🛠 Vintage restoration - an 11spi iron!
So I got another vintage pricking iron in the post today. I won this particular example on eBay for £50 including delivery.
It's a very fine 11 stitches per inch (12tpi) or about 2.2mm if you prefer metric.
It wasn't in terrible condition but someone had customarily dropped it on a tile floor at some point, actually, the end point!
So I had to carefully realign the tooth. (carpeting around the work station please people, or at least a long hallway runner!)
My favourite cleanup item for rough pricking irons is a foam sanding block, it just makes life so much easier.
240 grit is all that's necessary unless you have pitting in the steel:
A weak phosphoric acid solution (dishwasher cleaner) uncovered something interesting about this particular iron (done to clean rust from between the teeth).
There appears to be two different steels welded together to make the handle and the head before the grinding stage had hidden it.
This explains my need for diamond files when sharpening the teeth, yet the top of the handle shows signs of doming from being struck with a steel hammer, as this was the accepted practice pre-Instagram.
Different steels, different properties I imagine.
The effect below is caused by the phosphoric acid inducing a forced patina, yet the variations in the steel reacted slightly differently:
How does it stitch? I hear you say!
Restoration or not (well, clean up and tune up), what's important is the result it gives me. I have to say that I'm pretty happy!
The last picture shows a close up of the differences between a #6 iron (4.2mm), a modern iron (3.38mm - not shown) and the latest old boy to join Finch, the #11 (2.2mm).
Stitched on a 4mm piece of racing green English bridle leather (Thread / Wuta 0.35 - Wuta 0.45 - Lin Cable 532 (bit small))
All were done with the Jerome David awl. Had I used the larger 4mm awl we would have seen better angles on the big stitch, but alas, we are looking at the #11 here, so eyes up!
I hope you enjoyed this post! (I guess it's more like a blog! blog post? Plog? Blost??)
What do you think of the tiny stitch? What do you think it would look good on?
Thoughts please...
Yes, I feel that 532 is a little thin for a 4.2mm stitch (which is intended for luggage, cases and trunks), so I think 432 or even the biggest 332 would be better suited in this case.
532 was just the largest size I has on hand in this colour.