I would like to convert my wire stretchers that i have into wooden ones that would be used for coon. I have seen it done before, but cant remeber the exact process.

huh?

Where you add a section of plywood or such to the bottom half of a wire stretcher

Sounds like Alchemy. I thought you were wanting to SWITCH from one kind to the other......

I have not used them but I just duct taped a piece of plywood to the bottom of wire stretchers. Measured the width that is needed for the species. Not sure what I think of it but the duct tape holds, and should let youuse pins or staples.

you mean like this?

why would you do that

You CAN get the extra size using these converted or hybrid stretchers also, (as long as you make the correct initial cut on the raccoon) since you have a place to tack the pelt, rather than using the wire stretcher's hooks. At the NAFA skinning demos, they usually show how to make these converted stretchers.
I guess you can sell your wire stretchers to someone else and buy wood ones, but you won't be able to buy as many wood ones as the wire ones you sell with the money you get, so I say convert the wire ones you have, and when you need more, buy wood. Or buy more used wire ones cheap, and make more converted ones, as they work great. I use both converted stretchers and whole wood ones.

That is how mine are done except mine dont have metal bands and screws. All mine are duct taped in three differnt spots top, middle and bottom. I used 1/2 plywood for filler and staples instead of pins.

this needs to archived. excellent ideas to common problems. i'm definately going to convert some of my wire stretchers over. especially the ones that the hooks have broken on.

the grump.

Quite the contratrary. You can gain extra length using strictly wire. You can't squeeze a board down.

all my wire stretchers for coon are coverted like browndog has shown. this information is in NAFA wild fur pelt handling manual

"We let the nose slide down the board then staple the bottom at the proper line then use vice grips to pull/lever the nose over the end of the board. "

Good tip.

I converted a dozen of the #5s last year. I felt they did just fine as the rest of my coon forms I used are all wood.
By reading here I can see that I can downsize the wood width a lot. I can go to the 1/4 plywood and then get rid of the boards I used. That will cut the weight down greatly.

Also depending on where you ship or sell to will determine how to shape the top of the wire portion of the combo form. By bending the wire down to about a 4 inch span at 6 inches you get the NAFA minimum width there. One also needs 7 inches at 24 inches, 7.5 at 36 inches and 8 at 48 inches. I have found if you start your skirt board at say 27-28 inches down the the wire form and say then shape it to fit the sizes and let it run past the bottom of the 46-48 inch wire form about 4-6 inches you can handle the jumbos as well. I have also found that if you bend near the nose and then support at 27-28 inches there is no sag or slop in the wire form.
These are low cost modifications to get some benefits and now wedges needed.
I do not plan to cut the bottoms off of mine. I will keep those intact as the market may change what is desirable in the future.
That makes them a bit more difficult to handle but not much. I am going to use strapping tape this year as that stays tighter better than duct tape.

One of the posts stated that the wood makes the coon look that much better throughout the length and that may be a good discussion. I could put similar types of coons on both types of boards and ship them to different auctions and see what the differences may be. My collections are typically not large enough to have that many to be able to make that determination however.

Bryce