Matt S

Cutting dies are certainly in order I think. Your choice of press depends on a few factors (investment cost, space available, access, power available, required speed). Essentially they boil-down to: (1) Slightly modified garage/shop hydraulic press. These are popular options on this forum for the smaller businesses and hobbyists. A slow option but the lowest investment, and no power requirements are attractive. Most are O-frame designs which limits the size leather you can put in it. I can do at least 6 pieces per minute from my humble 6-ton press. For 100 pieces that shouldn't take you more than 20 minutes, though your mileage may vary. (2) Dedicated swing-arm manual presses like the Lucris. These are toggle presses and apparently need a bit of elbow grease to make em go, but they have a swinging head which means you can use larger pieces of leather as they are. Not a cheap option, about £1300 last time I checked. (3) Proper 3-phase swing-arm clicker press like Atom makes. Big, heavy, expensive (£3000ish) but fast. Can do a click in less time than it takes to place the dies. Usually need 3-phase electric. Used ones can be found online at lower prices. Usually need a pallet jack or small crane to move. There are a few other options like the Tippmann 1500, all sorts of things. Another option could be to subcontract your clicking to another company once you have your dies made. They could also source the leather for you. We have a few Aussies on this forum who may be able to put you in contact with someone.

I've put one in a VW Polo before (small hatchback). Took along a tool bag and spent a half hour stripping it down. Head off and in the passenger footwell. Motor ditto. Table top in the back (seats folded down), legs on top of that, all the other gubbins chucked on top of that. Finished the cuppa the nice lady made for me, washed the worst of the rusty schmoo off my hands and off I went.

You can make a loop of leather to fit your thumb without very much trouble. Or try an Inuit thimble: http://www.primitiveways.com/pt-thimble.html I just push the needle with the handle of the awl of it needs a bit more persuasion.

@Angebe, I think that 97730 is a part number -- can't remember off the top of my head but I think it's a fairly common part for Singer flatbed industrials. Those body-mounted bobbin winders continued for a while, parallel with the use of table-mounted types. Shiny black Singers were common until the 1960s, when they changed to a blue-grey hammered colour, barring a period from the 1940s-50s when they used a crinkled matt black. Are you curious about the date for a reason other than pure curiosity? I find that it's not a reliable indication of condition -- an old machine can have been used very little and stored carefully, whereas a machine just a few years old can have been ridden hard and put away wet. Also, older machines can have been rebuilt with new parts where it counts, and this can be hard to tell from a few photos and a description.

I'd take an old cast iron domestic over that... thing. Singer, Pfaff or Adler housewives specials from 1900s-1960s, straight stitch only, TKT40 (V69) thread with NM100 needles. Adequate on soft to medium temper leather up to 2-3mm total thickness, so long as you don't mind dog marks, layer slippage and uneven stitch length. You'll be paying about the same for decent needles as a real industrial machine, and changing bobbins frustratingly often on long runs, but it'll be okay for wallet interiors and such. They were made by the millions and a lot of them are still in excellent nick. You can buy them all day long for under £50 and once you wear it out it works great as a doorstop, or stick an ugly lamp on it and sell it for £200 as "upcycled". Just avoid the chancers on eBay selling the same things for 5x the value with weasel words like "industrial strength" or "semi-industrial", or with stacks of coins next to the presser foot.

@Windrider30, what quantity are we talking? 10? 100? 1000? How much scope is there for repeat orders, or other uses to which you can put the kit once you're done with this order?

I've split bridle under 0.5mm with a pull-skiver... but it's not consistent or reliable. Splits I normally now do with my crank splitter, but like most models it was designed primarily for splitting boot soles and other thick, stiff pieces. That's true of just about any fixed-knife splitter I'm aware of. (If there's a fixed-knife splitter around that does well on soft or thin leather's I'd be glad to be told.) If I want a consistent split under 1mm I farm it out to one of my suppliers, who have a band-knife splitter and are happy to do a few splits for some change thrown in their tea fund jar, or £10/hour for larger amounts. These band-knife splitters are apparently the stuff for precise, controlled splits and are fast once they're dialled in, with no stretch. The one they have is adjustable by 0.1mm increments and though I don't know how calibrated that is it's good enough for Simple Ol Matt and the reading on the display usually matches what the calipers say. Problem is these machines are temperamental, easy to put out of whack or break parts by untrained persons and cost a lot of money and shop space. I've been quoted minimum £3k for a small, heavily-used (used-up?) model. For smaller widths, bell-knife skivers can apparently be set for splitting and are much more accessible and versatile than a band-knife splitter but they are limited to splitting 2" widths at a time. A 4" strip can be done in two passes, but if you're splitting lining for a messenger bag that's going to take a long time.

From what thickness are you splitting? My splitter is much better at splitting, say, 3mm down to 0.7 than 1 down to 0.7. I find that stiffness of the original piece is key.

Well that depends on what speed is acceptable for production. My humble 6 ton manual hydraulic needs three pumps to click a 2mm thick piece. That's under 10 seconds per piece, including the time to place the die, pump, release and eject. 6+ pieces per minute is plenty fast enough for a lot of small one-person businesses, as we have a lot of on this forum. It may not be as fast as a swing-arm Atom but at <£100 vs. £3000 (plus transport, space, electric and 3-phase) I think this approach has a lot to recommend it.

