Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => HowTo's and Build-a-longs => Topic started by: HoBow on September 05, 2009, 12:47:26 pm
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I have had a few people pm me about doing a tan-a-long, so here is my humble attempt. I will be tanning this hide for the TomB memorial project, while PatB will be turning it into a quiver.
There are many many ways to tan, I choose the "salt alum" tan because it is an easy method with most of the chemicals needed easy to find. This will take a few weeks to complete and I will be tanning three hides and some other pieces as I post, so please be patient. The hides I will be tanning are axis deer. They are very thin, so they tear easy when cleaning, but tan easier because of how thin they are. If you have any questions, feel free to ask or pm me.
Pictures:
1- male and female axis deer
2- salt I use. I have read not to use iodized salt, but I have used iodized and noniodized with no problems. Perhaps if someone else knows why or have had issues, you could chime in.
3- You can see I have a few tears near the edge, which will not be a problem for this project as they will be cut off. I just cut the big chunks of meat off and the rest will come off easier once the salt pulls the moisture out....it took me several hides before I figured this out.
4- This is what the hide looks like from the front.
5- I start by pouring a pile of salt in the middle
6- Spread the salt out across the entire hide. Make sure you rub it in the edges really well. This will help you later. I will do this twice and in between will take a knife and scrape off the leftover meat and fat. I leave the salt on there a day or two depending on the humidity level
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Jeff, this is cool. Thanks for your contribution to Tom's memorial. I'm sure Patrick will really appreciate the effort and gesture.
Axis deer are cool looking. Where did you get the skins?
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Thanks for taking the time to do this Jeff, wondering what type of alum ya use as here at the plant we liguid alum as a coagulant
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Pat,
I have a buddy who keeps a heard of about 70 and thins them out as needed. He kills about 20 per year. He use to throw them out until I asked for them and I have been tanning them ever since. Anytime I go out to his house, I always make sure I bring my camera and telephoto lense because I can usually get photos. This time of year, they are not that skittish so they let me get fairly close.
Dana,
I use powdered aluminum sulfate. This is the same stuff that you can get at wal-mart for making pickles, but is much cheaper to buy in bulk. One ounce at Walmart is around $5, while I bought a 50 lb bag for $18. I could probably do about 100 hides with that amount, but I've made trades for hides and will send enough as this is by far the hardest ingredient to get (and it is easy if you go to the right places.)
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I left the salt on for 2 days. If you have to leave it longer, it is no problem.
Pictures:
1- This is the knife I use to cut and scrape the meat and fat off. You know you have left the salt on long enough when you can scrape the edge of the meat and then pull it off with your hands.
2- This was how much I scraped off
3- This is the hide mostly cleaned off. Notice it has shrunk up some, but this is OK. Eventually, I will pull and stretch the wrinkles out.
4- I resalted the hide one more time. I did not salt it as heavy this go round since it was mostly clean. If there was still quite a bit of fat and meat, I would have added more salt.
5- This is all the material when I finished. Some people will pull the meat out and reuse the salt, but the salt is so cheap I never bothered doing that. I will leave the salt on for another day or two.
At this point, you have rawhide with the hair on. If you wanted to put it up in storage, make sure you scrapped it well and add some extra salt. Fold in in half, flesh side to flesh side, and roll it up like a sleeping bag. Set it up vertically for a few days to let any moisture come out and put it in a paper bag (not plastic, it needs to breath). I have done this on several hides and had no hair slippage. If you are making leather without the hair, slippage would not be an issue anyway.
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This is coming along well.
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Next, you have to wash all the salt off. I lay it on the gray on spray it with a hose really well for a few minutes. Now to mix the borax solution. I use warm water (not hot- you don't want to cook the hide) and mix in Borax until the saturation point (until no more will mix in and settles to the bottom). Let the hide sit in this solution for about 24 hours. If it is colder, an extra day or two will not hurt, but no in hot weather as this could cause hair slippage. Once the hide(s) are in the solution, I weigh them down with rocks or buckets full of water.
Pictures:
1- Wash the hide off well
2- This is the Borax I buy at Wal-Mart. Some women keep it in the laundry room, so ask.
