2 New ones

[ohiovacuums]

I hit an estate sale and found 2 vacuums..I offered much less than the asking price and it was accepted. One is a "Everbody's Vacuum Cleaner Company" model from 1915 that does not have suction. The other is "Kenney ??" model sold by the A.H. Skeen sales company in Newark, Ohio. It dose have good suction. Haven't decided if I will fix the first one...if I do, what does everyone use for material to replace the old stuff...leather ?

 

[madman]

Fairly sure the original bellows are leather. Find an old leather couch curbside and skin it.

 

[huskyvacs]

Pretty much all leather furniture made today is called "bonded leather". It is a very thin fake leather look glued over some vinyl sheeting and then wrapped over polyester stuffing. You can not do anything with it. It peels, cracks, and splits apart with any flex which is why after it happens to chairs and couches people pitch it. It can't be used for making a bellows. It also is not airtight (if you ever noticed when you sit on "leather" furniture it hisses or makes some form of air wooshing noise as you sink into it, there you go).

I have never seen the inside of one of these pump vacuums because everyone always wants too much money for them, but assuming they use the same type of technology as bellows type floor sweepers, I presume it is a thick fabric material similar to denim. I do not believe they used actual real leather unless its super super old. I believe its something similar to this: https://www.ebay.com/itm/291934562230

If it is real actual leather the good news is that between antique camera collectors, people that collect and use antique or modern fireplace bellows, accordion players, there is no shortage at all of leather or leathermakers. It's just finding one is the challenge and knowing who to go to that can help you out. eBay sellers have lots and lots of raw leather sheeting to pick from. There are many many many different types, sizes, thicknesses of leather to study and figure out what would be best to use for bellowsmaking. Keep in mind that is all presuming they used real leather in these, which I do not think they would or did, as the pump handles need frequent oiling, which would saturate and eat away at the leather.

 

[madman]

Husky, the sad thing about the fake real leather is that it isn't technically fake, so they can legally call it 'real' leather. And it is, in a manner of speaking. It's made of ground-up leather scraps mixed with glue.