather tan deer and goat, but we'll see if this batch of hides changes my mind. I'm not also thinking I might want to make a sheepskin rug. That is some incentive to deal with them I guess lol. Good wool on sheep skin is nice stuff, so that probably is the way to go. I think they are used in book binding too.
This was an informative and entertaining video for me. Thank you for sharing it.
The camera angle was perfect for a casual tanning lesson. Did you achieve it through POV glasses or a chest-mounted camera rig?
It was good to be reminded about tossing a freshly skinned hide into a tannin solution as a short term means of preservation and as a method to set hair. So to was the tip about lime pasting just the flesh side. One of the bigger difficulties I had when tanning pig skins was the hairs breaking off flush with the skin rather than being pulled out. In hindsight, I should have used the blunter back edge of my fleshing knife for removing hair, but doing a lime pasting would have helped as well.
It's been several years since I've tanned a hide and videos like this help keep me refreshed.
Hey dude, nice to see you around. I use the sony x3000, head mounted on a headaband thing. It's a little tricky getting the angle right and keeping it, but when it works, it does exactly what it was designed for. One thing that can help for pigs is deep fleshing by scraping at higher angles with a sharp tool. more like shaving it, but more like the way a cabinet scraper works. You end up cutting a lot of the hair roots and the hair comes out easier. but yeah, dull tools for dehairing across the board. And using them backwards, to drag the hair out.
Great video, thanks Steven
First time I hear of the liming without soaking trick. I might give it a try. I have plenty sheepskins available, and always figured it's useless to dehair them since there are goats in the world, but if the skin is worth anything without the hair it looks like a good way to approach it, especially for skins with bald spots or very filthy wool, and wool-on tanning is really quite a hassle
tanning hair-on sheepskin in a tannin bath works fine for me, but people don't seem to like the discoloration. works great for black sheep though.
btw I've had thin skins disintegrating completely in lime baths in a week. always in hot weather if I remember correctly.
Very inspiring content. I'm looking forward to see what becomes of those skins!
Nimrod
"always figured it's useless to dehair them since there are goats in the world" Yeah, my sentiment exactly lol. I was wondering about dyeing the wool black with iron and tannin. Or some other color, other than that weak off-pink from tan bark.
I don't recall that kind of damage to hides in lime. It is actually more soluble when cold, so that might be a clue.
How many line you use to the hair the sheep and do you put salt in the solution
Lime is self regulating, so you can't use too much. I actually never measure it. You can use too little of course. It also depends on what form of lime. Lime putty is stronger than dry hydrated lime. If you add 1 pint of dry lime hydrate to a bucket for one skin, that should be enough.
How long do you keep the sheep skins in the solution before taking them out of the line
Basically until the hair comes out easily. They can stay in longer, but over a long time they will eventually become weakened.
This is a great video!
Do you have any plans to make suade from some of the skins? It could have a ton of uses
No. It is very thin, so by the time the grain is removed there might not be much left. I might play with scraping one of them just to see.
Thanks! Very interesting indeed.
But the tanning process is supposed to happen under constant movement, not flipping the skin once a week :D
That made me laugh though. We have a big ol barrel with a small motor rotating the whole solution while switched on. (Back in the days it would've been kids)
yeah, I'm not a big fan of suppose to's :) It is remarkable how much procrastinating we can get away with veg tanning, but More's better. I could only introduce occasional stirring if I were using any power because I'm on solar. I'll probably just keep being a flake and having my act together just enough to make things turn out okay lol.
@@SkillCult well, you know, if I'd be in your position I'd not be much better.
I have to store those skins in large open containers with stirring equipment next to it otherwise I'd just forget.
I don't think connecting it to the solar system would pay off.
Maybe I'd have a round drum to put the skins in and attach a mechanism on top to stirr it, like those manual laundry machines. It's more inviting to just give it a spin when you come by and you could put a lid on top
I liked it's video . I made just like you...
Tanning 4 deer skins now soaking in wood ash..any reason you use lime over wood ash? Should the skins be hair down or up..like does it penetrate the flesh or grain side easier.? Love ur channel man
Wood ash is fine, but it's not very predictable. You can't effectively measure it's strength and it's highly variable. Usually everything penetrates the flesh side easier since the fiber structure is much looser. But the lime is mostly affecting the hair roots, and probably working more than not from the hair side down into the hair roots. Either way, you don't need to worry about it in solutions.
