Pulling out my hair trying to soften this moose hide
 

I have a large bull moose hide that I have brain tanned to the point of exquisite softness in thinner parts but cannot get the thicker parts to soften. I am 6' tall 250 lbs and have put more force into banding and stretching than most even could. While dry scraping I got it down to a thickness that I had assumed would be suitable for tanning and experienced elders also agreed it was thin enough. certain thicker areas of this hide will not soften no matter how much I smoke, brain, soak and work it reapeatedly. it's like the rawhide glue in the thicker parts is trapped inside and will not come out no matter how much working it receives, wet or dry. Has anybody else dealt with this problem? Have I wasted my time putting weeks worth of work into this hide? I'm to the point now where I am out of brains, exhausted from trying to work it and almost ready to give up. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.:sign0176:

Moose hide tanning
 

Did you use a wringing stick on it for more leverage after the salt soak?

Yes
 

I did not salt soak, that's not part of the traditional tanning process. I did wring it each time, the first time was on a large wringing post with a pole and the rest have been with 2x4's. This hide also spent 2 weeks in bleachless water before fleshing and scraping to aid with bacterial breakdown.

Yup... it’s happened to me too.

When you brain do you soak the hide first in plain water then wring it out like a “well wrung rag” before braining? The solution penetrates better on damp hide than dry. My trouble is smoking...

No
 

For the first soaking this hide was folded semi dry with the brain mixture rubbed in vigorously and the remainder poured into the tote around it after 24 hours I smoked the hair side for a day and resoaked it for a few days after adding fresh water until it broke the grain. Then it was banded and worked in the smokey brain water. It just seems like the glue is more like flesh and locked in to some parts (even though I fleshed and scraped all the way to pure white).

Did you get all the epidermis off? That inhibits the brains from getting in the hide for sure. And when you soak it you need to be able to take the hide and make a “bubble” out of it. When you squeeze the bubble it should hiss and foam-the air and water should be able to pass through it.

Moose ain’t easy, especially if it’s a bull.

Elders are humans, we all make mistakes and can be wrong.
Or you misunderstood what they told you.
Perhaps your expectations are too high.

Thin enough for tanning and thin enough to be made exquisitely soft are two very different things.

I suspect the stiff areas are still too thick to become softer.

Areas such as the neck and top of the shoulders on old bulls are not meant to become soft, ever.
This area of the hide is better for shields than diapers.

I’ve never tanned a hide before, and this could be a ridiculous suggestion, but would a grinder or drill with a wire wheel work to help thin it out?

It does but it doesn’t work well. It seems to smear the hide and gets it overly hot which actually makes the hide tougher. Look up “boiled leather” if you want to learn about how to make hide into hard items-shields, armour etc.

A razor sharp hand scraper works.
When it’s cold out if the hide is strung up and still wet hand scraping works incredibly well.

I was thinking an Inuit woman with a good set of teeth. :lol:

Grizz

Just to be sure, you did remove the hair right? You’re not trying to do hair on?

I stitched a bull hide onto a frame and propped it up horizontally while it was still wet after graining. The kids used it as a trampoline as it dried. Still didn’t help much, I learned a lot about the importance of thinning on that hide.

I have an elk and a cow moose hide all scraped and ready for brains once it warms up. I thinned the cow enough I hope and it’s a gorgeous hide...fingers crossed.

Yes, it works great if you can control the depth of grinding.
Very easy to screw up.
And It's incredibly messy.
Dried bits of skin don't wash out of your hair very easily...
Anyone I've known to do this does it just once, quickly looking for a mentor to do the next one.

No doubt, it just seems like this guy is having an exceptionally hard time with this particular hide and seemed like it might solve the problem.

Haha beat me to it!

I was going to ask if he chewed it or gummed it! :sHa_sarcasticlol:

It’s kind of a fascinating process, if it’s done in a certain way it doesn’t take too much labor. I think of an old grandmother who can still finish moose hides and I realize that even though she’s a tough old lady there’s only so much energy she can expend. That leaves technique.

