[TheForge] Life in the SCA ;-)

[Phlip]

Ene bichizh ogsen baina shuu...

>
> BTW, what is "Cuir Boulli"?

Boiled leather- it's a method of hardening leather once it's shaped the way
you want it, rather like hardening plastics. Unfortunately, somewhere in the
early SCA, someone took a notion that using various additives, oil or wax
based, made "real" cuir boulli, but they were mistaken- the real stuff is
made by immersing the leather (needs to be vegetable tanned) in hot water.
One guy I know had used hot water to harden a drinking jack he had, then
accidently ran over it with his truck, and discovered the jack was intact,
so hardening leather in hot water is VERY effective ;-)

I haven't messed with it much, since I'm not into armoring, but one formula
I have, aside from hot water, is a 50/50 mix of beeswax and parafin, with
just a dab of alum added, to remove all of the water. I'll likely be
experimenting eventually, but my suspicion is that the wax versions don't do
well on hot days, and the water version might do VERY well, since it
actually changes the chemistry and structure of the leather fibers.

Saint Phlip,
CoD

"When in doubt, heat it up and hit it with a hammer."
 Blacksmith's credo.

 If it walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it is probably not a
cat.

Never a horse that cain't be rode,
And never a rider who cain't be throwed....



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