Aggiebraider

Roo, For a while I didnt soap mine much if at all either, and then I went to doing it religiously and it makes a big difference, even on lower numbered plaits. It lets me pull the braid in so much tighter and allows the strands to slip against each other. That is the biggest benefit is that it reduces the friction you are applying on the strand you are braiding from those that it passes over and under. This especially becomes apparent when you soap your button strings as they will be pulled under a lot of times, depending on how big your button is CW

Hey Fiddlegirl, I had been using Fiebings white saddle soap for my braiding until a couple months ago. I think it works well enough if you can get it lathered up and rub it in really well so it penetrates. I switched to making my own soap, and its really easy but I want to tweak my recipe some to get the consistency where I want. The recipe is 1 bar of Ivory soap, 1/2 cup of olive oil, and half a bar of Fiebings Glycerine saddle soap. Shave the glycerine with a cheese grater or a vegetable peeler. Warm 1.5 cups of water in a pot and add the glycerine slowly and let them melt. then add the ivory (works best if its shaved down too) and then add the olive oil. Stir this until its all melted, but make sure it doesnt boil. Then pour the liquid soap into a blender and blend it a while so it gets aerated and all the lumps are out. Then pour this into whatever container you want to use and cool it at room temperature. The last batch I made ended up like mashed potatoes in consistency but I want it to be more like cool whip so I might add more oil next time. It works great because you can just scoop some up with your hands and it applies really well. You can also add beeswax to help seal your work and make it a little water proof. I will probably make a small batch with beeswax to be a final application on a finished piece. Hope this helps, CW

I like how you did the slit braid (or blood knot as some people know it) for the initial loop. I think that would close up a bit better than even doing the 4 strand braid since it is much flatter CW

So I have been reading this thread, and Im sure its something you will want to work out, but most quirts dont have a taper. They will be braided the same size from top to bottom. Not sure if you can go back and use a different core that doesnt have a taper, and you would have a much easier time. CW

When you bevel, make sure you just knock the corner off. This is why many old timers call beveling "cornering". And just take a little off, less is more CW

Great job, especially on the reins buttons......HANG THE REINS STRAIGHT DOWN!!!!! lol it gave me th willies looking at them all wadded up like that on the fence. Would love to see some up close shots of both the reins and headstall. CW

What you can do for a sliding knot that works better than a ring knot is take a piece of leather that will wrap around the piece you want, skive the ends so that it will all lay flat, and then glue these ends with contact cement. You can make this leather foundation first of a dowel, which is what I would do, and then if your skiving isnt perfect, you can sand it some to smooth things up. then you could build up on top of the first piece with another piece that is a little narrower, and put as many more wraps of leather on as you want to get the foundation. Then to make it round, run it on a belt sander and basically turn it into a ball shape. Then tie your knot over this, once youre done, just slide the whole thing off the dowel and onto your lanyard. You can make it similar to a scarf slide, and it should work ok. Or you can do all of this on your lanyard first and by pass the dowel completely. Hope this helps, CW

It is actually WAY easier to tie a nose button if you use multiple strands (at least for me). I learned a technique from a couple TCAA members where you use 8 strands and crown them over each other at whatever side you want to start with, then braid them down the nose foundation Over 1 Under 1. This works best if you can hang the bosal body up so its going straight down in front of you. Then once you get near hte bottom, go about an inch past the bottom knot and then start going back up with each strand, following a strand thats already there, then once you get to the top, you will start splitting pairs. Once you have everything going O2 U2, you are done. Hope this makes sense, might take pics once i actually get to making another bosal and I will post them. CW

you can crown it no matter how many strands there are, but if you are trying to get it small, you will have to heat and roll it while its hot. You are basically melting the strands together

Annie Great job on the bosal. I posted that earlier reply without even reading who I was replying to lol... Guess next time I should look and know who Im talking to. CW

Ill throw in my .02 here (worth exactly that much lol). I would definitely do an 8 bight or even more. At the braiding workshop I was at a couple weeks ago, I asked Nate Wald about a problem I was having with interweaves on my pineapple knots. He said the problem was that I was doing a 6 bight and you are limited by where you can place interweaves and what they will look like with a 6 bight. With an 8 or larger, you can put an interweave in anywhere even if its just a single row of one color. Seems much easier to tie an 8 bight exactly like you want. CW

