congaplace.com

Hey guys,
I'm just curious about effect of soaking and drying of a new skin.
I bought a cow skin which was 2.5-2.8mm trick. I soaked it to put it on the drum and it came to approx 3.5-4mm after drying.
So when someone tells you that you need cetrain thickness, does it mean "after or before"?

Thank you

Mario

Mario2CP wrote:So when someone tells you that you need cetrain thickness, does it mean "after or before"?

Mario,
Usually that means before, because the final thickness depends on how long you soak it,
but also on the type of skin (i.e. the animal it was taken from).

How long are you soaking for ?
a 22 inch round @ 5oz or about 2mm shoulnd not need more than 4-5 hrs. Mule or Cow.... not saying its the easiest to mount at that point but any longer in water any you start breakinf down the fibers and thats not good

Very tough mule hide needs appr. 6 hours of soaking or even more, otherwise
mounting becomes a major struggle!

I planned to soak it for 6hrs but i found it very hard to put the skin on so i gave it 2 extra hrs. My supplyer told me to soak the skin for 12 hrs, so 8 hrs seemed to be fine.

Mario

Mario2CP wrote:I planned to soak it for 6hrs but i found it very hard to put the skin on so i gave it 2 extra hrs. My supplyer told me to soak the skin for 12 hrs, so 8 hrs seemed to be fine.

Mario

Yes, if the dry skin is already up to 2.8mm thick like the one you mention in your first post, it will definitely need 8 hours soaking time.
Having that said, oversoaking should be avoided, as the skin gets too thick then.

Hi Mario,

are you really sure that the entire skin has increased in thickness? Sometimes it's just the cut border of the skin that looks like swollen.

Thomas

Thomas is right, many times the final cut edge appears to be thicker than playing surface is.

Some skin do retract after drying, and some stay thicker than prior to mounting. They retract fully in about a month or so. That really depends on the individual skin though.

There's a new method I learned to not soak in full water anymore- i.e. I soak the skin underwater to a point that its about half way there, then take it out of the water and put it in a tightly closed plastic bag. This keeps the skin moist and keeps getting maleable (sp?), yet does not suck up more water.

I did this method with a bongos macho mule. Put underwater for 20 minutes and in a plastic bag for about 40 minutes. It as the easiest mounting I ever did.
Will try this on a conga skin soon to confirm the method.
T

Tonio let us know how that works out on a conga skin I'm very curious to see how well it works.

Thomas Altmann wrote:Hi Mario,

are you really sure that the entire skin has increased in thickness? Sometimes it's just the cut border of the skin that looks like swollen.

Thomas

yes, i meassured thickness of the skin parts i cut off on the other side than cut. Plus you can tell by eye. Btw not only the thickness changed, but also colour- from dark brown to yellow as you can see viewtopic.php?f=14&t=4713&start=15 (left drum)