Making a strap

[Invité]

Hello everybody !

I’m Cristian from JabbaStraps.
Some time ago, a colleague of forum asked me why I’m not posting about how a strap is made.
To be honest, I think there are several strapmakers older in branch, on this forum, and I expected that one of them do that.
Please notice that is not the only way of making straps, I will show MY WAY of making straps
From the beginning, I ask apologies for the pictures quality, as I’m a lousy photographer
1. Choosing the leather
I pick the hides from a tannery that’s in Bucharest, only few km from my home.
I only use cow leather, and especially a sort named CRUST, meaning the leather was not finished as for shoes or bags making, was not finally painted, it keeps the character of original hide. At this moment, only some mechanical treatments and sometimes some waxes are applied on the leather, making it very “workable” for the strapmaker.
A hide is half of the animal skin, around 1.7-2 sqm
When choosing the hide is important also the thickness-I prefer 1.8-2.2 mm thick.
If the hide is too thick, they can lower the thickness, and the stiffness, very quick, in a mechanical process, like rolling the metal sheets, combined with multiple little hammers-hope you will imagine

2. Tailoring the strap
As I’m making usually straps from about 2 mm thick leather, when bending, total thickness will be double. Therefore, dimensions for the strap sides will be-at me- 135-145/75-85, depending on customer wrist measure. A thicker strap always need to increase the length of strap sides.
So, first I cut a piece about 300x30 mm, for the long side of the strap, and a 200x30, for the buckle side.



For the long side:
Piece of leather will be bended in two even pieces, then glued.



After gluing, is pressed with a wheel, and keep pressed between 2 plates for a couple of hours to insure a better adhesion.
Then, I cut a straight side, measure the width and cut the other side



Depending on leather, and finishing process, sometimes I cut the width +1, or -1 mm, as the leather could “spread” or shrink after stitching or edge burnishing .
Then, I cut the tip, in different ways, using a template, or a shaped chisel.







3. Stitching holes
First I’m marking a stitch line, on a 2, 2.5 or 3 mm offset line from the edges, and the beginning of the stitch on the lugs area.
Then, I mark the stitch holes, using a tool named “overstitch wheel”, for which I have some interchangeable wheels, with different step size-(4, 4.5, 5 mm).
Holes will be made using an awl, on marks.
Awls have different point shapes; I use “diamond “ shape, and regular shape as well, depending on the strap and stitch model.





4.Holes for the tang buckle
For punching the tang holes, I use a rotating multi-head puncher, but any puncher will give good results.
Usually use the 3 mm diameter, as most of my straps are made for big watches, and Panerai style buckles.







5. Finishing the surface look
That depends on the model, I’m using different dyeing, oiling, burnishing or buffing techniques.





6.Finishing the edges
Depending on the strap model, edges can be
raw cutted,
burnished
dyed

In this case, edges are slightly burnished

For stitching I use nylon thread, semi waxed or fully waxed, due to the hand stitching technique, which is so called “saddle stitch”.







This is the old way of stitching leather, using two needles, as shown below (image took from “The art of hand sewing leather”, by Al Stohlman):





As you can see, this way of sewing is better than the “lock stitch”, made by a sewing machine, because once the thread broken, the thread will not get loose but on single side of material, stitch on the other side will hold.

All steps are the same for the buckle part, except that on the overlapped area, on the buckle end, leather must be taper skived, to obtain a similar thickness with the rest of the strap.





I personally taper just one side, the other remain at the same thickness, to assure the needed space for a fixed keeper or a buckle.
8.Making the keepers
For the keepers, same leather is used, cutted in stripes.
Then both sides will be putted one near the other, to obtain the needed thickness, then the stripe is measured, cutted, skived, finished if necessary, glued and stitched.
Depending on the model, keepers could be one fixed-one loose, two loose, one wider loose, etc.
And…finally…the assembling of the strap on the watch.









See how same leather, treated the same , can look different-irregularities on surface look different; one was dyed before anything(white stitched), and one was dyed just before stitching, after all tailoring steps(brown stitching).







Hope I didn’t bother you with this long post.
Thanks for reading
Cristian-JABBA STRAPS

[enzo]

Nice jobs and pretty look those straps....

[Invité]

amazing job

[Fab75]

Very interesting post, congratulations for the job done. Your strap suit very well the Legend Diver.
Kind regards
Fabrice

[Jean-Michel]

nice job, thanks for sharing with us

[tartine.74]

Thanks for sharing and explaining... It gives me many ideas...

Nicolas

[Invité]

Thanks for sharing and explaining... It gives me many ideas...

Nicolas

Yes, you'll make your own strap now...with a swing of your awl...

[Invité]

Nice work, thank you for sharing. Your watch is really nice with this strap

[Invité]

Nice work, thank you for sharing. Your watch is really nice with this strap

Thank you all

[Invité]

Very nice ! Thank you for sharing !

Lionel

[dante]

Thanks a lot for your explanation

Je propose qu'à terme ce fil soit conservé à part, dans une rubrique mode d'emploi; ce serait dommage qu'il disparaisse dans les profondeurs vu la qualité des explications

[Petit Fred]

Very nice !

Thank's

[Tightyjo]

Very interesting, great job and nice pics ! Thanks a lot for sharing.
Fully agree with Dante, this post should be moved in a tutorial part of the forum (maybe in this one: Technique, vintage, anciennes / technical, vintage watches).

[time2tic]

fantastic post Jabba. thanks very much.
(I tried to get info on how to do the saddle stitching but could never get my head around the 2 needle stitching).

really nice work!
This post is a reference, for sure!

[birdy1962]

thank you for your post !
i don't understand all, because i don't speak english !
i try to translate by google a another day !


greeting from swiss !

[Fabrice]

nice strap, nice work, thanx for sharing that!!!!

[Invité]

Thank you for the presentation of work you one.

j aime bien les cuirs sur montre

[Invité]

thanks for sharing !

C'est un beau tutoriel pour faire des bracelets robustes et rustiques. Donc adaptés aux montres de plongée.

En revanche, si je peux me permettre, d'autres méthodes sont utilisées pour les bracelets un peu plus "fins".

[Invité]

thanks for sharing !

C'est un beau tutoriel pour faire des bracelets robustes et rustiques. Donc adaptés aux montres de plongée.

En revanche, si je peux me permettre, d'autres méthodes sont utilisées pour les bracelets un peu plus "fins".

Thank you for your kind words!
But a tutorial...too much said...more some informations.

Always eager to learn more!
Share with us, I'm sure it will be very interesting.

Best,
Cristian

[time2tic]

En revanche, si je peux me permettre, d'autres méthodes sont utilisées pour les bracelets un peu plus "fins".

si t'as plus d'infos o est preneur.

[Invité]

J'ai fait un petit post dans la rubrique technique a ce sujet.
Vous pourrez voir un petit reportage sur la confection d'un croco fait main par l'artisane qui me fait mes bracelets.

JM.

[logan]

Very nice job !!!

[Invité]

May i ask a small question ?

Why dont you do the internal side a little bit shorter (before gluing) to shape perfectly the wrist ?

Regards
Colonia

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