What Hat Are You Working On Today?

[singlechange]

Nice cleaning done on your abused Resistol trilby . Wore this vintage Supernatural panama that I found on Mercari.com to Whole Foods in East Coast summer with 98% humidity. Though not really abused, rescued it for $25.00 on mercari.com. A two tiny chips broken off brim edge and a lot of aging patina. The label says EQUADORIAN PANAMA HAT CO, Supernatural, Genuine Panama, NEW YORK.

 

[RickP]

Nice cleaning done on your abused Resistol trilby . Wore this vintage Supernatural panama that I found on Mercari.com to Whole Foods in East Coast summer with 98% humidity. Though not really abused, rescued it for $25.00 on mercari.com. A two tiny chips broken off brim edge and a lot of aging patina. The label says EQUADORIAN PANAMA HAT CO, Supernatural, Genuine Panama, NEW YORK.

Nice straw.... fyi I have used this clear fabric adhesive on leather, felt and straw for all sorts of repairs, patches and plugs .

For straw hats with broken fibers I had good luck working a drop into the weave, the blotting off any excess, covering the area with a piece of waxed paper and weighting or clamping it down till dried. pretty much invisible when dry. If you dont already have any you can get it at any good fabric store. Handy stuff for straw season

 

[Hurricane Jack]

…covering the area with a piece of waxed paper and weighting or clamping it down till dried.

I’ve glued & clamped a lot of stuff with waxed paper. I would only add to make sure to face the waxed side of the paper towards the glue, for easy removal.

 

[RickP]

I’ve glued & clamped a lot of stuff with waxed paper. I would only add to make sure to face the waxed side of the paper towards the glue, for easy removal.

Good point.... Ive been wondering if the glue would work with parchment paper... or would it stick too it too much. Now that I think about it, a couple of the little thin silicone round jar openers/ heat pads would be great for this

 

[singlechange]

Nice straw.... fyi I have used this clear fabric adhesive on leather, felt and straw for all sorts of repairs, patches and plugs .

For straw hats with broken fibers I had good luck working a drop into the weave, the blotting off any excess, covering the area with a piece of waxed paper and weighting or clamping it down till dried. pretty much invisible when dry. If you dont already have any you can get it at any good fabric store. Handy stuff for straw season

View attachment 716982

Order placed for Fabri-Tac. Thank you.

 

[Hurricane Jack]

Good point.... Ive been wondering if the glue would work with parchment paper... or would it stick too it too much

Don’t know about parchment paper. Butcher paper has a shiny side & I tried it once. It will stick.

 

[Hurricane Jack]

This Resistol is still drying a bit but just about ready for the next phase, to be smoothed & shaped.

From this:

To this now:

Ll

 

[shopkin]

Don’t know about parchment paper. Butcher paper has a shiny side & I tried it once. It will stick.

I would be inclined to use as little glue as possible. Work a tiny bit into the straw with a needle or sharpened toothpick. Squashing it with paper will spread the glue out and make the spot more noticeable.

 

[RickP]

I would be inclined to use as little glue as possible. Work a tiny bit into the straw with a needle or sharpened toothpick. Squashing it with paper will spread the glue out and make the spot more noticeable.

Absolutely as little adhesive as possible! It doesnt take much. We dont want a 1/4" blob lol. Main idea is to resecure broken strands back in place so they dont get worse. The Fabric Tac just needs to be held in pposition till its tacked up. Ive used it on a few cracked straws ( cracks at edges of a crease) by working from the inside of the crown where its not noticable. If its on a brim, I try to work from the underside

 

[RickP]

Pulled a little brim maintenance today. Had some soft hats that had picked a little brim waviness from sitting on he wall rack a bit too long ( 4 really soft Stetson Temples, An old Stetson/ LLBean/Moose River, and a newer Stetson Roadster B). Always fun to steam and brim board a snap brim back to spec. Checked all the Open Roads while I was at it but they were all fine. Every things all back up to snuff now ( at least these hats are lol). Kind of like painting the golden Gate Bridge... when I finish one end of the wall its time to start back over on the other end.

 

[RickP]

I like Temples if you cant tell lol

 

[Hurricane Jack]

Great blocking on this Resistol. Unfortunately the tag has been torn out so I don’t know the model. Advertised as a 3” brim it’s really a dimensional 3/3.25 RE x 6 OC. Now a center crease with forward set elephant ear dents. Need to fill a couple of moth nibbles, & decide if I want to attempt a hand formed pencil curl or a slight flange with fender sides.

 

[belfastboy]

Today I finish my first "Duplex"...a Grade 2 Panama crown on a 115gr 50/50 beaver blend crown in Willow. I am making this just to scratch that itch. I doubt I will add the Duplex to my offering but it was a fun experience.

