Girth or Rope Belt Information

  • Thread starter Migrate from As You Wish
  • Start date
Has anybody tried using TINTEX fabric dye?

I plan on dyeing the horse girth in ROTJ color, should i use
Cardinal or Scarlet Red?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
As I have gone through a number of girths I thought I'd make a few comments. The brown girth mentioend at the top of this thread looks like crap. I owned one. It is slick and very glossy and as someone else mentioned it is synthtic so there is absolutely NOTHING you can do with it to change the color aside from piant it.

The mohair girth is definitely the way to go. However, the first few mohair girths I went through did not accept dye well. I laid them for HOURS in tubs of hot water with dye in them. I even went as far as buying one of those giant turkey pans and placing the girth in it and it in the overn. While the girth accept a bit of the dye it was only a little.

Finally I just broke down and bought a giant pot (with lid) and took anohter girth and the dye took extremely well. The secret is constant heat and a LOT of it. Once I started useing the pot and dying my girths on the stoves I have never had a problem with them accepting dye.

You can find more info on this here:
http://tdh.prop-planet.com/viewtopic.php?topic=1408&forum=3
 
Last edited:
For those of you who have had a successful with the girth, what size is everyone buying? My waist is about 33-34in, so I'm trying to figure out what length of girth to buy. This is assuming that when I boil it, I will have the fixture set up to keep it from shinking. Any suggestions?

FYI to all interested:
The State Line Tack girth appears to be 60% rayon / 40% wool - this may not be the most desirable for dying. The Rider Supply girth appears to be 100% mohair wool - may be better for dying!
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Hammerhead,

I just ordered a replacement girth from StatelineTack. I ordered the 38" one. My waist is around 36", and I remember the last belt I ordered gave me about 4 inches to play around with.

If it shrinks from dying, I will make adjustments to the connectors.

When my belt comes in, I will do measurements for my waist and girth size, it might help you a little in sizing.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
That would be much appreciated. (y)

What I'm struggling with is that I know there should be a gap in the back between the ends of the girth buckles, a gap which is bridged by pieces of leather strap about 4-6 inches long. I also know that the girth needs to sit a bit lower on your hips than a regular belt would, so it that needs to be taken into account.

To me, the difficult part is, how do I determine what length of girth to start with, if I want the gap in the back to appear correct? Especially when shrink may need to be factored in. Starting with a 38-inch long girth may, in my case (34-inch waist) be too long, unless you could somehow determine what length of girth you wanted after shrinkage, and could control the shrinkage to that amount.

Has anyone else had to deal with all of this? :confused
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I'm still waiting on my new girth to come in. Maybe today.

For my old one, I sewed a couple cloth pieces together, and added Velcro. There's enough Velcro on the crossover pieces to allow me to gain or lose a few pounds without ruining the effect.

However, if I ever catch anyone looking at my booty THAT close, I'll have to whip out the jammy and flat-blast ya.

On a different note, is there a preferred dye method for ROTJ belts? I read somewhere I should start with Rit Cardinal Red...
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I'm not sure of what the shrink ratio is, but I've been told it can be quite substantial if you're not careful. I got lucky and bought mine pre-dyed so all I had to do was add the straps.

I would recommend temporarily adding the belts/straps to the girth (before you dye it) and see how much you want to shrink it. Now remove the straps. Measure out the total desired length on a board (a 2x6 would probably be ideal) and mark it. Now dye it. Afterwards (and while it is still wet), attach it to the board via nails through the metal rings, and it will dry to that length on its own. If you let it dry out without limiting the amount of shrinkage, it could (and probably will) shrink more than you planned. If that does happen, you'll just have to use longer leather (or nylon) belts/straps to make up the difference.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Just an update- still waiting on the girth to arrive from StateLine Tack. I was hoping it would come in yesterday, since I was workin from home. Maybe today, and then I will post 'un-dyed' measurement from actual end-to-end with and without buckles, as compared to the 'listed' length.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
batninja, that would be great.

My concern is that if I order one of the 100% Mohair wool girths (which sounds like the best option in terms of accomplishing the dying), then do I really want one that is "38 inches" long, as the Rider Supply site shows? If it starts at 38 inches, and I'm going to need something LESS than 34 inches to both fit my waist and leave the appropriate gap in the back, then it seems that the girth is going to need to shrink at least 4 inches from its original length, probably more like 8 inches!

