bridger wrote:
"... Instead I shifted the leather discs around to even up the spacing of them
on the handle and am figuring to soak them in something to get them to swell
back up to size. They seem to still be pretty pliable. I worked the surface of
the leather handle a bit with some coarse sandpaper to open it up. I'm wondering
what would be an appropriate material to soak them in. I can see not wanting
something that hardens and makes the leather brittle, but not something that
makes the leather soft and fragile either. A mix of mineral oil and linseed?
Maybe top that with shellac or something..."

To the best of my knowledge and belief there is nothing you can do to reinflate
the shrunken leather of a leather washer handle. Nothing. No way. Don't even
bother to hope. Don't try to get anything into the leather, it will be worse
than useless. I've soaked old leather, of various kinds for for various reasons,
in neat's-foot oil. Soaked it in linseed oil. I've used neats-foot-oil/lanolin
leather dressings. If you are lucky soaking the washers will do nothing much. If
not lucky, you will get a disgusting, gummy, fragile mess. What you **won't** do
is improve the handle in any way whatever.

Most likely your best bet is to push all the washers up really tight next to
each other. Then fill the gap between the last washer and the end, or maybe
leave the gap between the two last washers and fill that, by wrapping tightly
with thick thread or very thin cord. I might perhaps work glue down between the
washers before snugging them up, then lay in the filling cord in glue. When dry
put on a coat or two of shellac. The first coat of shellac will soak in a bit
but seal the surface, so you might need two or more. Or maybe glue ooze-out will
ahve sealed the surface. Smoothing or shaping the surface, or sanding to clean
it, probably won't do much good before the shellac is on, but will expose raw
leather and require a bit more shellac. Sanding leather, especially old leather,
usually doesn't work very well; trimming with a sharp edge tool is much more
successful. I would try a float, haven't yet but mean to.

I could well be wrong in my opinion; I haven't attempted to restore a leather-
washer handle (though I have dealt with old washers on chisel handles, where
soaking in BLO with the rest of the handle sometimes is beneficial). If someone
has successfully tightened up an old leather-washer handle (without repeaning or
adding new solid material like the cord I suggest) I'll be happy to add it to my
list of possibilities. But at this point I've got about thirty years'
professional experience with old leather (mostly in the form of bookbindings)
and I wouldn't waste the energy hoping that its condition will be improved by
soaking it in something.
Tom Conroy