Thoughts on a Radiomir Strap I made :D

[graphite]

Hey all. I've dabbled here and there in some amateur strap making and wondered what you all thought.

One of my main pet peeves for radiomir straps are ones that are 26mm (like many of the aftermarket ones). I like the strap to reach the entire width of the lugs such that they are tight against the wires, i.e. be 27mm.

The other peeve I have is when the leather around the wires begin to stretch/wear. When this happens, the watch has a small amount of space for the watch to wiggle in there... I hate that. The slack just bothers me -- I'd prefer the leather strap to fit very snugly around the wire lugs. I still haven't figured out a solution to this leather stretch/wear. I'm thinking that over time and use, the leather is naturally going to give. I tried making this strap out of very thick leather in hopes that it would be more resistant to any stretch, but time will tell.


I dyed the leather with "buffalo brown" water based dye. Afterwards, I gave it a coat of Fiebing's acrylic resolene for a little water resistance. I don't really care for how the finish came out due to the resolene. I have to admit I did a pretty amateur job in the dye, so in some spots it's splotchy or uneven. I'm ok with this, as I like the worn-in look, and given time I think the color is going to pick up some nice character.

The edges of the strap are burnished with a bit of gum of tragacanth.

In order to make the strap fit to my specs, I had to taper one end. So the strap-end is like 28mm (squishes a bit between the lugs) and then tapers down to 26mm to fit the buckle. The buckle-end is just 28mm both sides, again squished a little (on purpose).


This ended up a very beefy strap. The best part about custom straps is having *one* hole -- to fit my wrist!


Any thoughts or improvement?

[enzo panuccio]

love it!

what a brilliant effort graphite.

I love dark browns which are so dark they almost look black, so that buffalo brown is stunning.
And the attention to width sizing so that it doesn't "wiggle."
the attention to edging
the attention to the dye colour, spots and water resistance
the burnishing
...you're obviously a nutter!

I like nutters,
they make OCD me feel more normal!


roger

[eXis10z]

i love it! it sorts of "toughens" up the rad to make it worthy bro of the luminor. Can we have more pics?

[Carson]

Like the color! I'm a fan of 1 hole straps myself.

[stilo]

i love it! it sorts of "toughens" up the rad to make it worthy bro of the luminor. Can we have more pics?

+1

[EL_Chingon]

Looks great, I also like it you the NATO strap, and how you customized it. I am working on my own, but with canvas material.

[graphite]

i love it! it sorts of "toughens" up the rad to make it worthy bro of the luminor. Can we have more pics?

ok

i dunno why imgur made all the images sideways.

[AAWATCHES]

Great looking strap, I am working on one myself so it helps to see good ones to get ideas from. thx.

[stilo]

Is that a Panerai logo sticker on your car?

[graphite]

yup