3- Hides in the solution
4- Hides weighted down
All this step is doing is neutralizing the hide to prepare it to dehair or pickle.
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I do not have pictures for the next step as I will not be dehairing these hides. Next hide I dehair, I will post photos of it. Here are the steps:
You need to prepare an alkali solution to a PH of 12 or 13. The easiest way to measure this is to buy the paper PH paper strips in my opinion. To increase the PH, I usually use caustic soda (sodium hydroxide) because that is easy for me to get. Other chemicals you could use include caustic potash (KOH or potassium hydroxide), lime, lye, or ashes from a fire pit (which is what the Indians used to expedite the process). You can also use the bark from pine trees, but this process is much slower. You could also weigh it down in a stream and let nature take its course, but I have never tried this. I let it sit in this solution for 2-3 days, about double that if the temperature is in the 30's and 40's. Let it sit until you can take your hand (with a rubber glove) and push the hair off fairly easily. Most should push off, but you may have to pull the hair out or hit it with a powerwasher (Beware of this as the hair will get everywhere and you will find it for the next 6 months ;D ) Once you have dehaired the hide, wash well with a hose and neutralize in the borax solution for another day or two. Now the hide is ready to pickle.
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Now we are pickling the hide. Pickling the hide prepares it to soak in the tanning solution, or at least that was the way it was explained to me. Pickling the hide is no different than pickling cucumbers or any other vegetable. I chose to pickle these hides with vinegar since most would have easy access to this. You can use anything to bring the PH down between 2 and 3. I have used sulfuric acid (battery acid), sulfamic acid, and vinegar. Standard vinegar has a PH of 2.4, which is perfect for the hides. Apple cider vinegar has a PH of 2.1. It is probably a few dollars cheaper to use sulfuric acid on a per hide basis, but vinegar is so cheap anyway. The PH scale is logrythymic (a PH of 2 is 10 times stronger than a PH of 3 and a PH of 3 is 10 times stronger than 4, etc), so make sure the PH stays between 2-3. I pickle the hides for two days, but monitor them closely. I have had some hair slippage in this step, but never that bad.
Pictures
1- This is the vinegar I use. One gallon cost about $2.00 and you can add a half gallon of water and not affect the PH that much, but recheck it.
2- I moved the hides to a five gallon bucket because I could not get them covered in the larger container. In this bucket, I have three hides, several dew claw pieces, 2.5 gallons of vinegar, and one gallon of water.
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Now we finally are at the tanning stage. Pull the hides out of the pickling solution. You can reuse this as long as the PH is does not come back above 3. If it does, add a stronger acid to pull it back down. Rinse the hides again with a hose.
Now, mix the alum tanning solution- 1 lb alum, 8 oz salt, 4 oz of sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) for every gallon of water. Mix it with warm water, but not hot as it will cook the hide into glue. I let the hide set for 3-4 days. You can not overtan it, so let set longer if possible. I let set 1 week. You want to check back every day and stir the hide and make sure there are no problems, like hair slippage if you are doing a hair on tan. Alum is an astringent, so slippage should not be an issue with this type of tan if you have made it this far.
Pictures:
1- Wash the hide of the picking solution
2- This is the aluminum sulfate
3- Sodium Carbonate or baking soda
4- The three chemicals that will turn this green hide into leather
5- The hides in the solution
6- Make sure you weigh the hides down. Anything not submersed will not be tanned. Turn every day and stir the solution to make sure everything gets tanned. The easy part is now over with. The fun is about to begin.
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Thanks this has been very informative.
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Yes, this is very cool. I'm looking forward to turning that hide into a quiver. ;)
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I just killed a couple of coons will the same principle work for them. Cool Tan along. Marlin
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Kerbinator- This process will work on any hide. Coon's can be greasy, so I would make sure to degrease them with dawn soap or something before or after you salt them. I will be finishing up this tan-a-long sometime tomorrow. The hides are now leather, I just need to post the last part.
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so it would work for squirrel too?
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Jeff...where are you getting Bulk Aluminm Sulfate at? I really need some....I have a good supply of Sulfuric Acid.... now I need the others!
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Youngbowyer- Yep, squirrels are an easy tan with this method.