@@SkillCult do the wood ashes end up weaker than lime? Is it better to mix the solution stronger..as in lots of ash? Thanks for ur expertise
@@glennwilck5459 it can be stronger actually, but more often weaker. It is not really possible to make lime solutions so strong that they ruin the hide rapidly. It will only dissolve to so high a strength. Of course potassium and sodium hydroxides also have limited solubility, but can be made strong enough to ruin the skin. But usually you'll have the opposite problem and often even a batter consistency of any given woodash is not strong enough, so you have to extract and concentrate, either by cooking the liquid down or using the same liquid to leach out two batches of acid. And since it contains more than one hydroxide, probably all three, you can't just measure the specific gravity. Like I said, it's inconvenient and inconsistent and hard to measure by simple means. I think learning your ashes locally and doing the same thing over and over would yield more predictable and reliable results, but age is also a factor...
@@SkillCult thanks..yes this will be my third year with ashes I try to get them fresh out of the stoves. I did ruin one hide last year that I soaked too long and the grain just fell off so easy but the skin also tore very easily. I just try and check them every day and see if hair will slip.. usually about a week. I think I'm getting the feel for it. Soo what if I dressed some hides with eggs but they didn't soften very good like still pretty hard in spots..should I just redress them and resoften? Or will they never resoften?
I have a question and hope you see it. Is there anyway you can test tannin levels without buying a testing kit? I read that commercial tanners use chestnut if I remember correctly at 30% tannin concentrate. I wanted to start testing different batches but the only kit I found was $175
there is actually something called a barkometer. It's just a regular blown glass hydrometer, but graduated for tannin content. You should be able to find one.
braintan.com used to selll them.
@@SkillCult I looked they dont anymore I guess, I also could not find anyone who wells them lol
@@VanSantHaus www.carltonglass.com/product/barkometer/ kind of expensive. but I found that in a few minutes. Maybe look some more. Also, if you can find a conversion chart, you can use any hydrometer. they have ones for saline and sugar and just regular specific gravity I guess.
Do red oak leaves work for tanning? Plenty of those around, but no tan oak
You can use other oak barks. Leaves will probably work if you use enough and they have not been rained on, but boil them, then use the water to boil several batches of new leaves to get the concentration up. Better to find some bark
Look up my videon vegetable tanning materials for more ideas.
@@SkillCult thank you!
As a spinner I definitely had a 'BUT WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH THE WOOL' moment XD
This area is a long time sheep growing region and I've been offered sheep skins and wool too many times to remember. So I don't really see it as super valuable :)
@@SkillCult That's a really good point! Quality fleece makes a big difference in spinning!
Hey,
I am tanning sheepskin hides for 1 year now with alum and salt etc.
I am interested in making some leather and I have been trying with 3 lamb hides for now and it is a disaster. I have tried lime soaking with various lime quantity and the hair is not coming off but the skin breaks apart idk why. Last time was only 100g of garden lime for 30l of warm water. I've soaked it for 2 days and the skin is so damages that I can't do anything but throw my hard work.
If you all have advises I am taking it, i want to make great stuffs with my handmade leather...
I should specify that I am using only natural products,
Thanks
Sounds like the wrong kind of lime. Most agricultural limes are ground up dolomite, a limestone containing a lot of magnesium. Using that is pretty much like soaking in plain water. If it is warm, the hide and water could spoil pretty fast. If you are regularly seeing damage to the hide in just a couple of days, that seems too fast, as even plain water soaking should not usually do that. As long as the water is not hot, or kept too warm. For tanning, what you need is hydrated lime. I have a video that explains it. Depending on where you live the name can be different. In the U.S. it is called type S or hydrated lime, or masons lime, or builders lime. Chemical name is calcium hydroxide. ruclips.net/video/2B3y6iZPCzY/видео.html If you can get the right lime, and watch this whole series, you should be able to produce good leather pretty quickly. Once you do it and watch again, you'll understand it all better. Good luck, you'll figure it out :)
@@SkillCult wow first of all I need the thank you because I didn't expect any answer and this fast!
