steveb leatherworks: the blather

Shrinkage – the word hasn’t been the same since that fateful Seinfeld episode.[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysEHVhliosw[/youtube]

But in this instance the shrinkage I am referring to is of the vegetable tanned leather type – the type of leather  that i favor for my work… veg tan leather shrinks if it is not sealed up tight to moisture. The only problem with sealing leather, is basically your turning it to plastic to seal it tight – not a look i find attractive – and my feeling is that if the leather shrinks, so be it – its leather – it snot metal for crying out loud…

This saga of shrinkage begins innocently enough and a few years ago. I was looking to dress up a few Harley bike parts with leather, and the points cover is a natural for this kind of treatment. Well truthfully, not so much, for some of the obvious reasons i will outline.

The points cover gets hot, it gets wet, it gets kicked by boots- and in general is ground zero in terms of heat, road debris, dust and dirt. These are not optimal conditions for leather – it begins to do weird stuff when you subject it to this kind of treatment…curling is one bad behavior that leather can exhibit in these circumstances. Leather likes cool, dry, clean.

So determined to figure out a way to make this work, i asked my friend Fabricator Kevin to help me out and make me a few blank steel backing plates for points covers (evo & tc) usage, all the right size holes in ‘em,  in the right positions..

So i got to getting and in short order  i am having issues, namely – how the hell do you attach leather to a metal plate?  In a word ya need to use – glue. Using rivets and mechanical devices adds depth, metal and doesn’t hold the leather to the backing plate across its whole surface. You wouldn’t think glue would be the solution – but believe me  – it is. The trick is  – what glue to use?

Well, I spent a bunch of cake and got me some glues and did a heap of ex-perimenting and found the right glue. I aint telling ya either – but it is some nasty shit – trust me on this.

But the point of this post is to show you how leather shrinks in this condition – it shrinks evenly across is whole surface. The leather  on this cover use to be flush with the metal edge of the plate….now?  There is a solid 1/8” shrinkage – that is alot of shrinkage …its pretty wild.

On some covers, where i know the customer i will leave it unsealed and simply remake the cover in a few years, but for folks who live far away – i seal them with Krylon Poly – seals em up tight and prevents…shrinkage…

heaven forbid, we got shrinkage