El Destructo- I get my Aluminum Sulfate from Univar, but have also got it from Brenntag. If I remember from one of your posts, you work at a Refinery...Univar should have a strong presence in their so contact the rep and I bet he would give you a good deal. Any chemical distributor would work (Univar, Brenntag, Ashland, Harcross, etc). You could probably contact one of the industrial cleaners (PSC, Hydrochem, etc) and they should be able to help you out.
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Thanks Jeff ...I have a Hydrochem Company in Town...also Univar too! Also how do you Pickle with Sulfuric Acid...just add till you get the proper PH?? I am wanting to do a Hair-On Tan with a Cow Elk Hide....I tried for two Months to give it away so I could get room in my Freezer...but nobody wants to pay Shipping....and I ain't shipping it for Free!! So I will tan it myself I guess
This has been a a very Informative Tan a Long....I appreciate the time you have taken and can't wait for the Ending!!
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El D- Just add the sulfuric until the PH gets between 2-3. Sulfuric is a strong acid so it will drop really fast once it starts to go down.
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Once I pulled the hides out of the tanning solution, I let them sit until they are almost dry. Becuase it has been extremely wet and humid here lately, I actually let them sit for about 36 hours and they were still a little wet, but I started to work them anyway. I did a few hides this summer where I sat them on the hood of my car and came back 10 minutes later and they were stiff as a board. You can tell they are ready to work when you stretch the hides and they hold the form well and are not floppy.
Picture 1- Through every step, I continue to puill the extra fat, meat, and grizzle off. Most of this came off the edges as I am just going to cut the edges off anyway so I did not work them that much.
Picture 2- I am actually tanning three hides throug this process. I wanted to post this hide to show everyone that it is not that different from building bows. You can do everything correct and still have problems. It might be the hide (or wood) and the project was a disaster from the get-go without even knowing. This particular hide tore a bit easier when I was cleaning it. There were some black spots on the hide, but I just assumed it was bruised. I don't think it is mold as it will not wipe off, and I'm not sure this even caused the probelms.
Picture 3- This is the same hide. I had several spots of bad hair slippage. I know it was not the process as the other two hides had minimal slippage. I will probably end up dehairing the entire hide and use the leather for other projects like bow handles.
Picture 4- This was a bit hard to document as I was alone. You need to work the hide from every angle; diagonal and side to side. Stretching will take several hours depending on the weather. If it is humid, it could take an entire day. If the weather is more dry, you could probably do it in an hour or two. Unfortunately, living on the gulf coast this is a very long process for me as we are extremely humid most of the year.
Picture 5- Continue stretching
Picture 6- Continue stretching
The more you stretch it, the softer it will get. I have worked hides until they were as soft and flexable as a leather jacket you buy at the store. I have also let stay stiff depending on the project. I will work these hides, but not a great deal as they are going to be used for quivers. They need to stay a bit stiff for this, in my opinion. Breaking the hide in is complete when you can't stretch the hide and it is dry.
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Once the hide has been completely broken in, take a days rest because your hands will need it. ;D Depending on what you are doing with the leather, you can do a few things to continue to soften it, especially if you are turning it into mocassins or a clothes. Get a pumice stone (not your wifes, trust me on this one >:D ) and work the flesh side. You can get these at Wal-Mart or Walgreens. Don't bother with this unless the leather will touch your skin. This does turn it velvet soft, though.
Picture 1- Neatsfoot oil- I rub this into most of my projects just to make it a bit softer.
Picture 2- If you have a project in mind and want to leave the hide a bit stiff, work it as much as you are going to and let dry on a form. This hide, I let dry on a drum so it would have a more round form for the quiver. If you let it dry out to much, rub some of the tanning solution on the hide and start working it again until the point you want and then put it on the form. The nice thing about this is if you do let it dry to much and have to put more of the tanning solution on it, you will not be starting from scratch. Once you have streched the fibers, they are much easier to work and will not get stiff as easily.
