Anyone ever made their own leather grip?

[MaximRecoil]

I have a couple Puma Becker rackets, and they came with a white leather grip. Brown or tan leather replacements just wouldn't look right to me on these particular rackets. There doesn't seem to be any white leather grips commercially available. How hard would it be to make a grip?

What type and thickness of leather should be used? Is calfskin considered better for a grip than ordinary cowhide? I'm guessing that the hardest part would be bevelling the edges of the strip of leather, so that they can overlap and still be flat, like commercial leather grips. Any ideas on how to do this? Sandpaper maybe?

[User Name]

white leather sounds amazing. hm anyway, where do you plan to get a forty foot strip of leather?

[dacrymn]

huh? where did he say anything about 40 feet? Are you thinking of string?

[MaximRecoil]

white leather sounds amazing. hm anyway, where do you plan to get a forty foot strip of leather?
You only need about 4 1/2' to do a 4 5/8" grip. Getting the leather itself shouldn't be a problem. Finding out what type, thickness, and the best way to go about bevelling the edges is the issue.

[dunloplayah]

if you have a saddlery shop in your town, they can probably help you. I did a project some years ago that required custom cut leather inserts with bevels and tooling, a saddle guy did it all for a very resonable price. I was also able to go to his shop and pick out the leather from the entire cow "pelt" and matched grains. He was knowledgable about how the leather would age and wear. Good luck.

[User Name]

o sorry, i meant 40 inches

[User Name]

so did you end up making one, post some pics if you can