I went to take a deer cape out of my tanning solution and I realized I forgot to add the salt. I am using Lutan-F. I remembered the salt in my pickle, then I neutrilized before it went into the tanning solution 2 days ago. I pulled on the hair down at the edge of the cape and it will come out. I added the salt required to the lutan-f solution and put the cape back in. Is it too late? Is there anything else I can do? I can't believe I did this!
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I dont know if leaving the salt out caused the hair to pull out, because all hair will pull out after being soaked in a pickle, then neutrilized in bakeing soda, then tanned. And if you tanned it twice, the longer it is under water, the easer the hair will fall out. I use Lutan F also, and if I pull on any hair, it will come out. In the wet mode, you have to handle the cape very gently while mounting, even when placing ear liners in the ear, be carfull with the hair on the back and inside of the ear if you have to push and tug to get the earliner in. This area will pull out too. Even when in the pickle and tan, stir gently and pick it up from the inside of the cape. After the job is done and dried rock hard, then the hair is truly set and wont come out. Oh, and remember to add some basacryl to the pickle and tan to kill bacteria witch causes hair to fall out also. Use basacryl in all soaks, thin the cape up front so the pickle time is to a minimum, 24 hours, neutrilize 1/2 hour, rince, tan 18 hours with Lutan F is all I do for deer capes. Hope this helps.
I think you are right on the money. After leaving the cape in the tanning solution another night the hair seemed even looser. Not knowing anything else to do I oiled it as normal. That was three days ago and the hair seems to have tightened up quite a bit. Good advice about being careful with the hide in a wet stage. The last deer I put ear liners in I was pulling kind of hard on the hide and rubbed a small patch of hair off. I blamed it on me not fleshing enough or that part of the hide maybe being folded during tanning or something even though I tried real hard not to do either.I was putting a cap full of lysol in the rehydration bath after the salting but if you say basacryl is compatable in all solutions I'll start using that. The directions I have for Lutan-F say 48 hours for deer, moose and elk capes. You would think if that works for moose or elk you could go shorter with deer. I'll try it. One more question, I live in a high humidy area and after double salting and putting a fan on the cape for a couple of days it's pretty dry and stiff but not rock hard. After oiling the cape after tanning I also put a fan on it and it seems to take about a week to dry all the way. Without a fan it's longer. I'm using a minifleshall and feel I'm doing a decent job fleshing. It sure takes me a while. Also do I need to wait till the cape is 100% dry to rehydrate and mount. Sorry this is so long. Thanks for your help!