Matt S

Core-spun Polyester glace thread -- what is it? Best I can figure it has a polyester core with cotton wrapped round and glazed. I'm having trouble finding nylon in TKT8/V346 size and what few UK suppliers sell heavy threads like this only carry these sizes in core-spun. They say it's fine for upholstery and general leatherwork but I've heard claims like that before. Ideally I'd get monofilament spun poly but the place I previously got it is rather expensive. Should I just bite the bullet and buy Ritza machine thread?

You're not the first to do that. Spent a morning recently trying to figure why my machine was running so heavy with a poor stitch til I realised I'd pulled a pack of 135x17 out the drawer instead of x16.

Another vote for John James harness needles and their confusing sizing system. I use #4 for fine threads (e.g. hand-finishing or making repairs with TKT40 thread), #2 for most hand sewing threads and #00 for heavy 18/5 (5-cord) linen. Don't know what prices are like on tother side of the pond but over here they're about £2/pack so that cheapest top-quality professional tool you'll likely ever find.

I was chatting with a person associated with one of their suppliers a little while ago. He mentioned 5 or 6 figure prices for their premium bags. Bags they don't even need to advertise. I just don't even potato how that works.

No problem TF, glad to help. Are you using leather-specific needles? Looks like you are but if not then they reduce blowthrough. Otherwise there's not a great deal you can do, other than rubbing and/or hammering the back side of the seam. It's hard to tell from the "before" photo but is it definitely blowthrough you're getting, or is the leather getting smooshed down into the feed dog hole? If it's the latter as I said earlier you could reduce the pressure on the presser foot.

Looks like you have a few things going on there: marking, insufficient needle thread tension and maybe a little blowthrough. If you back off the presser tension it should reduce the marking. If you keep backing off the for pressure at some point the work will start to lift with the needle, which will be the point at which you've reduced the presser tension too far and need to increase it again. At that point you'll more or less had to live with whatever marking you're getting. You'll probably have to rub or hammer out what little you're getting then. You can probably fill and/or grind any serrations on your feed dog and needle plate but that's almost a last ditch approach. Tension is probably fixable by increasing the needle thread tension a little. Go up in 1/4 or 1/2 turn steps, sew a few inches of scrap material same as what you want to sew for real and adjust again. If you can't get the tensions balanced using the needle thread tension knob you'll have to decrease the bobbin thread tension but you shouldn't have to do that. Blowthrough can be reduced by using leather specific needles but you're probably using them already. Getting the thread tensions balanced should help with it.

We don't get Weldwood over here but I've used plenty of contact cement of various types. There's definitely an optimal use window which varies on your exact cement -- some will stick just fine when still damp, some won't; some will stick when dry and some won't. A little experimentation often pays off. If you let it dry too far most can be reactivated with a heat gun. Something that usually helps, especially with very absorbent leathers, is to apply two layers. Let the first coat dry to the touch before reapplication then treat the second coat as according to the instructions on the tin. If your leather is very greasy, oily or waxy scrape any excess off the back before gluing. Glazed/mossed/sealed backs should be roughened with sandpaper or a surform. Or, better yet, split a tiny bit off the back if you have that ability.

I had this once with a W/F machine quite similar to the 206 -- somewhere above 1,300SPM the stitches would lengthen well above what I had it set to. Stitch length shortened back to normal when I throttled back. Not a huge surprise, it was rated for 1,200 or so. I figured something is either bouncing more than it's supposed to or is bouncing its normal amount and not being able to return to its starting position (under spring pressure) in time for the next stitch. Fixed by keeping the speed within the rated limits. I've also had issues with W/F machines changing stitch length when the two feet bind against one another, when the outer foot binds against a step up, when the foot timing is off and when there's excessive tension on one side (most commonly with the needle thread catching on something). However none of these have varied with speed, except for the above story. @tagfan what speeds are you encountering this issue at?

What's the fella sewing-- a pool cue case for Paul Bunyon?

Beltmaker I used to know kept a dedicated dye bench. It was just a large old glass shelf on four wooden legs. Wiped off easy whenever he was done. Only has to be slightly larger than the largest thing you commonly make.

I have or have had every one of these tools and completely agree with your assessment. Band-knife splitters are the dog's danglers, absolutely knock the tar out of all the other options for almost all situations but they're big, expensive, finnicky and heavy. Absolutely agree. I have split 4" wide wallet backs down to 1.2mm from 4mm English bridle using a pull skiver but I wouldn't recommend it. Probably ruined more leather than I successfully split. Jennifer, may I ask where you are currently located? We have a worldwide membership on this forum and one of us may know of someone near to you who offers a splitting service but doesn't advertise. It's not necessarily the wrong tool, it can work for what you want but it's not ideal. I get annoyed when manufacturers call these machines splitters for exactly this reason. IMHO these tools are lap skivers -- ideal for thinning down the foldbacks on leather straps, good for straps up to 2". Okay for levelling straps. Not much good for splitting wide pieces of leather. I'm sure you can learn to sharpen these simple blades, really not too difficult. However a lot of skiver/splitter manufacturers allow you to buy extra blades so you can use the spare while you send the other out for sharpening. Sometimes the original manufacturer will sharpen it for a small fee, sometimes you have to send it to a specialist sharpening service. Those sheet-metal pliers will really help you grab the leather. As I mentioned above I used to split 4" stiff bridle leather from 4mm down to 1.2mm (I think that's 10oz down to 3oz) with a pull-skiver and pliers like those really helped. Had to put my boot against the bench and pull with a lot of power though and probably ruined more leather than I successfully split.