Does this seem possible? Has anyone found a place that sells 14-strand 100% Mohair wool girths that are less than 38 inches long?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I bought a girth from Rider Supply and just a couple of days ago, I tried to dye it ROTJ style (came out the wrong color by the way, I tried the bottle of RIT wine + a package of cocoa brown):facepalm
It came exactly at 38" end to end.
I prepared a piece of 6" X 40" plywood that we had lying around the shop and drilled screws (2 per buckle) to prepare for the extreme shrinkage I was expecting.
So far it has only shrunk 2", maybe less, and I've died it twice already. My waist is no where near that, especially since I wanted an extra gap.

But, if my sweaters and shirts have anything to say, its that I can shrink anything, wool or otherwise:D
 
Last edited by a moderator:
UPS just dropped off my girth (while I was, um, indisposed). Here's a diagram of the sizing, for those who need it. VashDstampede is correct. It is to the inch, buckle to buckle.

girthsize.jpg


I hope this helps.
 
Last edited by a moderator:

Hammerhead wrote:

Has anyone found a place that sells 14-strand 100% Mohair wool girths that are less than 38 inches long?

Hammerhead--check this site out:

http://www.buytack.com/products/saddle1/mc/english.htm

I got a 100% wool mohair girth 30" length. It ended up being about thirty bucks because of the 100% thing. I ordered a white girth and it came in a light tan color. Hope this helps ya!
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Thanks, phantomfett, I might have to pick one of those up.

Here are a few more questions that I'm throwing out there:

- What type of buckles are accurate for the ESB girth? I have seen a few different buckle shapes while seaching for girths online.

- How many "seams" should the ESB girth have? By "seams" I mean the strip where all of the strands have been joined together. In batninja's very nicely draw diagram, there are three seams depicted. Is this correct for ESB, or should there be two seams? I've seen girths with both two and three seams while searching online.

:confused
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I'm not sure about the ESB version, but the ROTJ version appears to have 4 buckles (2 on a side). They don't use two of the belt prongs on one side; they wrapped two loops of webbing around, sewed it closed, and they other ends stretch to the other side, where the two buckle prongs ARE used, just like a belt.

girthrear.jpg


Did you get all that?

Anyhoo, I just cut off the un-used buckle prongs (don't want 'em clanking around while I stealthily lurk around conventions) with a Dremel. Now I'm off to a fabric store to get the webbing.

By the way, I was in a rush and attempted an 'out-of-the-package' dye job. Nope, only made it pink. Gotta get some acetone and soak that sucker overnight. We're having a garrison party tomorrow, so they'll get to see how Fett gets that ruby red dye job for his ROTJ belt.

As for your cross-seam question, I have absolutely no idea. I've seen them with both two and three seams as well.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Ok,

Another quick question...If the mohair girth aI have is a very light color, should I still soak it in acetone overnight before trying to dye it brown?


Just putting together some last minute details before I attempt it.

Thanks...



Jodo
 
Last edited by a moderator:
JodoKast,
Not sure if it's too late, but..

Since my girth didn't dye well without it, I'm going to soak it in acetone NOW, after the first attempt. I'll let you know if I screw it up. :)
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Okay, sports fans, mission accomplished.

I placed the girth in a glass bowl, poured a can of acetone over it and let it soak for 5 hours. After this time, the acetone completely soaked into the girth and dried.

Then I hand-washed the belt with laundry detergent. NOTE: Use rubber gloves for all these steps!

I heated a large pot of water to a simmer, poured in cup of salt, half cup of laundry detergent (helps to soften the water), and my Rit dye. For the ROTJ belt, I used two packages of Rit Scarlet (couldn't find Cardinal) and a third of a package of Cocoa Brown. I stirred the mixture, and then added the wet girth.

Keeping the heat just below a boil, I stirred the water for about 45 minutes (didn't have a wooden spoon, so I used a spare DP range finder stalk; it came an interesting color).

Then I hung the belt on the dry rack (board with 4 screws/nails). It appears to have only shrunk by about 2 inches, but I was able to stretch it onto the board easily. The color is now (after drying) a reddish-maroon, exactly what I was after, even if it is not 'dead-on' accurate.

So now...is there anything I need to do to keep the belt from rubbing dye all over my jempsuit/codpiece front? If I flat-out wash it, will it bleed the dye? Is there a sealer for this?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Do you have any pics of your girth?
Here's what mine looks like after the third attempt at dyeing. It's not that accurate either, but I'm leaving it alone so I don't mess it up some more.
1801312.jpg
 
Last edited by a moderator:
This thread is more than 14 years old.

Your message may be considered spam for the following reasons:

  1. This thread hasn't been active in some time. A new post in this thread might not contribute constructively to this discussion after so long.
If you wish to reply despite these issues, check the box below before replying.
Be aware that malicious compliance may result in more severe penalties.
Back
Top