Broke out a strap nose last night with some abusive guitar-shaking and neck-bending tomfoolery, which is probably not recommended by anyone, for anyone. But, in this case I am in a musical contest/journey on another forum, similar to "Do Something" and the latest challenge is to "Tame the Monster" or try to force feedback into something musical - so playing around with ideas on that. And as a result, here's what happened - big ol' nose leather bust-out!
This is one of the few cheapy hootenanny straps I keep around here for kicks, also to remind me why I started building straps over dozen years ago for myself, and now for many others. I was asked if it was chrome-tanned leather or vegtan, and I suspect chrome. There is a burn test to find out but I don't want to stink up my shop worse than it already is LOL. Doesn't matter much anyway. It's not the type of tannage here in my opinion, but the choice of leather the manufacturer decided was "good enough" for a strap end.
Here is a measurement, I estimated it was 2mm, but it turns out more like 1.75 mm thick.
Music shop owners have told me strap manufacturers have steadily gone to thinner and thinner ends because the #1 reason guitar straps get returned to stores is, "It's too hard to get on the button." When a guitar strap gets returned, retailers return it to the strap company for compensation. Strap companies HATE that. Music stores don't mind these thinner ends because selling straps with flimsy ends gives them a fantastic opportunity to bundle in strap locks, which are high margin items, But anyone with any sense should know this absolutely does NOT address the problem, and only gives guitarists a false sense of security.
Here's one of my typical nose ends on a strap I built yesterday, shipped to Californy this morning.
Not the best camera angle, but it's a little under 4.5 for millimeters, or about 3 times as thick. Try as I might, I'd probably bust the neck bolts out of my strat, before this nose would give way. I'm pretty sure I would not pull the button/screw out, because i have Well-Hung Pro-pins installed (a jumbo strap button of my own design). Here's the two nose ends side by side.
As you can see, a SIGNIFICANT difference. The broken nose leather, even doubled-over by the rivets is still not as thick as my strap nose leather - but it is at least one piece of leather.
But, in looking even closer at the other end I found another concern I didn't even realize.
On the tail end, (and I believe this is fairly common construction in nose or tail). See how the leather is two pieces sandwiched together? Combined, it is a bit thicker than the nose leather, say that 2mm, but that is built up of two thin pieces laminated together.
I also laminate leather in my shop from time-to-time. But there's no way I'd say two 1mm pieces of leather, no matter what kind of glue, how much sewing, or how many rivets is enough. But still, so far it has held my guitars. A broken strap end is no big deal for me. I have all the materials, tools and know-how to repair. Now that I have to swap in new nose leather, I'll change out the tail side leather for better too. once I get to it.
Anyway, all that is just a little food for thought. I never thought to look closely at the strap ends, and I'm in the friggin business LOL!
New in the reverb store today was "SwaggerMan" Mahogany. Custom order, sorry. I build these out of a special 3" wide fashion belt as I can source them. I love this strap so much, I've kept back two of them for my personal collection, a black and saddle brown. When this belt came in, ordered for a special customer in the UK, I so wanted to say.. "Deal's off" I'm keeping it for myself LOL
It really is something special. Patina is so great.
Mid-Evil Black is now in the Reverb store. An original Well-Hung design. Bold, macho, padded! That's sometimes an issue with "aggressive-looking" straps. They can feel aggressive on the shoulder too.
