Bash Ghost

apologies if this has been covered somewhere else and please move it to its appropriate spot if so ... but my forum search for the topic was fruitless


anyway ...

share some of your techniques for ridding a hat of an old crease ghost ...

looking for more home remedies as apposed to having a pro cleaning and reblocking

I have some techniques that I use with some success ... but am always interested in hearing about things that others may do

just thought this could be an interesting topic

looking forward to reading replies

Might sound silly, but one of my most versatile homemade implements is a stretchy sock, partly filled with rice and sewn shut on the end, rather like a long sandbag. Makes a great flexinle weight or adjustable rest to hold something in place while drying. I have used it to get rid of a phantom bash line by moistening the felt, suspending hat upside down with tip of crown not resting on anything and lowering the sock in carefully, trying to get it to evenly rest in the crown to push it out to open. Not as good as a block, but cheap to make and you can even microwave it for a few minutes and put it on your sore muscles at the end of a long day. Works great for that too. Won't do much for dirt and wear lines though...

That's brilliant, moehawk. I've tried dampening, but not soaking, the crown and then steaming and ironing. That seemed to do a pretty good job. That and a ton of elbow grease.

Wilkey

With specialty finishes it can be fruitless. For example you can see a faint line (the old crease) just below new crease (you have to look closely) on this 1930s JHS "Durit". This hat was re-blocked open and the nap reworkerd but you can still see a trace of the old crease.

TY Ginseng. Although, brilliant might be a bit much for rice in a sock....

moehawk said:

TY Ginseng. Although, brilliant might be a bit much for rice in a sock....

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Sometimes it's the simplest things. It's weighty without being too dense and gently conforms, yet can be shaped by pressure. It is a pretty darn good idea. Have you tried putting the sock in after microwaving it? The heat added to the warmth might further help reshape from the inside.
Wilkey

I have warmed them in the microwave and used to hold down a brim while shaping it. Worked nicely. I bet it would work on the crown too.

ANOTHER note on microwaving rice in a sock or sack (or Tupperware tub) to warm it; after which it's also perfect to extract moisture from a cellphone or other electronic device placed into the warm mass. Keep it warm in hot/warm water bath (only the Tupperware approach, of course) and it's amazing how effectively it works to pull water out of the air.

Steve despite your claims to the contrary, I think that's a darn near perfect lid, sir! And the one to the right (in the background) is not one you have shown us, is it? Please do!

Charlie, Yes in this photo it's hard to see but if you look down about an inch from the center crease you will see the old crease line. Unfortunately I can't make out the hat on the right.

Oh, yeah. But So slight, Steve.

This hat, wth a feather?i

That is an Italian Military Alpini (elite mountain warfare military corps) hat. I will take a photo of it.

Here you go. This one is non officer and made of wool. The officer ones are fur felt and still made by Barbisio / Cervo.







The one in the middle is a Barbisio / Cervo. You can see it has a side box bow and brim binding.



Sorry for the thread drift!

Thanks Steve;
One can almost sense the great esprit de corps from being in an elite group.
Just like when a beret meant something
And very modern Beretta AR70/90 also

Thanks, Steve! That style might not work well in my town (although, why not?) but it's a remarkable work of fine felt and feather!

Back to ghost stories...

I had to dig it out of the vault. I am not into Militaria but I was curious about them. I was surprised that the higher ranking ones were Cervo Bantams.

This is a timely topic for me. I've never really "warmed" to my Taupe Fawn Campdraft, but couldn't quite put my finger on why and had concluded several months ago that I just didn't care for the color. But as I was looking at it again not long ago I realized it was because I had shaped the crown too low. So I popped the crown out to re-shape it, and quickly realized I had made the rookie mistake (when I first shaped it) of making the transition over the top of the crown too severe (I don't know if there's a proper terminology for that), which resulted in a visible "crease/bump" around the crown. I don't have any proper hat tools, and don't have a way to apply a proper amount of focused steam to the felt, so while I pondered this dilemma I left the hat as-is.

Before long it dawned on me that we have a set of stainless steel mixing bowls in various sizes, and that the curvature of one of those was a fairly close match to the curvature of the hat's open crown. So I soaked the crown with distilled water, and used one of the bowls on the inside of the crown as a "forming block", working the wet felt over the bowl with my fingers as I moved around the crown. This was clearly an amateur effort and I wasn't able to eliminate the crease/bump completely, but I was able to minimize it just enough to re-crease the hat's crown without it being too visible--only a very slight "depression" around the back of the crown that no one but me will probably ever notice. And I was able to raise the crown's height about 3/4"-7/8", which isn't much but was just enough for me to like the hat's appearance more:



Previous crease on the left, new crease on the right. It's difficult to see the difference in height in those photos, and I'll probably try to raise it a little more at some point in the future, but I'm happier with it now and it might actually get worn on occasion.

On a separate note, that late afternoon sun really changes the color, doesn't it? If it had that warm tone all of the time I'd definitely wear it more often.

Edit 04/29/18: I re-posted the photo after the great Photobucket fiasco of 2017. I'm pretty sure this is the photo I originally used, but that was two-and-a-half years ago and I'm not 100% certain.

Nice improvement!

Looks great to me.

Off topic, but I just realized "Bash Ghost" would be a great name for a band.

Bob Roberts said:

Nice improvement!

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moehawk said:

Looks great to me.

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Thank you Gents! :yo: The sun even shines on a dog's backside sometimes. lol

moehawk said:

Off topic, but I just realized "Bash Ghost" would be a great name for a band.

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Especially if all of the band members wore beater hats showing plenty of evidence that their crowns had been re-creased several times.

Revisiting an old thread. Helpful advice. Thanks.