For your viewing pleasure..? how to make a two sided leather strop!
Anyway, I had to make this as a gift and even though the weather was crappy, it needed doing. Materials I used were some mdf wood board, a cut of old leather belt, a cut of old leather jacket, a screw hook, 8 tiny nails, autosol metal polish, spray adhesive & superglue and a little oil!
Tools used were my angle grinder with various discs (the work horse of my operations!), a knife, pencil, sandpaper, hammer and a sandwich bag..
I started with sourcing the bits from my plethora of wombled junk. The penciled out where to cut.
Cut them out..
I used a sanding disc to cut away the handle excess, this took a few minutes and I contoured it slightly so it was nicer to hold.
As I didn't have any solid wood to use as the paddle of the strop I need to make sure to seal the edges. I did this with 3 little cheapo tubes of superglue from the 99p store. I'm too cheap for fancy surgical gloves so i use a sarnie bag as a glove and apply the glue along the edges of the wood that won't have adhesive and leather on. This way it'll keep out moisture and stop any swelling, which oil would likely do on its own. And no body wants a strop that's swollen like a tampon in the rain.
and after..
This also brings out some colour from an otherwise boring bit of wood/material. This takes several minutes to dry.
Then I scored the paddle and the leather bits to allow for a better grip of the adhesive. The carpet fitters left the adhesive behind.. but any glue will do. I also took the time to sand the glue down a little as it was rough and blotchy.
I then give the adhesive a minute to dry out a little as advised then stick it to the paddle and clamp! this makes for a better contact and more secure leather. I do this on both sides once the first had dried, and I cut away at any excess hanging leather.
Once dry, I screwed in the hook so it can hang neatly. I also tacked the corners with little nails to secure it, they are hammered into the leather deep so don't touch the blade. And applied a small amount of linseed oil onto the glued surface to give it a shine!
Then a fed the thick leather side with autosol..
I gave it a good finger pounding to make sure it got into the grain and left the other side without any. This way you can start on the thick leather side and finish on the suede side for the final polish!
This like I said, is a gift. And I know the person will like it! (mainly because he asked for one lol)
So, that's how it can be done, buuut if you're too lazy to do all that, you can just use some cardboard and some toothpaste..
I hope you enjoyed the end result and the time I took to photograp it all and type it all up!
Thanks for looking, any questions feel free to pm me.
Cheers,
Samon.
Anyway, I had to make this as a gift and even though the weather was crappy, it needed doing. Materials I used were some mdf wood board, a cut of old leather belt, a cut of old leather jacket, a screw hook, 8 tiny nails, autosol metal polish, spray adhesive & superglue and a little oil!
Tools used were my angle grinder with various discs (the work horse of my operations!), a knife, pencil, sandpaper, hammer and a sandwich bag..
I started with sourcing the bits from my plethora of wombled junk. The penciled out where to cut.
Cut them out..
I used a sanding disc to cut away the handle excess, this took a few minutes and I contoured it slightly so it was nicer to hold.
As I didn't have any solid wood to use as the paddle of the strop I need to make sure to seal the edges. I did this with 3 little cheapo tubes of superglue from the 99p store. I'm too cheap for fancy surgical gloves so i use a sarnie bag as a glove and apply the glue along the edges of the wood that won't have adhesive and leather on. This way it'll keep out moisture and stop any swelling, which oil would likely do on its own. And no body wants a strop that's swollen like a tampon in the rain.
and after..
This also brings out some colour from an otherwise boring bit of wood/material. This takes several minutes to dry.
Then I scored the paddle and the leather bits to allow for a better grip of the adhesive. The carpet fitters left the adhesive behind.. but any glue will do. I also took the time to sand the glue down a little as it was rough and blotchy.
I then give the adhesive a minute to dry out a little as advised then stick it to the paddle and clamp! this makes for a better contact and more secure leather. I do this on both sides once the first had dried, and I cut away at any excess hanging leather.
Once dry, I screwed in the hook so it can hang neatly. I also tacked the corners with little nails to secure it, they are hammered into the leather deep so don't touch the blade. And applied a small amount of linseed oil onto the glued surface to give it a shine!
Then a fed the thick leather side with autosol..
I gave it a good finger pounding to make sure it got into the grain and left the other side without any. This way you can start on the thick leather side and finish on the suede side for the final polish!
This like I said, is a gift. And I know the person will like it! (mainly because he asked for one lol)
So, that's how it can be done, buuut if you're too lazy to do all that, you can just use some cardboard and some toothpaste..
I hope you enjoyed the end result and the time I took to photograp it all and type it all up!
Thanks for looking, any questions feel free to pm me.
Cheers,
Samon.
