Skiving

Skiving is the process of thinning vegetable-tanned leather. Thinned leather is useful for achieving a uniform thickness in advanced projects, and creating a flat fold for straps, such as around buckles. Skivers come in two versions, handheld and bench mounted.

Materials

Vegetable-tanned leather

Tools

Handheld skiver

Clamps

Mechanical pencil

Bench-mounted strap skiver

USING A HANDHELD SKIVER

A handheld skiver is ideal to use if you are trying to skive a small section from a large piece of leather or an irregular shape, but will also work for skiving straps. It is less expensive and bulky than a bench-mounted skiver.

1 Secure leather for freehand skiving. Using a handheld skiver is similar to using a razor. It is not adjustable, so to get the right thickness, you may have to go over the leather more than once. Place the leather rough side up on the work surface and secure it with clamps.

2 Skive freehand. Hold the handheld skiver with the blade facing you. Exert downward pressure and pull toward you, from the marked line to the edges of the leather. Make sure to keep your hands safely out of the way at all times.

3 Repeat as necessary. Repeat, going over the marked skiving area with the handheld skiver as many times as necessary, shaving one thickness of leather at a time, until you reach the desired thickness.

USING A BENCH-MOUNTED SKIVER

Bench-mounted skivers work best on straps. Use a strap no wider than the width of the bench-mounted skiver blade.

1 Adjust the bench-mounted skiver. Adjust the bench-mounted blade height to your desired thickness. Test the thickness of the cut on a piece of scrap leather by inserting with rough side facing up and pulling toward you. Skiving with dull blades is very difficult, and poorly aligned blades will skive the leather into a wedge shape.

2 Insert the strap. Insert the strap into the skiver by lowering the rolling pin with the thumb lever, with the rough side facing up. If skiving only a specific area, insert it up to the mark made in Step 1. Release the lever, securing the leather against the blade.

3 Skive the leather. Pull the strap toward you with confidence. The most difficult part is getting it started. Gently wiggling the strap back and forth just a few degrees left and right may make it easier to start.

4 Skive the other side of the strap, if necessary. When skiving an entire strap, turn the belt around, put it into the skiver again, and skive the rest of the strap up to where it was skived in Step 4.