I have begun making more and more out of leather in the past years. Part of it is for our little company, where I change zippers in riding boots and occasionally make other small repair jobs on shoes and boots etc.
Gustav had an old set of riding boots where the sole had come halfway off, I have kept them in the workshop for about a year, with the intention of one day taking them apart and see if I could use them as template and make a new pair. But in the mean time I got inspired to try and fix them myself.
First the sole was removed by means of a set of pliers.
The insole needed to be replaced as did the midsole. both of these were made of some cardboard like material. Kind of surprising actually that a set of decent boots are made with such crappy materials.
Another thing that was surprising was the fact that the insole and the uppers weren't sewn. it all relied on glue to hold the boot together.
I made a new insole form a piece of vegetable tanned leather and glued it into place. Then I used an awl with a hook to sew it in place. The steel stiffener was glued in place and the voids were filled with some small scraps of leather. I had tried to make my own filler putty of of some PVA glue, sawdust and a bit of latex paint. After about a day I decided that I didn't trust that enough, so I removed it again. In addition to being difficult to remove, it left an ugly white deposit on the lower part of the boot. (So much for that experiment).
The next thing to come on was the midsole that I also made out of a piece of vegetable tanned leather. With that in place, the underside was sanded using a sanding wheel. This was done to get nice flowing curves and make sure that it would fit the rubber sole that was also going to be glued on.
I don't have a heel press for shoes and boots, so all the pressing of the contact glue was done by means of a hammer.
Finally the boots got some long needed black leather grease, and now they will hopefully last a couple of seasons more.
Sole, inner lining, midsole, insole (with the metal stiffener on top)
Very interesting, I've wondered how shoes and boots are assembled and how many parts are hidden in them. The leather insole seems like it will be more comfortable than the original.
ReplyDeleteHi Jeff
DeleteI am fairly new in the shoe repairing business, but I find it really interesting.
The main difference compared to woodworking is that you can stretch and compress much more. Which can be a bit daunting since you can easily change the shape or the size if you put a stitch the wrong place and thereby change e.g. the width of the shoe.
I will probably try to make a set of lasts out of wood at some point, so I can try to make some shoes or boots from scratch.
Brgds Jonas