Sweat Stains?

[Undertow]

Remember those hats some of us drove to St. Joe's, MO to purchase? Well, I purchased a few and I wear a couple. For the most part, I wear a gray Royal Stetson. It's a bit heavy and in this Iowa heat (even mild heat) there is a ton of humidity.

I've recently noticed a few areas around the leather sweatband are beginning to turn orange/pink.

A.) I this from sweat?
B.) Is this normal for most hats?
c.) How can I stop this?

 

[deanglen]

If it's a brown sweatband, I'm wondering if the spots are traces of leather dye leeching out from the heat, and salt in the perspiration.

dean

 

[Baron Kurtz]

Is that Benny Hill, Dean?

bk

 

[deanglen]

Is that Benny Hill, Dean?

bk

Yup. The old music hall tradition, of sort, eh?

dean

 

[Undertow]

Nope, it's a black sweatband.

 

[Baron Kurtz]

Sounds to me like a reaction between the sweat and the dye in the felt is changing the optical properties of the dye.

bk

 

[Undertow]

The strange thing here is that the sweat band looks immaculate. I cannot, for the life of me, figure out why this is happening.

Is this normal? Or is this happening because Stetson puts out a defective hat?

 

[Muzz]

I had a Stetson turn pink once! The crown though, not the sweat.