Leather or rubber soles?

[nh10222]



this is the crux of the entire thread and it didn't seem to really get answered - namely whether or not a really high-quality double sole will keep your feet dry in heavy rain and other wintry weather,

Whether your feet stay dry depends what you are walking in, how deep it is and for how long. Even if the rubber itself is waterproof, your feet can still get wet via the welt or upper, and possibly even the exposed stitching of some rubber soles like Dainite. Still, I'd say there's less chance of wet feet with rubber.

There is no consensus in relation to these important questions. We've had the input of a respected bootmaker, a respected retailer and several customers. In general, you won't catch me deliberately heading out into wet conditions with leather soles, and not often for long walks in the dry, either. However, there are some people still doing it. Another factor we have to deal with is a reluctance to say anything positive about rubber soles among purists.

Member Crane's (another retailer) wrote that no boot should be taken into rough, wet conditions until it has been treated with products like Filson Boot Oil, Obenauf Leather Oil / Heavy Duty LP, Lexol Leather Conditioner, Atsko Sno Seal (beeswax, white sprit), etc. I don't know what the experts here think about that, but it was reported that leather soled boots could withstand ankle-deep water and mud after thorough (and ongoing periodical) treatment to the upper, welt and soles, with no leakage, and that it helped preserve the leather, bearing in mind that the boots concerned were Wolverine 1000 Mile - nice, but not formal enough to wear in the office. http://www.styleforum.net/t/205531/...ordovan-1000-mile-boot-review/15#post_3732081

I'm about to start experimenting with those relatively inexpensive products myself, using surplus footwear and I was also going to try it on a pair of Ammunition Boots pattern B5 from William Lennon, which I believe are Blake/Rapid-stitched, with a vegetable-tanned double leather sole and oiled rough-out kip leather upper. Like the Wolverine 1000 Mile, they are rough Derby work boots, not for the city and therefore probably not what most people exploring the rubber v. leather question would be thinking of.

 and if so whether it will then last as long as a high-quality rubber or dainite while doing so.

It has been claimed on AAAC that Dainite lasts three times longer than standard grade double leather soles.

On the other hand, it has also been claimed by others that Dainite lasts no longer than leather. While I find that hard to believe for either dry or wet conditions, it goes to show how much our mileage varies. Perhaps the comparison was between Dainite and oak or chestnut bark-tanned leather soles, which should last much longer than standard grade leather (and have even been claimed to last longer than Dainite - see above).

The number of boots with Barker or JR soles out there getting deliberately beaten up in nasty weather would be rather small. Leather soles can survive occasional soakings but, let's not bullshit ourselves here - it's not exactly good for them. I'm not really prepared to sacrifice mine just to find out how resilient they are - not when water runs straight off rubber without swelling or shredding - but if someone else here is, please post photographs and share your story.

 i have never in my life experienced foot odor or fungus or anything (knock on wood), so this is not my greatest concern.

 

Likewise


I'm going to get some more experience wearing the various types of sole and intend to revisit questions like those posted above. For the record, my next few boot orders will specify leather soles - I already have enough rubber. Oh, and since I'm only a customer who wears boots, my opinions might only be worth a fraction of an expert's.

 

[rabiesinfrance]

Edward Green now charge £195 for a resole! That takes the piss. If I had a choice of a diamond rubber sole or an oak bark tanned sole on my dress shoes, I'd go for the former. And factor in maybe three or four re-solings until they raise two fingers and tell you to bugger off.

 

[nh10222]

Edward Green now charge £195 for a resole! That takes the piss. If I had a choice of a diamond rubber sole or an oak bark tanned sole on my dress shoes, I'd go for the former. And factor in maybe three or four re-solings until they raise two fingers and tell you to bugger off.

£195?

Sounds like a good price for Goodyear-cemented shoes!

 

[dbhdnhdbh]

I don't rely on a rubber sole to keep my feet dry. For serious wet weather I use full rubber bottom Bean boots. I gather it is possible to make truly water proof leather, but unless the entire boot is constructed to be waterproof they will leak at the seams. The rubber sole would not help here.

History question: back in the day, say 19yh century in the English countryside, would there have been practical reasons for double sole brogues? We have already discussed the greater support of the double soles. They might also have been sturdier over rough ground. If a double sole, with the midsole made of the same outsole material, lasted twice as long as a single sole then how about this? At least today resoling a double soled shoe is less than twice the cost of a single sole. If that were true back then, double soling and resoling only after both wore out would be the more economical move. When you lived in the country, had only one, or maybe two pair of shoes, then a resole was not a simple matter of dropping them off at the cobbler on the way home from work. It may have meant a long walk to the nearest person who could do the job, another trip to pick them up, and doing without in the interim.


