Painting Boots - Which Finish?

[aggyface]

Hey all, two quick questions:

I have my old pair of chisel-toe blundstones that I'd like to refinish for my TK kit. I'll be replacing the elastic to white, then painting with Angelus white leather paint and the appropriate finish.

 

Question One: Is the toe (and boot itself, I suppose) appropriate? I see nothing in the CRL about the toe shape, but I'm curious.

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Question Two:

What finish should I be going for? Matte or gloss? 

 

This is certainly something I'm happy to experiment on since I already own the old (very comfortable, and only slightly leaky!) pair of boots, so I'm not fussed if it doesn't work, but I want to make sure the boots are appropriate to start with.

Edited February 5, 2022 by gmrhodes13
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[sharkbait[TK]]

To my eyes, your squared toes don't look too far off from the round-ish TK Boots I have (which are approved)- yours aren't a sharp square, and the traditional aren't a solid round shape, but like a rounded square.  I would run that by your GML prior to making a decision, however.  Also, if you were going for EIB or Centurion, I would run it past one of those guys first, to see what they say.  

 

As to your second question: go matte.  The old original style boots with the seam were glossy looking, and nowadays glossy tends to look like cheap costume boots.  Plus, all current TKs I've seen have matte boots (also including myself).  They start a bright matte, but they're definitely matte.  

[aggyface]

Alright! Did the thing, here are the results.
1) To start, I took my old, worn out Blundstones that saw me through several years of daily wear and renoing a house. They've got a few holes here and there, leak a little, have a very worn toe, and generally are in a sad place.

 

2) You could use the intended stripper leather shops sell, but I work in a lab, so I scrubbed them thoroughly with a cloth and lab-grade methanol in a fume hood to remove any last bits of finish. Since I didn't really know what I was doing, the leather store recommended their in-house dye. This is two coats of the dye later. I don't really mind it - it soaked right into the leather, but it's sure not covering. Maybe it'll make scratches less obvious, but at the least it can hopefully act as a "primer" coat for the paint. This was a failed experiment - there's probably no need to do the dye layer. 

 

3)  Now we're starting to get somewhere! This is the often recommended Angelus leather paint in white, about 4-5 coats in. I thinned it a little (it thins with water), and applied with a brush. If you're doing it by brush, thin a bit for sure - it helps keeps the coats even. It has a long enough dry time you can brush out any little streaks/ridges and the like, but make sure you do. I was going to try fabric paint on the elastic, but after one coat of the fabric paint (and the need to heat set it), the Angelus applies perfectly fine onto the elastic as well, so I just thinned it a bit more to soak in better and made sure to go over the elastic every time. As recommended, I stuffed the shoes with newspaper to expand out the wrinkles as much as I could - I'm guessing this is more relevant on old shoes like this, but it's a good step to remember.

 

4) And this is about 8-9 coats in! The Angelus stuff is awesome - it's honestly weird how well this stuff works. For about $20 and an old pair of shoes I kept 'just in case', I'm pretty happy! (Pro tip: The elastics tighten up a ton post-painting. Don't freak out like me if the shoes don't pull on. Stick your hands into the boot and stretch it out before you try!) I haven't gone through the approval process yet, and I'm not sure if that front seam is covered entirely by armour (one of our TKs said it likely is). Hopefully these are approvable for basic....and if not, I'm only out $20, and I have a spare set for a rainy day.

 

 

Edited March 20, 2018 by aggyface