Lightening leather

[Cloudfeather]

I made myself an archery bracer a few months back that had an engraving of a falcon and some ivy leaves. My brother is pretty good with leather work, so I had him seal it for me. The oil and sealer he used ended up making it much darker than I wanted. Is there any way to lighten it up or am I stuck with it? I can post a couple pics if that helps any. Thanks.

[JW_Halverson]

Short of going back in time and not adding the oil, no. 

Oh wait, you can paint it!

[madcrow]

You could always put it on the trade blanket and make yourself a new one.  Usually when I am finish tooling something, I did it in melted wax and tehn rub it in.  Its sealed and turns out the medium brown color that I want.

[Cloudfeather]

I was actually thinking of giving it to someone and making a new one. Had a blast carving it.

[Cameroo]

I had the same thing happen to me with a wallet I made.  Someone told me to cover it in salt.  I never did try it because it was a gift for someone else, and the recipient didn't have a problem with the color.  So I'm not sure how well this works, but it wouldn't hurt to try. 

I learned that lesson the hard way too.  It's locked in the ol' memory bank now though

[YosemiteBen]

pic?

[BowEd]

If you want that light colored look...I've used beef rawhide 1/8th" thick slotted with short knapped sheepskin contact cemented on the inside of bracer.If your getting smacked once in a while from the string the padding from the sheepskin deadens it completely.The slots lets your arm breath underneath the bracer too.

[Cloudfeather]

I don't even use the bracer anymore. It's not that I want a light look. It's that the darkness from the oil makes the engraving very hard to see, that's my only issue with it.

[Cloudfeather]

Here's the before and after oil and seal

[danny f]

 nice bracer. i think it looks better dark.

[Cloudfeather]

Don't get me wrong, I dig the dark color too. I just wish it wouldn't have muted out the carving as much as it did. Any good sources of info for doing different colors on a piece of leather? Paint, dye, etc?

[BowEd]

You may have already but Tandy Leather deals with this all the time.Ask them.

[bubby]

way back in the day we would hit the areas we wanted lighter with some neatlac, probably don't even make it any more, then stained over the whole pc shaded/tooled areas would be darker than the flats, bub