My Pearson No6 has plain/journal bearings just like the Bunkhouse machines. Over the past 100 years it must have done 100 miles of stitching through the toughest of materials and they've not developed any slop yet. Steel-on-steel doesn't make much friction. Add a couple drops of oil and that plummets. I reckon a small manual embossing machine should be fine.

There isn't going to be much saving in material or labour cost in a dedicated manual machine over a powered head. At the same time the Outlaw is a machine that appeals to a limited section of a limited market so the development costs have to be absorbed among a smaller number of units to be sold than, say a 441 type machine. Prices being comparable doesn't surprise me -- the 441 and 205 type machines are designs that were cloned from designs developed by Juki and Adler 30 years ago -- Cowboy had far lower development costs to bring these to market than they did the Outlaw. Buying a 441 or 205 type head and fit a handle, like you suggest, would certainly give you a machine with some "expansion room" over say a one-arm-bandit like the Outlaw (you have the option to fit a motor later). Some dealers in fact do that. However if you've not worked with industrial machines like these before you might be surprised at the weight. Juki 441 (= Cowboy 4500) is 123lb/56Kg. Not very portable.

£575 OVNO.

Are those grommets steel based or brass based? Looks like an iron reaction.

Here's a very good set of instructional videos on the bell-knife skiver: As usual these videos by Checaflo are full of common sense solutions to things that I would overthink. I love, for instance, his use of pieces of different papers as feeler gauges -- they cost nothing, you'll always have some lying around and they don't take any time to make. They're also really effective -- it's how I now get a "starting" set of adjustments, and tweak from there after trying it out on scraps. My belt is on the far left, which is slightly less than a 1:1 ratio -- slow feed fast knife. The ratios inside your machine may be different. Running off a 1450RPM clutch motor FWIW, though the motor pulley is maybe twice the diameter of the skiver's pulley. I tend to run it with the pedal to the metal so the knife is probably doing about 3000 RPM. Yes you can buy a second motor and have the feed and knife totally independent. It's something I intend to do with mine one day. As said by Jimi above, finished thickness is primarily affected by the height of the presser foot. I suggest you try to get your knife closer to the foot. I like to bring the knife in until it touches the foot and back it off just enough to remove contact (all being turned by hand -- motor off). This is the position where a fresh clean piece of cheap copy paper just slides between the foot and the knife.

Well I'm glad that Norn Iron has been sorted out -- if that's what the politicos and PSNI are spending their time dreaming up and enforcing surely all the other problems must be squared away...

Supposedly it's because the singles get nicked regularly whereas it's a little more difficult to tuck a block under yer Adidas jacket. It's not rocket science how to stop this "problem" -- put the singles in a locked cabinet where a member of staff has to take it out when you ask for it. They already have some pretty effective measures at stopping you nicking a packet of smoked salmon or a bagload of mobile phones (otherwise they'd go out of business PDQ). I suspect that there's been some confidential discussions of cost-benefit analysis. Too much time/effort/aggro for their staff to actually effect simple and reasonable shrinkage controls. Plus if they don't have any £3 single crappy knives to sell you'll be forced to buy the £25 set of crappy knives if you want/need one. Increased ATV, that'll keep the bean counters happy.

But its electric, mines manual is 1.2 " So pass the leather through 10 times! Rattling traps? Think I'm going to steal that one.

Harry, you've just forced me to count how many sewing machines I have. It's stayed in the single digits for now if I stick just to industrials. Might be time to thin the herd. I've at least been strict with myself and resisted the temptation of a "real" clicker press. It may or may not have something to do with the fact I've got over 1000Kg of iron in the shed already. My splitter's not that big, it's only a 12"er. I'm also Matt and I have... a few tools. How many? Always one too few.

I have one press with a 1/4-24 top thread and one with a M8 top thread. It is a pain to have to keep track of incompatible top tools. Luckily the bottom tools are interchangeable. One day I'll get around to buying a kick-press and sell off my hand presses and all my incompatible dies.

I'm glad you like your machine -- if it weren't the small matter of a few thousand miles between us I'd happily swap you a second Chinese patcher for your Singer Mine works fine, it's just a limited design. If your Singer isn't backstitching into the same holes it probably needs a tweak. Hey that's great Doug. I'm really pleased you've got it working as you want. What adjustments did you make to your machine?

I do, as do many others on this forum, and I agree wholeheartedly with Singermania's assessment of these machines. They have their uses, especially if your circumstances don't allow you any other industrial sewing machine suitable for sewing lightweight leather. But almost any other industrial sewing machine will be better for manufacturing leathergoods. Unless being used to sew in really awkward spaces (where there is little choice) I'd rather stick to hand sewing than use one for sewing anything visible on quality goods.

Hey TT, this may be a case of the blind leading the blind but in my definitely non-expert opinion I agree that that microswitch and the thing that actuates it is something to look at next. Perhaps the microswitch is jammed "in" and tells the solenoid that the head has reached the bottom of travel all the time? There doesn't look like there's much of that white nubbin sticking out.

Ah sweet, I bet that'd be handy for long pieces. Best of luck with the machine