Youre also not technically "extending" the knot if by extending you mean make it longer. You are really just filling the middle in more to cover a larger object. The same principle can be applied when a smaller knot wont completely cover the foundation you are using. CW

Yes you basically just keep going with O4 U4 but at the top and bottom you will go under more parts than you did the last time. Without getting a book out, I think you will go U5 at the top and U3 at the bottom. If you are using multiple colors (which I recommend), this will be easier and the pattern will start to show itself once you go around a couple times and start splitting pairs.' CW

Yeah that would be great, just let me know when youre moving down and I will try to have some stuff finished to bring with me. CW

Alpaca halters are different from horse halters if I remember correctly. Im pretty sure they dont have the strap that goes from the throat to the chin, so I think you made it correctly for an alpaca CW

Hey Ann, Welcome to LW! Its always nice to get more braiders in here Hey want2braid, Thanks for clearing that up. I thought I had it right in my head, but when I tried to write it down it didnt come out right lol. I guess I should have written down more and taken a few pics thanks for doing that for everyone lol. CW

The only problem with buying lace directly from Bill is that it doesnt come beveled. It is extremely good lace and really consistent (yes I have bought some from him precut) but I own my own beveler and can finish the lace as I see fit. You can buy a cheap beveler from Y Knot Lace, I thought about buying one of the larger sized ones to be able to bevel up to an inch, but I dont have the extra cash. You really almost have to bevel rawhide. When its braided, the raised edges on non beveled lace will almost cut you its so sharp. And it will also look MUCH better if it is beveled. If you dont want to bevel it yourself, you might be able to find a braider that is willing to sell you some. I could maybe be sweet talked into beveling it for you for the right price lol. CW

And as far as the multi string buttons go, for a noseband for example, both Mehl and Nate use a vice to hold the body of their bosal up and down and then braid the strings towards yourself just like if you were doing the body. Start braiding them over one under one (from the middle of 4 strands if you wanted to do an 8 bight) and once you get to the bottom, crown the strands back up and go the other way, following the strands you already put in and making pairs. Then you turn back the other way, increasing the number of bights at the top and start splitting pairs back down. I am going to try and get a body made this week and hopefully will be able to do a tutorial on it this weekend. Im sure it sounds kinda confusing, but if you see it it will make sense. I didnt have my camera with me, but hopefully we can get want2braid to post some that he took. CW

Take a look at the patterns MarkB has for sale on his website. http://www.cowcampsaddlery.com/ He is a member here and does a great job on his patterns. He hasnt finished the spur strap patterns yet, but has headstall, chink. chap, and slobber strap patterns for sale on his site. He even has an awesome chink making DVD that covers everything you need to know about making a set of chinks. CW

Awesome job on the saddle and nice to see you posting some work again. You actually came up in a couple different conversations at the braiding workshop this weekend in San Diego lol. Hope everything is well up north, CW

Melanie, First off, try and post any braiding questions in the braiding section of the forum, it will typically get better responses there from the braiders that follow the section regularly. As far as your question, Im really not sure what you are asking. By keepers, what do you mean? If you havent bought any books yet, I recommend you buying Gail Hought's books, especially her bosal books. You wouldnt need to get both of them to just start, I would just get the first. You should also get the Bruce Grant books as they cover the bosal building process quite well. After reading your post about 10 times and looking at the pics, I think I understand what you are asking now. If you do a nose button over your body (doesnt matter if you braided the body or if you are using a rope), and you make a true nose button, the ends will stay just fine and wont need anything over top them. The way people achieve the swelled look at each side of a nose button is by building a foundation that you want (either with a spanish ring knot or a piece of leather wrapped around the body and skived), then braid the nose button over top this and the foundation of the nose button. You dont have to do this as you can just build an even foundation and braid over this, which would make a straight nose button without any swells. Kind of a personal preference as to whether you make a "moused" nose button as its called or a straight one. Hope this helps and if not ask away and I will try and answer any other questions you might have. CW

