Leather tanning can be carried out using very different methods, but all of them, despite the apparent simplicity at times, require a lot of knowledge and practice. In addition, the tanning process itself and the preparation steps give off unpleasant odors, which is burdensome for the environment. For this reason, at home, you can only try to tan small skins of fur animals. The following recipe will allow you to orientate yourself in the issue and gain practice with not very valuable material.
Tanning of rabbit and hare skins.
Soak the dried rinds in water, containing 50 g table salt per 1000 cm3, w temp. ok. 18°C. When the skins are completely flaccid, clean them with a blunt knife from the inside (speaking the tanning language – from the side of the mizdra), what to do exactly, but very carefully, so as not to damage the crust. Then rinse three times in clean water, changed after each rinse. Allow it to drain on a sloped board. Weigh the wet rinds.
The tanning bath should be prepared in quantity: two kilograms of bathing for every kilogram of moist skins. Bath composition: w 1000 Dissolve cm3 of water 100 g table salt and add 17 cm3 of concentrated sulfuric acid. 1000 cm3 of this bath has a mass 1130 g. Weigh out the required number of baths (or measure by volume). Weigh out the amount of chromium-potassium alum 20 g for every kilogram of skins and dissolve in a weighed bath.
Toss the skins into the bath and knead them through 30 min (in rubber gloves!), leave for further 30 min, then knead again by 30 min. Repeat the kneading operation after an hour – twice after 15 min within the next hour. Leave it on 24 h in the tanning solution. Take it out and leave it for some more 24 h for drainage on the sloped stand. Prepare a mash of the following composition: egg yolk – one for each skin, wheat flour – so many grams, how much together the yolks weigh, salt – half the weight of flour, glycerine – 10 cm3 for each crust. Separate the pulp into as many equal parts, how many skins are there. Rub each part carefully into the skin from the side of the flesh.
Dry very slowly in the air at temp. ok. 20°C. Then carefully clean the peel of excess dried pulp and soften it by carefully stretching it over a thick surface., round wooden block. Smaller and finer skins can be treated in a similar way, replacing chromium-potassium alum with aluminum-potassium alum, taken in the same amount. It makes the trip softer.
