Snake Skin

[David Hornett]

Has anyone ever tried to use snake skin for bellows leathers?

 

With my latest effort I decided to use snake skin, sea snake fresh from Thailand. The leather is sold as 1mm thick, but it's more like .80mm and comes in many stained colours. The skins average 10mm wide and 100mm long. I chose black and brown. Looks fantastic, and at about $15 a skin, deals can be done, economical: two skins to an instrument, not including the gussets.

 

BUT try to skive it! It skives OK except the material is pulled from between each scale so all one is left with is a matrix of scales held together at the four corners. Rather amazing to look at, especially if held up to the light, but no good for what I want to do, so it seems any snake skin concertina will need to miss skiving.

 

I have found that if the leather is attached to the bellows boards, and they are slightly moistened, and powder dusted on the inside to stop sticking, the bellows can be pressed (I have a large book press) and the leather sinks slightly into the card, almost as good as skiving, but there is still a little to be desired.

 

Any thoughts? Hmm ... maybe I should change my snake?

 

David

 

[David Hornett]

The skins average 10mm wide and 100mm long??

 

Sorry, change to cos please.

 

David

[Chris Ghent]

How airtight is the leather..?

[David Hornett]

Chris,

 

I did my trusted test, placed a skin tightly against the lips and sucked as hard as I could, no movement of air. (But if skived it is totally porous) Then I did a net search, extracts below, but it does appear a very good air barrier -- although I have 8 skins, and on two of them if held up to the light in a few places around the peripheries where they have been pinned and in the centre of the extreme near the tail, are pin holes (where they have been pinned to boards to tan. All the skins have these holes but on two they a further in from the side so if not noted could cause problems.

 

All the best,

 

David

 

PS: enjoy the last extract -- I am certain with a bit of thought its insights could be adapted to the concertina maker.

 

 

Reptiles have keratinous skin that is not permeable to water. Keratine is the same material as mammalian

hair and finger nails. This allows reptiles like sea snakes and crocodiles to live in saline [salty] environments and to not disrupt their homeostasis.

 

Although I believe this extract from Pub Med totally sorted out the issue:

Comparison of the percutaneous absorption of hydrophilic and lipophilic compounds in shed snake skin and human skin.

Ngawhirunpat T1, Panomsuk S, Opanasopit P, Rojanarata T, Hatanaka T.

Author information

Abstract

The in vitro transdermal permeation of eight hydrophilic drugs (antipyrine, L-dopa, dopamine hydrochloride, diclofenac sodium, 5-fluorouracil, isoprenaline hydrochloride, nicorandil and morphine hydrochloride) and eight lipophilic drugs (aminopyrine, cyclobarbital, ibuprofen, indomethacin, isosorbide dinitrate, flurbiprofen, ketoprofen and lignocaine) was determined using shed snake skin of Elaphae obsoleta and human skin. The permeation parameters and physiological characteristics of the skin, e.g. the water and lipid content, and the thickness of shed snake skin and human skin were evaluated and compared. In shed snake skin, the permeability coefficients (P) of lipophilic drugs were in the same range as those through the human skin (0.9 to 1.8-times); whereas those of hydrophilic drugs were remarkably lower (3.3 to 6.1-times). The thickness and lipid content of shed snake skin and human stratum corneum were not significantly different (P > 0.05), whereas the water content of shed snake skin was significantly lower than that of human stratum corneum (P < 0.05). The lower permeability of shed snake skin for hydrophilic compounds might be caused by the lower porosity of skin strata. The results suggested a potential use of shed snake skin as barrier membrane for lipophilic compounds percutaneous absorption studies in vitro.

[Chris Ghent]

Mmm...

[JimLucas]

...enjoy the last extract -- I am certain with a bit of thought its insights could be adapted to the concertina maker.

 

...using shed snake skin ... and human skin.

Just wondering:

• Are the properties of snake skin necessarily identical for all species?
• Are the properties of snake skin necessarily the same for shed skin and that skinned from the animal?
• Where/how did they obtain the human skin?

[mike_s]

Will defer to David for the answers to Jim's questions (especially the human skin one), but would like to see some photos. As an aside, I remember seeing those snakes in the Gulf of Tonkin back in the day. Very poisonous and nasty as I recall, just sayin'..........

[David Hornett]

• Are the properties of snake skin necessarily identical for all species?

According to my most trusted source, the 12 year old daughter, : "There are nearly 3000 species of snakes in the world, Dad." So i will do a bit of testing and get back to you, Jim, might take a while though.

• Are the properties of snake skin necessarily the same for shed skin and that skinned from the animal?

No idea and a little late in the year in Tasmania to do the research. Hmmm ... Do sea snakes shed their skin

 

• Where/how did they obtain the human skin?

Assuming they compared shed skin with shed skin, then from a very sunburnt human three days into the Australian Christmas holiday season.

 

​Photos Mike, sorry I have cut all the binding and belly strips already, but if you go onto eBay and type in 'snake leather', the material from Thailand, (snake not python), seems to be a difference, is the stuff i am using, well trying to use: "glossy black".

 

​And yes, they are very poisonous and nasty, but interestingly, apparently when they bite, unless very excited, they don't usually inject poison so there are few fatalities, according to Wiki. I have seen the yellow bellied variety washed up on Australian beaches and also when fishing around the barrier reef, there are a lot of them in the sea: certainly not the most friendly looking animal: but then would you be if you thought you might be stripped down to cover a concertina bellows?

 

Have a great day.

 

David

[JimLucas]

...certainly not the most friendly looking animal: but then would you be if you thought you might be stripped down to cover a concertina bellows?

 

Well, it would presumably give the creature a much longer "life" than if it simply died "in the wild".