Abbey Saddlery has a range of crew punches in various qualities. English size 39 is 25mm.

That looks handy, and I bet it wasn't an expensive fence to build ;-) If you attach a ruler to the fence, with the zero in line with the centre of the punch, you can easily space your holes too. Let's say your hole spacing is 1.5". Punch the first hole, slide the belt so the hole is level with the 1.5" mark, then punch again... Rinse and repeat!

Hi, Please see your inbox for an email from me. Regards, Matt

I don't think many machines are offered with differential-feeding options, certainly in leather-suitable machines. The Adler 105-25MO sprung to mind since I've seen a few for sale last year. It's a more common feature on garment machines.

Looks like a machine-sewn moc toe. There are machines specifically designed for this sort of puckered/gathered seam, such as the Adler 105-25MO. These are modified over standard machines so that they have differential feeding on the top and bottom.

Heavy nylon thread is a penny per yard. Lighter stuff is even cheaper. If it's a product where appearance is paramount I'll happily empty a partial and start a seam (especially a long one) with a full bobbin. As Joon says above, bobbins can be a very good investment. In industry it's common to have two spools of each colour and weight of thread, so bobbins can be wound without unthreading the machine. That's why most thread stands have a place for two spools. However I use a lot of different colours and weights of thread and even at £10-20 per spool that adds up to a lot of money tied up in thread. Doubling that by getting two of each isn't something I'm keen to do, so I bought a lot of bobbins. I've got more than 50 for my main machine. When I change top threads I take the opportunity for a coffee break and wind a handful of bobbins before threading it, more than I'll need to finish the job I've got on. Any left over get saved until next time I need that thread again. Thread is pennies, my time is pounds.

I hear this repeated amongst the hobby leatherworking community a lot, and taken as gospel. I don't say this as a disparagement but simply as fact. I've said it many times myself. Under certain circumstances yes saddle stitching can be stronger than machine stitching. Perhaps when heavy stitchers first came out saddlers tried to emulate what they were doing by hand and found the machined seams lacking. However machine stitching is simply different. Good design and execution reflects this -- accounting for the different strengths and weaknesses of each construction technique. I machine-stitch card pocket bottoms with TKT40 nylon thread. I could saddle-stitch it with 8-ply linen thread but it doesn't need that strength. What it does need is a seam that sits flat against the leather to allow a card to slide past it on both sides. TKT40 lock-stitched with a NM100 leather-point needle and 2mm stitch length allows me to do this. It also allows me to spend a lot less time per item, which brings down what I have to charge the customer. It is stronger than the situation requires and, for these reasons, better than hand stitching. Strength isn't everything. As others have said above, "hand made" != "hand sewn". If I bought a "hand made" shirt I would not expect the seamstress to sit there for 12 hours with a needle and thread. If a cabinetmaker sold me a "hand made" box to keep my cufflinks in I would have no problem with his using a power sander. However if he advertised it as having "hand-cut dovetails" I would be very angry to find he'd done them with a router jig. Or he may use a comb joint or a locking mitre. The locking mitre may not be as strong as a dovetail but it would look cleaner, be faster to make and I would trust him to make it stronger than it needs to be to do the job. Task him to build me a box for transporting my fossil collection and I would not expect him to supply me a thing of balsa butt-jointed with hot-melt glue. I am paying for the seamstress or cabinetmaker's skill and experience at technical design, the materials used, their execution, their aesthetic sense and the convenience over doing it myself. The price will reflect this. So it is with what I sell.

What's wrong with machine sewing or using cutting dies?

That's right, no feed dog. The standard plate is very simple -- a short strip of steel with chamfered edges, a needle slot at both ends (different sizes) and a half round cut for a locking screw.

I have seen pictures of raised plates for the #6, but I'm not aware of any in current production. The needle plate on a #6 is a very simple piece, I would imagine a machinist wouldn't have that much trouble fabbing one. I'm waiting til my tame chipwrangler gets back from his winter holiday to have him make me one.

Fifties are mainly used by tourists, but they are still around. You can't get them from ATMs (don't think they fit) so only if you go to a bank counter or I guess a bureau de change. We got a new pattern about 3 years ago which was great fun -- at the time I was working in a department store and had to write up a lot of staff who continued to take the old ones from chancers months after they were no longer valid.

Looking good mate, some very neat work. However I would avoid stitching across a strap like that if it's going to take any strain -- it is prone to tear quite quickly -- think like those sheets of stamps you used to get. Best practice is to keep the stitch lines as parallel to the strap as possible -- or if you like you can angle or curve it across.

KT I don't know where you are in the Peaks but Abbey England is in Knutsford, which is probably a comparable journey to Manchester. They do tooling shoulders. I've not bought any off them but I've always been impressed with the quality of their bridle and service generally.

Uses needles class 126x9. I understand that one of the needles and hook assemblies can be removed to convert a 112 to a single-needle, which would make it a very versatile machine for flat, lighter work -- wallets, chaps, bags... There's a lot of information out there on the 111 and 112.

The model # is on a brass plate directly underneath the one with the Singer logo. Looks like a 112 of some sort (dual needle 111), with a walking foot. Quite the bargain for $50.

That's very neat work, I love wet-moulding but find still find it tricky after several years of trying.