Picture 3- I was also tanning about 12 dew claw pieces. I have seen some dew claw bags that looked awesome, so I decided to try and make one. As you can tell, I don't let much of a deer go to waste. I saved the toes thinking I will figure something to do with them. I've heard of people making rattlers with them, but not sure what I will be doing with these. Anyone know if you could make bow tips with them? I still have the leg bones and though about making a knife out of one and some tools out of others (Pappy just posted some cool pics of the tools and jackcrafty just did an awesome knife for the kith- perhaps a build along for that is in order :) ).
Picture 4- Here is the finished hide. I will be sending this out shortly for the Tom B Memorial Project so Pat can turn it into a quiver. I've never made a quiver, but thought I might try with one of these.
Picture 5- This was a bow grip that I tanned from a hide a few years ago. I just finished this bow and will be posting pics of it in the bow section. I smoked the leather so it would look better with the copperhead and osage. The leather comes out ivory white, which looks good on some projects, but I like to smoke or dye leather for most projects. Smoking leather can be a fun process, but it is an exhausting one in my opinion. If you don't watch it carefully, you can ruin all the work from turning the hide into leather.
Well, that's how I tan my hides. There are many ways, but this is my preference. I would like to do a brain-tan, but never have. Perhaps someone who has done this would do a brain-tan-a-long for me ;D If anyone has any questions about the process, feel free to ask. Thanks for looking.
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So when you are Stretching this...are you doing it over the Wire Spool? And are you stretching it on th Hair Side or Hide? I have always done mine over a Post in the Ground...but this takes forever since the Post is only about 6 inches in diameter!
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El D- I do it by hand on the flesh side. This is by far not the easiest, but I will usually sit down and start stretching. I pulled this picture of the internet of one way of stretching it. Once you get it strung up, you can use a broom handle or something larger in diameter and start pushing in on the hide and working it that way. This allows it to dry quicker and breaks the hide much quicker, but I just prefer to work the hide by hand.
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could you take a rubber headed mallet to the hide?
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Youngbowyer- Not sure if that would work as you do not necessarily hit the hide, you are pushing in on it to stretch it. You can use a rubber mallet to lightly hit the hide after youi put the neatsfoot oil on it. This works it in better, but I usually just rub it in.
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Jeff can you post a pic of how you have the stings tied to the hide? Thanks Joel
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Great Tan Along Jeff and the hide looks great also :)
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Deerhunter- That was a picture I pulled of the internet. I never have stretched a hide that way. If you have a large hide (axis deer are small), it would be imperative to use that. I would assume they just tied a simple slip knot, but not sure. El D- I've never seen an elk hide, but I believe they are big, so this design would probably be helpful.
Thanks Dana! I'm glad I could be part of the memorial project and it worked out that I got to document it in this manner. I get great satisfaction when I complete a hide, just like a bow, and it feels better it is going for such a nice project! Now I just have to ship it to Pat and let him do his magic. My next project will be a quiver out of one of the other hides ;D
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Jeff, would you have a pic of you and the hide taken, and be sure it if high resolution. ;) You can e-mail it to me( marciaandpat@citcom.net )
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Great tan along I've done it with little kits. But it's great to know the actual clemicals.
The hide looks super i'm sure Pat will make a wonderful quiver out of it. Thank you for
taking the time to do this.
Thanks Leroy
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so it would work for squirrel too?
good lord man you got it out for the skwirls dont you? lol
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Is the 8 oz salt and 4 oz baking soda pickling solution measurement weight or volume?
Nice information. You did a nice job on the "build-a-long". It's appreciated.
Thanks, Doug
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Thanks FriedPie. I do it by volume.
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Great how to on tanning, really enjoyed it. you do good work, thanks for sharing. Brokenhand....Aho.
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Will the aluminum sulphate from a garden supply store for changing soil ph work?
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Thanks Broken Hand. Kship- that will work just fine.
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where did you come up with the aluminum sulfate?
