If you remove the wire on Akubra FedIV...

[iwantamorganreelbad1]

...would you be able to put a turn in the fedora and not damage the hat body itself?

I typed this in the search function and found nothing. I've read Holt's thread and this is what it said:

-removed the steel wire.
-soaked the hat and rebashed it.
-took of the standard ribbon and bow and replaced it with darker and more accurate one.
-made a new accurate bow.
-tightend the ribbon up. (you can see that from the side shots under the pinch)
-put in a reverse taper like we see on screen.
-new plain white liner.
-trimmed the brim.
-gave it a turn.
-threw it on the floor.rolled it up to a ball to have her break in after the soak and bash.
-added a little dust around the ribbon.

With no explanation as to how well this worked.

[Michaelson]

search.php?keywords=wire+in+sweatband&t ... mit=Search" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The wire is in the sweatband, not in the felt body.

Check out the posts above.

Regards! Michaelson

[iwantamorganreelbad1]

You can remove the wire with a pair of needlenose pliers. Just get hold of one end of the wire and slowly pull it out. Make sure you clear the end that may be 'hooked' to hold the two ends together. Otherwise, it is easy to slowly remove.

The wire is there to hold the shape of the sweatband.

I've done this in the past with no problem. You may find the hat much more comfortable to wear too. I know I did.

Regards! Michaelson

I was just about to ask how to remove the wire but found your post Michaelson- Thanks!
Also please explain about the end that is hooked?

[jnicktem]

If it isn't uncomfortable- then don't remove it. It does serve a purpose. I had to remove mine because of some massive dents and kinks in the wire. But if it weren't for that I would have left it alone.

[Tennessee Smith]

Just remember everyone, if you remove the wire the hat warmer will no longer work. So be careful.


...but it is a relatively easy.

[Oildale Jones]

I removed the wire and now I get no reception.

[Tennessee Smith]

Thankfully there's an App for that!!

[PyramidBlaster]

If I remove the wire and wear the hat 'as intended', will I now get charged 'Roaming' fees?

[Travelsonic]

rI had to remove the wire in mine - poked out and would be digging into my skin if I wore it with the wire in.
Hat was / is just fine.

[BendingOak]

Don't worry about pulling out the wire. I have learned most people don't or couldn't notice the difference anyway.

[jnicktem]

Really the only reason why you should pull out the wire is when the sweatband looks like this:

[BendingOak]

Correct.

[Indiana Bugs]

rI had to remove the wire in mine - poked out and would be digging into my skin if I wore it with the wire in.
Hat was / is just fine.

I had that same problem. But instead of pulling out the whole wire, I grabbed a wire cutter and snipped off the end that was sticking out and poking me in the head. Problem solved and I still have my wire.

[Oildale Jones]

I didn't like how my sweatband was deforming and wasn't sure whether I had a wire in mine (I'd read about newer plastic...reeds?); I was surprised at how small it turned out to be. Here's what my Deluxe looked like before I removed the wire.



And after.



As you can see, it made a huge difference in the appearance. (I pulled the liner out in the first 15 minutes because it was baking my brain.)

What really bugs me, though, is how much of the band you can see when looking up toward the band. Is it normal to have some overlap, and/or is there some variation between hats and makers? Is it related to quality control on lower-end fedoras?

[BendingOak]

Are you talking about the sweatband right where the wire was located?

[Tennessee Smith]

Oildale, I have a Fed IV and just checked it out. The sweatband on mine is technically lower than the brim (like yours) but it feathers back into the brim so it doesn't stand out like that. I think you may have one of the very few defective Fed's out there. I'd send that pic to hatsdirect and see if they can send you another one.


-TS

[Michaelson]

It sure looks like that sweat wasn't seated deep enough into the hat to me. I've had one or two Fed's come though my door that were like that. Steve Delk seated them deeper into the hat when he did bashes for me in the past.

Not sure why they let these get out of the factory like that, but it's not uncommon.

As a side note, I, too, have removed wires from the sweats of these hats before when they were too tight on my head. The hat was the right size, but the wire just won't give when your hair grows. When I removed the wire, the comfort level improved 100%, and I never had any problems from that point on.

I'm not a big fan of the 'wire' type sweatband myself for that very reason, but it's one I can live with as I know I can fix the problem if I have to.

Regards! Michaelson

[BendingOak]

This is why you really shouldn't remove the reed. The reed is there to keep the bell. To hug the felt. I understand why some must remove it when it gets kinked but the reed serves this exact purpose.

Thank you for posting this.

[Chiliana Jones]

Yessir.

same thing is going on with the sweatband in my fed too. I've had the hat for over 3 years now so i bet it's a bit late contacting hatsdirect about it, still, the sweat started becoming like that last year. but the hat have seen too much action with me anyway so replacing the hat because of that is no option, no matter what(for the sentimental reasons). Maybe the sweatband will be replaced in a few years though, if it has to.


CJ

[BendingOak]

Yessir.

same thing is going on with the sweatband in my fed too. I've had the hat for over 3 years now so i bet it's a bit late contacting hatsdirect about it, still, the sweat started becoming like that last year. but the hat have seen too much action with me anyway so replacing the hat because of that is no option, no matter what(for the sentimental reasons). Maybe the sweatband will be replaced in a few years though, if it has to.


CJ

you could put a new red in the sweatband but you will have to take the hat apart and then the sweatband apart. then re-sew the sweatband and sew everything back into the hat. hardest part is sinking the sweatband correctly. I have seen hat makers do it wrong.

[Chiliana Jones]

Yessir.

same thing is going on with the sweatband in my fed too. I've had the hat for over 3 years now so i bet it's a bit late contacting hatsdirect about it, still, the sweat started becoming like that last year. but the hat have seen too much action with me anyway so replacing the hat because of that is no option, no matter what(for the sentimental reasons). Maybe the sweatband will be replaced in a few years though, if it has to.


CJ

you could put a new red in the sweatband but you will have to take the hat apart and then the sweatband apart. then re-sew the sweatband and sew everything back into the hat. hardest part is sinking the sweatband correctly. I have seen hat makers do it wrong.

crickey! sounds like a lot of work

[Indiana Bugs]

I'll say. I would just replace the sweat with a new one. It's a bit tedious, but much less so than taking apart an existing sweat, laying in a wire, resewing it shut, and then resewing that into the hat.

[BendingOak]

I'll say. I would just replace the sweat with a new one. It's a bit tedious, but much less so than taking apart an existing sweat, laying in a wire, resewing it shut, and then resewing that into the hat.

I do that every day.


The sinking of and sewing the sweatband into the hat is the hardest part.

[jnicktem]

The above picture I posted of the kinked sweatband was from my old Akubra. Even after pulling out the bented reed I wasn't happy with it, so I ended up completely removing the sweatband, and liner, and then I sewed both back in. It took some time, but I was happy with the result and definitely gave me more respect to our hatters!

[Oildale Jones]

I don't really care about the wire; I just don't like the sweatband being so obvious. I guess I could just go SoC and ditch the sweatband, too...

[BendingOak]

Don't feel to bad I seen some hats that had that same result even with the reed still in it. drives me nuts when I see that.

[darthjones2]

This thread is pretty informative - just basically bumped it for folks with funky sweat bands/ reeds/ wire...