How Baseball Gloves Are Made – Sewing Machines Los Angeles

Baseball is popular in America, and gloves for baseball are important to people who play this game. Thus, in this article, I will give you an introduction about how to produce them.

Preparation

Most baseball gloves are made of cowhides. After being cured (a method to kill bacteria) and tanned (treated by chemical method to keep from putrefaction), these cowhides are sent to the factory. In there, the cowhides are estimated from the color and tested the strength in a special laboratory.

Cutting

Here, the cowhides are cut into four parts for making gloves: the shell, lining, web, and pad. This procedure will be finished by a machine automatically, and the shape line is designed to save the material as soon as possible. Sometimes, the logo or lettering (used to identify the manufacturer) is burned on the leather by using a brass stamping die.

Sewing

When the cowhides are cut into for parts, they will be sewn together to become a baseball glove.

The shell part of the glove must be sewn together while inside-out, then, it is turned right-side-out to make its lining inserted. Before the shell reversed, it is wetted or steamed to make it flexibility and so that it will not crack or rip during reversing.

After the shell is reversed, it is heated by a device called hot hand (a hand-shaped equipment). It will help the shell change into its correct size. In this procedure, the fingers of the glove must be assured to open correctly.

Reinforcements

Commonly, each glove is inserted with one pad. While, to make it more comfortable and easier when squeezed, more pads (often two pads) are needed. Two layers of leather will make into an eligible pad used in a glove. However, for some special gloves, such as catchers’ mitts, the pad is made with five layers of leather. All the pads must be stitched together by worker’s hands to make them suitable for players.

Beside the pad, the glove needs another kind of reinforcement-plastic. The purpose of inserting plastic reinforcements is that they can make the glove more suitable and provide the protection for the player’s fingers to prevent them from being bent too much accidentally.

Web

The web is made of several pieces of leather and the size of each web is different according to the type of glove.

Stitching

After all the procedures finished, a lacing will be stitched around the edges of a glove. Usually, the lacing is made of rawhide and is about 80-90 inches long. In some parts of the glove, such as the web, it must use non-leather stitching to make its shape and size correctly.

“Lay Off Operation”

It is the final procedure of the glove manufacture. In this step, the glove is put on a hot hand again to make the shape of glove correct and all the fingers are opened. And now, a new baseball glove is made.