If the hide is dry scraped instead of wet scraped it’s a lot easier to come back to it when we have time. Wet scraping has to happen within a couple days of the hair slipping. It’s a great technique but way too labor intensive. And a wet moose hide with hair on it is more than anyone can lift, I had to use pulleys to get it out and drained enough to move it around. Way too much effort, and hard on the wrists too.

That brings it back to dry scraping. But dry scraping doesn’t squeeze out the hide glue and that’s a problem but it can me mitigated by soaking and wringing. Especially in slightly warm water as hide glue (gelatin) dissolves easier in warm water (jello anyone?).

So dry scraping, presmoking, soaking and wringing, then braining, then lacing onto a frame and stretching as it dries, then smoke again. Then resoaking, wringing, braining and working on a blade or cable as it dries.
That seems to work with less wrist destroying labor. The more it’s smoked and more often it’s brained the better.

And we wonder why folks want a grand for a hide tanned like this!

Perhaps
 

Yes, it took a long time to dry scrape on tight ropes. This has no hair. I'm fearing that I may have to rack it again and do more scraping (and yes the scrapers I use are kokum and mosom sharp lol).
I just don't dont want to repeat steps that I dont have to is all, I'm fairly new to this but have received advice from the best, even they are perplexed by this hide. Some even say it's just a thick bull and there isn't much option.

I know one thing for certain, my next hide will be a deer, they seem to be alot easier.

Was going to say something similar a while back. :)

You know what’s worked great on a deer hide I did....

It was strung on a frame while still wet and then it froze hard for a couple weeks.
When I went to it it had freeze dried and the pores were all opened and ready to be brained, it soaked up the brains like a sponge and was really soft when I dried it. Almost no physical effort.

Yes frost scraping works extremely well

Headway!
 

So, I took all of the advice offered to me here and built a game plan. I soaked and wrung the hide really well before adding some lecithin and fat to it. I built a makeshift frame between 2 trees with 2x4s and will be stringing it up in the morning. Until then, I am continually adding fresh warm water and dumping out the old after stepping on it in a tote like I am mushing grapes for wine. This appears to help since the water is turning very white and loads of lint like grey goop that I haven't seen since the first braining is coming off in copius amounts. I'm going to try this and will report back. Thanks to everyone for your input. It was very helpful. I'll post pics when I'm done if anyone cares :test:

There are lots who are interested, including me. You wouldn't get the responses you've received if many aren't keen to see you succeed. :love0025:

Agreed... I love this stuff.

My big challenge has always been smoking the hides biespcause I live in the city.
It really does take a couple days to get it done by the time it’s all organized etc.

Well you have a dozen guys responding to this thread and hundreds of others watching it . I would say plenty of guys would love to know how it works out and who doesn’t love pictures!

https://youtu.be/mzgG92RHohI


This is hands down the best traditional tanning video I’ve seen and what a likeable fellow too! There’s lots and lots of going back and forth in his method.
Soaking, smoking, scraping, wringing.... gets rid of the hide glue, works the fibers and coats the fibres in smoke so they can’t reglue themselves.

It’s brilliant.

Update
 

Sorry for leaving you guys hanging for a few days. After following my plan I was told that the hide was still too thick. Another person had lent me their best piece of mill banding so I decided to to try dry banding to see where I'm at. Much to my surprise it began to soften from hard rawhide parts into thick soft buckskin!! Finally!! I knew it was thin enough. It is taking alot of hard banding but it is finally breaking. The neck is still thick but slowly softening. tried to upload pictures but the size limit would not allow this and I don't know how to make them smaller.

Lesson learned, right tool for the job. Get some thick mill banding with many small nicks. Tonight I will try to finish the softening for a double smoke tomorrow.
I'm so glad this hasn't all been in vain.

:happy0034:

Tanning hides
 

When the hide is hard dry on the frame, try a belt sander to thin
thick areas.

Best thread in a while. Looking forward to pics. Also what are you going to make with the hide?