Lot happening part II

Ok onto the second part of the chaos i call balloon building. So after cleaning the basket i bought it home to dry off. It seems a couple things had been done to the basket early on like the hide being coated in varnish and also the bottom of the basket seemed to have the signed of varnishing also.


When i got it home i noticed where mainfreight staff had tagged the basket it had gone though onto the wicker which took a lot of rubbing to remove most of it. As i mentioned in the previous post i took a lot of before pictures to show how much work i had done and what difference can be made with a little time/effort.

So i got this stuff called leather cleanser which apparently takes a layer off the leather. It worked alright i did notice the water being a different colour but all up it didn't make much of a difference to the raw hide. I followed this up by using tanners oil which soaks into the leather making it supple, waterproof and durable. That has made made a bit more of a difference. The leather is taking the oil and seems to be a little more lively. I have done about 3 coats and i will follow up with one or two more just to make sure its well hydrated.

The wicker when the basket arrived was a little dry but had good colour. Its always interesting the variety of methods that get thrown around to care for your basket and i guess it comes down to personal preference. I went for the more traditional way of caring for my basket which is using natural linseed oil. It is very slow drying which gives the wicker a lot of time to absorb the moisture. After about two coats its made a drastic improvement to the colour and strength of the basket.

A fan came in the basket. It is pretty rough but i have managed to pull it to pieces. The motor has been pulled to bits for general cleaning and checking over everything. It looks like cleaning up the surface rust, installing a new gasket seal, greasing of the bolts and a lick of paint on the tank  was all the motor needs.

Whilst giving the basket a once over i noticed the basket bolts were a lightly rusted so they have been removed and new bolts have been ordered. After 26 years even the most robust elements of the basket are showing its sign of age.

I have ordered fabric for the tank covers, basket cover, targets and the various basket goods. Once this arrives ill be busy back at the machine making all the elements for the basket. Sadly if i don't sort out all the bits of the basket prior to putting it into service it will likely go incomplete for all the unessential elements.