 

[belfastboy]

I just placed the final stitch in the ribbon of this "Duplex" hat. I trimmed it with vintage French grosgrain in a dark green that perfectly complements the soft Willow green felt.
I am leaving the 3" brim flat for now but may add a 1/4" pencil curl

 

[RickP]

I sanded off some felt fibers from inside the crown of the little Knox Stewart and got the "top front" hole filled and reworked the crown to roll that spot from "up front and visible" to "up top and out of sight". Perfectly usable now... Just need to figure out what Ill do with the creases... leaning toward a couple lengthwise side creases ( sort of cattlemens crease-ish)

 

[jeffgarf]

I sanded off some felt fibers from inside the crown of the little Knox Stewart and got the "top front" hole filled and reworked the crown to roll that spot from "up front and visible" to "up top and out of sight". Perfectably usable now... Just need to figure out what Ill do with the creases... leaning toward a couple lenghtwise side creases ( sort of cattlemens crease-ish)

View attachment 719899 View attachment 719898

Looking good, so far.

 

[Blare]

I sanded off some felt fibers from inside the crown of the little Knox Stewart and got the "top front" hole filled and reworked the crown to roll that spot from "up front and visible" to "up top and out of sight". Perfectly usable now... Just need to figure out what Ill do with the creases... leaning toward a couple lengthwise side creases ( sort of cattlemens crease-ish)

View attachment 719899 View attachment 719898

Great… What did you use as adhesive to hold the fibers in the hole.

 

[RickP]

Great… What did you use as adhesive to hold the fibers in the hole.

Ive used the FabriTac for years on leather and sewing projects. Its pretty thick stuff that sets pretty quickly. Its not meant to be a strong glue, but more of a positioning adhesive to hold things where they are. it binds to fur felt fibers pretty well... just dont use too much volume.

To start I temporarily apply a piece or tape inside the hat to act as a backing and cover the back of the hole. If you let it tack up first, you can then roll up some of the fibers between the fingers and apply an ever so small dab of adhesive on the "tail" which is then stuffed down into the hole where is bonds with the tacked up adhesive. This method means there is no glue oozing out and up to the surface. Give it a bit of time and you can trim just above flush with a razor... then tap down flat and really careful sand with some 800 or 1000 grit paper

In a perfect world the best method ive found is to punch a new perfect hole and then punch out a perfectly sized matching plug from spare felt. the plug should be slightly thicker than the holy felt. once adhesive is tacked up, I use a polished face hammer and gently tap to smash it down flush and squeeze it out for a better fit. Heres a few pics of a badly abused Stetson Tijuana that came to my possession a while back. Someone had cut the brim down to 1-1/4" and physically pulled the stitched felt hatband off resulting in several holes in the crown and a 2-1/2" long tear in the brim/ crown junction. I reblocked the crown shorter to gain some brim width. With the tear now down flat on the brim, I carefully got the edges re glued, and used the old felt hatband as a donor piece to punch out plugs to fill the holes made from the ripped out hatband.

As arrived;

I dug around my spares bin and found a brim trimming that was close to the thickness of the felt , very carefully sewed and glued it on with very small thread, and gained over 1/4" more brim width...... covered the patch by sewing on a bound edge grosgrain.. Here below you can see the finished job with about 10 plugged patches and the big tear. Not perfect but a hat that was destined for the trash bin, got a new life.

Now:

Since this one Ive improved my brim binding stitch skills lol

Its far from a perfect process, but its salvaged a few really bad hats from sad ebay purchases.

 

[Blare]

Ive used the FabriTac for years on leather and sewing projects. Its pretty thick stuff that sets pretty quickly. Its not meant to be a strong glue, but more of a positioning adhesive to hold things where they are. it binds to fur felt fibers pretty well... just dont use too much volume.
View attachment 719904
To start I temporarily apply a piece or tape inside the hat to act as a backing and cover the back of the hole. If you let it tack up first, you can then roll up some of the fibers between the fingers and apply an ever so small dab of adhesive on the "tail" which is then stuffed down into the hole where is bonds with the tacked up adhesive. This method means there is no glue oozing out and up to the surface. Give it a bit of time and you can trim just above flush with a razor... then tap down flat and really careful sand with some 800 or 1000 grit paper

In a perfect world the best method ive found is to punch a new perfect hole and then punch out a perfectly sized matching plug from spare felt. the plug should be slightly thicker than the holy felt. once adhesive is tacked up, I use a polished face hammer and gently tap to smash it down flush and squeeze it out for a better fit. Heres a few pics of a badly abused Stetson Tijuana that came to my possession a while back. Someone had cut the brim down to 1-1/4" and physically pulled the stitched felt hatband off resulting in several holes in the crown and a 2-1/2" long tear in the brim/ crown junction. I reblocked the crown shorter to gain some brim width. With the tear now down flat on the brim, I carefully got the edges re glued, and used the old felt hatband as a donor piece to punch out plugs to fill the holes made from the ripped out hatband.

As arrived;
View attachment 719911 View attachment 719912

I dug around my spares bin and found a brim trimming that was close to the thickness of the felt , very carefully sewed and glued it on with very small thread, and gained over 1/4" more brim width...... covered the patch by sewing on a bound edge grosgrain.. Here below you can see the finished job with about 10 plugged patches and the big tear. Not perfect but a hat that was destined for the trash bin, got a new life.

Now:
View attachment 719915 View attachment 719914 View attachment 719916


Since this one Ive improved my brim binding stitch skills lol

Its far from a perfect process, but its salvaged a few really bad hats from sad ebay purchases.

Great improvement on that rebuild.

 

[Dmytro]

It seems a little tricky but would allow the reed to still rest on the brink break.