You can also use a rein rounder if you dont want to have a sewn edge. Just run your edger over all four corners and pull it through the rein rounder. Since a rein rounder typically has a top half that can be lifted up, you wouldnt have to worry about fitting the flat sections through, just lift the rein rounder up, put the "round" section in, pull it through the rounder, then lift the top half of the rounder back up and remove your collar. Typically, you will have to pull it through 2 or 3 sized holes to get it down to your target diameter and to make it as round as possible. You may have to experiment with edger size and rounder holes to get the right combination to get to your target diameter. If you dont have a rein rounder, Weavers has a couple that they sell, but they arent the nice cast iron ones like the old rounders. Good luck finding the old rounders like an Osborne. I have been looking for almost a year now and I cant find one that attaches to a bench top and doesnt require a vice. If someone has one for sale, let me know lol. Hope this helps, CW

This is what is called a Horn Knot. It is used by calf ropers and any other cowboy wanting to tie their rope on "hard and fast" to their saddle horn. The end of the rope is folded over and slid through this horn knot making a loop in the end of the rope that can be placed over the saddle horn. As you pull on the rope, it will draw down tight onto the saddle horn, but will also release if slack is forced into the rope just before the horn knot. Horn knots are fairly easy to make in relation to other knots such as pineapple knots. Not really sure if this is considered a turks head or knot but I wouldnt be surprised if it is considering how many knots can be labeled as such. For me, the easiest way to tie a horn knot is over 2 or 3 fingers (make sure you get things too tight, because if your string is small enough, it can get really hard to get off your fingers). This knot is made with only one string, but if you really wanted to, you might be able to add another strand to get a different color in (I will explain a problem with this later). The entire process for making these is to do what is called crowning. You basically twist the working end of your string over the standing end (make sure you always go in the same direction), and working in odd numbers of twists. Depending on your string diameter, you may want to do more or less twists per pass (smaller diameter, more twists). Once you have completed your first pass, you will follow the working end, making crowns (or twists) through the same places. On the third pass, you want to follow the standing end in the same process. Once you get to this point, the pattern should be apparent, and the process just continues until you have done as many passes as you want. Most horn knots are probably 1.5" - 2" in height, but thats completely dictated on personal preference. Once you have the knot made initially, you will want to find something (a dowel works well) that is the diameter you want the finished knot to be and you will want to tighten all of the twists down. You want this knot to be fairly firm, so you cant pull it tight enough. Once you have it tightened down, cut the ends and burn them. One of the major problems with this knot is the inability to effectively hide the ends in an attractive manner. If you dont have the ends secured down, the knot will unravel, no matter what you do. This is why most horn knots are made from a nylon based cord, because when burned it melts really well and you can (and should) burn it enough to melt the end to adjacent twists so it wont pull through. Once finished, most are shaped fairly flat, or will take that shape when used since the two pieces of the calf rope that pass through the horn knot will pull on the outer sides of the knot. The problem I mentioned earlier is the fact that because you cant hide the ends, if you add another color, you just add two more ends that have to be burned to adjacent twists. One really cool application of this knot is to tie it actually directly around the saddle horn as a cover. Because of the nature of the knot and how it will draw tight down onto whatever round shape you want, it covers a saddle horn well. The hard part about this is that you have to tie the knot initially around the saddle horn or try to slide the finished knot down over and then tighten it. If you are going to try covering a saddle horn in one shot with this, you need to be careful not to damage the leather of the saddle horn with your hemostats or needle nose pliers. If you are going to cover a saddle horn with this, DO NOT DALLY WITH IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This is designed for calf roping saddles or barrel racing saddles that will not be dallied on, as the knot will not allow a rope to slide if you try and dally over top this. I hope this all makes sense and Im sorry its so long winded, I just wanted to explain this knot as best as I can, because its really simple, but can seem confusing at first. Hope this helps, CW

Great info, thanks for sharing! Too bad I just ordered two more hides from hardtkes this week lol. Hopefully this will take them some time and I can still get a hold of some directly from them next time I need some. Have a good one, CW

Not sure if you are just referring to rawhide or not, but as far as leather, kangaroo is the absolute best for braiding. It has superior tensile strength to just about anything you would like to compare it to, and a beautiful grain to it. Latigo can be used, but I have yet to find a latigo hide that I think would work very well. I think Im not looking for the correct tannage, I just didnt have the hide I used turn out worth a darn. I havent heard of anyone using bridle or skirting leathers thinned down, so not sure how they would work.