If these thoughts are correct, then a double sole could have t a very practical solution for rural working man.

 

[nh10222]

History question: back in the day, say 19yh century in the English countryside, would there have been practical reasons for double sole brogues? We have already discussed the greater support of the double soles. They might also have been sturdier over rough ground. If a double sole, with the midsole made of the same outsole material, lasted twice as long as a single sole then how about this? At least today resoling a double soled shoe is less than twice the cost of a single sole. If that were true back then, double soling and resoling only after both wore out would be the more economical move. When you lived in the country, had only one, or maybe two pair of shoes, then a resole was not a simple matter of dropping them off at the cobbler on the way home from work. It may have meant a long walk to the nearest person who could do the job, another trip to pick them up, and doing without in the interim.


If these thoughts are correct, then a double sole could have t a very practical solution for rural working man.

Double leather soles do last much longer than single leather, which must have made them an attractive option for work and country boots in the nineteenth century and later. However, I think rubber does their job better overall, and for a rather extreme and possibly contraversial comparison, so do the armies of the world. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that rubber has left us with very little need for double leather in a practical sense.

The British Army "Ammunition" Boot, standard issue in various forms from 1887 to 1958 (and still available new), has a double leather sole, albeit usually with (for non-commissioned ranks) up to 25 hobnails and a horseshoe-like heel ring. These additions were to prolong the life of the leather sole and heel, which it was known would not last long despite a rotation of two pairs. The American Trench Boot from 1917 seems very similar. A mass produced rubber or synthetic sole would appear to make sense under combat conditions, and also for rural working men trudging through mud and manure. If they were available in the nineteenth century, I'd say they would have been as popular then as they are now.

I have three pairs of shoes and five pairs of boots with double leather soles, and a sixth on order. I don't think I need any more.

Quote: dbhdnhdbh Nor would I, but dry feet is not the only reason why people choose rubber over leather.

Double leather soles - a good choice for work boots in the nineteenth / early twentieth century, but now?
Well, if there is such an endorsement to be found, it will be found on a forum like this.

 

[RogerP]

Double leather soles do last much longer than single leather, which must have made them an attractive option for work and country boots in the nineteenth century and later. However, I think rubber does their job better overall, and for a rather extreme and possibly contraversial comparison, so do the armies of the world.

Agreed - particularly with the first bit.

Nor would I, but dry feet is not the only reason why people choose rubber over leather.

Correct again.

 

[nh10222]

I'm about to start experimenting with those relatively inexpensive products myself, using surplus footwear and I was also going to try it on a pair of Ammunition Boots pattern B5 from William Lennon, which I believe are Blake/Rapid-stitched, with a vegetable-tanned double leather sole and oiled rough-out kip leather upper.

Some time ago it became apparent to me that the soles of William Lennon boots are not attached using the Blake Rapid method. While the process has been described elsewhere, I'm not sure that it has a name.

The shoes are made by using a British United Shoe Machinery Co 'standard brass screw' machine, introduced circa 1870 or so by Tebbut and Hall Brothers in Northants.

For the sake of clarity, the stitching that you see is to join outsole and midsole, prior to the two soles, as one, then being attached to the insole through brass wire.

It's an interesting method, however makes for a rather unyielding feel under foot. Better suited to shepherds tramping over field than anything more town and country - however, this is now my opinion only.

The machine is mentioned at http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/index.php?/topic/227570-hobnail-b5s/
and http://www.styleforum.net/t/297037/sole-welting/1275
and http://loomstate.blogspot.com/2011/11/william-lennon-factory-stoney-middleton.html

 

[nh10222]

...

 

[Nick V.]

Forgive me if some of this was covered in the previous 4 -or- 5 pages. I didn't have the chance to read them but will when I can.

Crockett & Jones spent over 150K in R&D and over a year in time developing this sole:
http://www.crockettandjones.com/news/index/aw16-new-rubber-city-sole
The money I mentioned and the time does not include finally purchasing a beginning inventory.

The chemicals used in tanning sole leather are so dangerous to humans and our environment that the U.S. government kept imposing stricter and stricter regulations. Eventually it became cost prohibitive to tan soling leather in the U.S. (and compete price-wise).

http://gizmodo.com/how-leather-is-slowly-killing-the-people-and-places-tha-1572678618

 

[DWFII]

^Psuedo-science at best, outright balderdash in any event.