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Ohio John- any chemical distribution company will have it....bulk food places may have it as it is added to pickling jars to keep the food crunchy. Wal Mart sells it but only in very small quantities and it is very expensive compared to buying a 50 lb bag from a chemical company. I have some if you'd be up for a trade...I'm moving and don't want to take all my tanning chemicals with me. ;)
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Ok, well my first endeavor did not fare so well...not really sure what happened but I had some unexpected results. For starters when I first mixed the ingredients for the tan itself I ended up with a chemical reaction that caused water and foam to come rolling out of the top of my bucket and down the sides of the cabinet and onto the carpet in my parents laundry room ( was at their house to do all this as they have much more room for such things than I do). Best way I can describe it is the reaction you get from doing the elementary science experiment with the volcano from vinegar and baking soda. I'm wondering if anyone else has had this happen or if perhaps it was just me and a problem from the aluminum sulfate I used. I do not believe it was vinegar from the hides as I am fairly certain it happened before I put the hides into the bath. Plus after I thought it was over I stirred the water some to make sure everything had dissolved and it had the reaction again but this time even more than before. I'm not a chemist by profession but do enjoy it some and best I can figure is the aluminum sulfate mixed with water created an acid that reacted with the baking soda like vinegar would. Pretty sure there was a large release of CO2. Anyway enough about that...after I finally got it all settled down I put the hide pieces in and left them in there for a week. After a week I took them out and left them to dry out. Upon drying I went to start working a piece and it just snapped in half, stuff was SUPER brittle. So I am fairly certain I did something very wrong. Any advice on what happened would be awesome as I would really love to try this again but do not want to ruin the hides I get. Thanks a ton!
Kip
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I should have put the warning about the chemical reaction O:) When I get in a hurry, it happens to me. You do have to mix the alum slowly as it will bubble up. As far as being brittle. It sounds like it dried out to much before you started working it. I wring the hide out really well and depending on my timing and schedule either start working it immediately or set it to the side, but not for too long. The more you stretch it and work it, the softer it will be. I've let them set to long and had them come out as hard as rawhide. Simply wet them again and work them really good. Hope this helps!
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I stumbled on this thread a while back ago and it has been bothering me. While you intentions are good..trying to describe how to tan items, you are misinformed about some of the chemical processes involved. I have been doing taxidermy and tanning for 27 years.
While using borax has its place in preservation qualities. It is caustic and will cause hair to slip the way you are using it here. Skip the borax step. Rinse your hides in regular water before adding to your pickle that you are making with the alum.
For your pickle, in the steps you describe, it has you mixing alum--an acid, and baking soda--a caustic, together. Of course your going to get a chemical reaction of fizzing. You are neutralizing the acid. You need to keep the acid at a pH between 2 and 3. Even 3 is somewhat high for tanning. I personally like to keep it below 2.5. After the hide becomes white from being in the pickle or tan as you call it, this will occur in a few days, then you can neutralize the hide with the baking soda solution.
If I were to use household chemicals to tan a hide with the hair on, this is what I would do:
Flesh hide
Put hide under salt for a couple days
Rinse out hide with water to get excess salt off
Mix Pickle or Tan in this case, adjust amounts equally enough to submerge hide, this will bring the ph to about 2.5
use the 5% vinegar found in the grocery section
2 Qts. of White Vinegar
2 Qts. of Water
1 Lb. of Salt
Let soak for a few days
Take hide out of pickle and drain letting it become damp dry, do any final fleshing at this time to get any remaining meat and fat off.
Place back in pickle for another day.
Take hide out from pickle, drain, and place in enough clean water to submerge with 4 ounces of baking soda
This will neutralize the vinegar. Let soak for about 20 minutes. Agitate every 5 minutes.
Take out hide and once again rinse in clean water.
Let the hide dry until it looses about half of its moisture.
Oil with neatsfoot oil, but try to find the bisolfianted (sp) or
Go to the drugstore and get some lanolin...this is also known as wool oil. Heat this up until its a liquid and apply to the hide on the flesh side only. Just use enough lanolin that the hide will soak in. The hide will also need to be somewhat worm also
Let the hide dry , working it as it is drying to keep it soft. You can use sandpaper to give the hide a velvety swede feel.
There you have it. All these steps are chemically compatible with each other.
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Jeff, thanks for all the work and effort you've put into this thread, it's much appreciated.
Lots learned and lots confirmed.
Thanks also to Keith for his input. I'd tend to agree with you on the acid - alkali neutralisation.
You guys have just made my humble attempts seem less daunting.
Thanks again.