Main Discussion Area > Cave Men only "Oooga Booga"
The Adventures of Stinky Rawhide: Deerskin Soup, Part 1
Minuteman:
I envy your lack of frozen-ness :( What the temps like there?
It was 28 degrees and freezing rain this morning.
JackCrafty:
We had a warm snap last couple days....72o today with 40o tonight. Getting colder tomorrow....42o tomorrow with 23o overnight.
JackCrafty:
OK...here's the progress on the deerskins:
The first batch of skins I got was on Tuesday (Dec 2nd).
They were placed in a bin until Thursday...flesh and all.
When I got the second batch on Thursday, I washed all the skins and put them into bins...flesh and all.
No hair was slipping and all the skins smelled fresh.
Saturday I fleshed two skins and put them into a solution of water and drain opener.
No hair was slipping.
Sunday I fleshed 3 more skins and hung them up to dry.
I didn't have time to rack them so I just hung them them up.
They were a little smelly but not too bad.
No hair was slipping.
Last night (Monday), I tried to scrape hair off the two hides that were in the water and drain opener solution....hmmmm....the hair was not coming off at all. Now, the other hides that were still in water were smelling pretty ripe....but no hair slipping on any of them either.....at all......nada......the hair was as firmly in place as the first day I got them.
Temperatures ranged from high 20's at night to low 70's during the day during this period.
So I decided put all the skins (even the dry ones - they were getting smellier) into water with drain opener. This time I added quite a bit of drain opener to the water....and they are soaking right now. I stirred them this morning before going to work. I'll check on them tonight. ;D
JackCrafty:
No go on the drain opener (the hair is getting weaker but at this rate it will take a month...or more). :-\ The hair is not slipping well on ANY of the hides except where the skins are thin, like the belly area. It appears that lye is not the main ingredient in drain opener anymore anyway....I read the label and it's bleach (10%) and lye (2%). GREAT. >:(
So I racked 4 hides (I might dry scrape these), threw out the ones that smelled really bad, and put two hides into a bin with hydrated lime.
I tried looking for pickling lime but after 4 grocery stores, confused looks, and wasted gas (good thing it's cheap right now)...I bought some hydrated lime. If that doesn't work I'm going to mail order some potassium hydroxide. (While I was at it, I looked for borax with not luck....except for the type that kills roaches).
El Destructo:
Man ....you don't have a Super Wal-Mart...or a United Supermarket near You??? We use 20 Mule Team Borax all the time...and buy it from Wal-Mart....and they have pickling Lime too...so does United....cause I just bought two more Pounds for an Elk Hide I have to do
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version