I am French I live in France and it was hard for me to get what hydralized lime is, I mean what equivalent I can find in France. Maybe it is the wrong lime that I am getting since beggining. For this I will try to get the exact product that you're mentioning. Here in France Taning is a lost knowledge that is why I am managing to make it survive. We will have Taning industries but most of the hide are send to China to be cleaned and fleshed before... What a waste...
Anyway, thank you I will be looking forward your videos.
@@SpellsofLal One time a French woman came over here to learn braintanning. Her name is Sylvie Beries, but I'm not sure if that spelling is correct. She may have published some papers in french on tanning through an institute of paleotechnology or something like that. I know she made a video about tanning reindeer skin in Siberia. You may be able to buy quicklime there, which is the first stage of lime. It boils when you add it to water, and can cause fires if not handled carefully, so it is not sold to just anybody here. If you watch my videos on burning lime, you will understand lime better. ruclips.net/p/PL60FnyEY-eJBTMfy9Bl5QRmBKUAvLLCwp
There are small traditional tanneries starting right now. It is becoming a movement, as it should. follow these guys on instagram and you'll find more. @bioleder_pelz_organic_leather @thebushtannery @7leaguesleather @lottasgarfveri @traditional_tanners @billytannery and follow me @ skillcult :)
@@SkillCult thank you a lot and I hope I will be soon able to make proper leather
A bit late to the party but all alkaline solutions attacks keratin, bases dissolve hair, that's why sodium hydroxide is used in shower drains not sulfuric acid, it breaks down hair quite readily.
yes, exactly. While it's slow to really damage hair thoroughly, it's bad enough that you don't want to soak wool you're going to keep in it. It does mess up the skin too, but much more slowly. It's a matter of concentration too. the concentrations used in tanning affect keratin quick enough, but not so hot as to destroy the skin. If you get a solution that is too strong, the skin will be ruined overnight.
Wouldn’t sheering the sheep before skinning it be easier?
It's a lot of work. I think the two just don't always coincide conveniently
why not use the hair for plaster?
I don't really need it. I have a feeling it would be hard to work with trying to get it untangled. relative to horse hair and such at least.
Жаксы
no second cuts on that fleece either, it should clean up nice
I want to cut it a lot shorter. i wonder if my hair clippers will work.... I think I have the old scissor spring shears around somewhere.
@@SkillCult I'm going to try the lime paste method with the icelandic lambs I'm parting out right now. Shearing them is like a MMA match, if I can get the fleece off of them without second cuts it increases the value of the fleece. Sheep are easier to handle when they are dead. When I get the first one done I'll let you know how the fleece turns out urn out .
@@guyspencer4322 Cool, I'm curious how it works for you. If you have a lot, you might try laying them flesh to flesh and stacking instead of folding. I found that I had to wet the flesh side a couple of times, so maybe check it after a day or two and then again after a while. I have a video on types of lime for tanning, if you need that information. Look forward to hearing results.
premiere feature is awful
Why? I'm trying post on a schedule anyway, so I just tell people ahead of time and they can show up and hang out, or not. I would probably post a little earlier if it weren't for premier feature, but not much else would be different.
It only seems awful because we as a culture have been trained to always get everything immediately when we want it, and we feel upset if we have to wait for something. I personally think it is great, because hanging out on premiere chat is always fun and interesting.
@@mihacurk i agree. back in the day before shows being posted on streaming platforms a whole season at once and you end up spending a whole night running through it we used to wait to watch the new episode of our favourite tv series for a whole week. Now we are used to consuming the product as soon as it is ready so some people are getting frustrated that a new video is ready but he has to wait for the premier. The live chat function is the best feature about youtube premier, i hope i will be free today. I am sure the guy is complaining more as a joke not as a serious criticism.
No it's annoying because you get a notification and go to watch the video and it's not available and so you go back to your life and just forget about it and look back and you've missed ever premiere video because you checked on it when it was announced before it was watchable it's just a stupid bad system
@@doctact7144 you can still watch it after the premier lol