Chrome tanning is toxic...so toxic that even shoes that are made of chrome tanned leather (most high end brands) can cause allergies and skin lesions.

On the other hand, vegetable tanning is no more toxic than a movable bog. That's what it is, fundamentally--a liquor of bark extracts. Thousands of years of bark tanning and no one has ever shown that bogs are detrimental to the environment or people who work in them.

And more to the point, very few leather outsoles are chrome tanned. They are Traditionally and almost to a product, vegetable tanned.

And on the other other hand, rubber products such as rubber outsoles, plastics and even All Purpose cement (products made from petro-chemicals all) are as toxic if not moreso, both in manufacturing and in use, as any method of tanning...it's just more insidious.

Millions of dollars in R&D have been spent in developing plastics...to drink from, to eat off of, to enclose our food...and they are in our bodies even now, in the environment, killing the planet (Google the Pacific Vortex), animals (innocent every one), and us.

And every one who extols, blithely defends and/or mindlessly buys into the hype and uses them without thought is culpable in that destruction and death.

"Here's lookin' at you kid."

edited for punctuation and clarity

 

[nh10222]



Crockett & Jones spent over 150K in R&D and over a year in time developing this sole:

The money I mentioned and the time does not include finally purchasing a beginning inventory.

They look pretty sleek; hopefully, they're not too slick. It's a pity they will be C&J only as I'm not a C&J man, leaving me with Dainite and Commando.

The chemicals used in tanning sole leather are so dangerous to humans and our environment that the U.S. government kept imposing stricter and stricter regulations. Eventually it became cost prohibitive to tan soling leather in the U.S. (and compete price-wise).

It's a pity something supposedly so natural and beautiful also has a dark and dirty side. It makes me feel better about having rubber soles in my collection. If average leather uppers are also a potential problem, it seems we can't win if we want to enjoy average offerings from average makers.

 

[shoefan]



Forgive me if some of this was covered in the previous 4 -or- 5 pages. I didn't have the chance to read them but will when I can.

Crockett & Jones spent over 150K in R&D and over a year in time developing this sole:
http://www.crockettandjones.com/news/index/aw16-new-rubber-city-sole
The money I mentioned and the time does not include finally purchasing a beginning inventory.

The chemicals used in tanning sole leather are so dangerous to humans and our environment that the U.S. government kept imposing stricter and stricter regulations. Eventually it became cost prohibitive to tan soling leather in the U.S. (and compete price-wise).

http://gizmodo.com/how-leather-is-slowly-killing-the-people-and-places-tha-1572678618

I would point out that traditionally tanned soling leather such as that done by Bakers in England does not use the chromium cited in the gizmodo article. I believe that pit-tanned leather has far fewer environmental consequences than chrome-tanning. Not say it is entirely benign, but it does not involve much beyond a strong concentration of tanning liquor derived from the bark of oak trees.

Furthermore, one might also state that the environmental consequences of synthetic products such as rubber soles are not necessarily trivial.

(edit: didn't see DW's previous post, much of which I have repeated....)

 

[DWFII]



The chemicals used in tanning sole leather are so dangerous to humans and our environment that the U.S. government kept imposing stricter and stricter regulations. Eventually it became cost prohibitive to tan soling leather in the U.S. (and compete price-wise).

Again, internet, lala-land bullshit at its worst. If there is any danger to tanning leather outsoles it is when tanners use synthetic chemicals to substitute or accelerate barks. Many in the US...in service to the almighty dollar...do that. But there is, in fact, no significant difference between the way outsole leather is tanned and what comes out of Hermann Oak, for instance, or Muir and McDonald, or any other tannery of saddle leather in the US.

And, in fact, Baker Leather has been in one place for several centuries tanning outsole leather with oak bark and no appreciable deleterious effect either in the environment or the people who work there.

 

[DWFII]



(edit: didn't see DW's previous post, much of which I have repeated....)

I didn't see your's either...ships crossing in the night

 

[nh10222]



Again, internet, lala-land bullshit at its worst.

In that case, I'm glad it wasn't my bullshit. That was part of Nick V's post.

If there is any danger to tanning leather outsoles it is when tanners use synthetic chemicals to substitute or accelerate barks. Many in the US...in service to the almighty dollar...do that.

The trouble is that much of the time we don’t know what we are getting. Most of us are here because we like leather shoes, with or without leather soles. If they are more environmentally friendly than fully synthetic running shoes, and don't leech oestrogens into our bodies, that's a bonus. Fact of life: many industrial processes are dirty and/or toxic. It won't stop me from buying shoes.