BIGGUNDOCTOR

I for one hate over packaged items. I see sooooo much waste generated form items that have more packaging than item. When I had my shop, I recycled lots of packing supplies from foam peanuts to newspaper. Check around some. Where I work now they toss garbage cans full of bubble wrap, foam sheets, air bags, and peanuts from items we order. Take a garbage bag with you to a company that moves some merchandise, and ask them if they wouldn't mind letting you have some of what they are tossing. My buddy had a motorcycle parts business, and he generated tons of boxes, and packing materials. For bagging parts we went through cases of 6mil ziplocks in the Jelly Belly Candy Co maintenance dept. Most that got tossed were still clean, and usable. Those plastic grocery bags work good to for sending stuff. Drop the item in, and tie the handles together. Remember to reduce, reuse, recycle when you can. With packing , it could mean free packing materials, which will up your profits. We used to get bearings delivered from a local supplier in small dog food bags. They were rejects from the printing company.

Hello Treadhead1952 from another (close to) Las Vegas denizen. Would you happen to be the gentleman I talked with in Tandy last Saturday, and told about LW.net? MOA, looks like you are getting some good info now. When you get going don't forget to post some pics of your work .

Eylem, I will have to check that out more sometime. Is there a way to bring the forum names up in English? One thing I found funny, is even in Turkey you have the faces too.

Hello MOA, Depends on what type of holsters that you intend to make. The basics would be leather, knife, and lacing ,or needle and thread. The fancier you get the more, or different tools you may want/need to accomplish what you want to do. Fancy tools do not make a better item, craftsmanship does. Some tools will make some jobs easier, but they don't neccessarilly have to be used to get great results. Old West Concealment rigs LEO gear Competition Reproductions There are lots of different holsters with different ways to make each. A little more clarity will help us help you.

Welcome to the group. You may also want to check out www.iforgeiron.com for some knife ideas. I am a member of that blacksmithing forum myself.

Really surprised that no one has brought up trademark, or copyright infringement yet. That was the first question a biker coworker asked, when we were discussing JJ closing up shop today, and I mentioned your seats.

Probably a LOT faster to just hacksaw the mushroom off since it is so huge. Ya need to protect yer peepers since the fake ones don't work as good as the ones you have.

My Mom used a Lignum Vitae burnishing stick that my Dad made. Burnishing means to polish by rubbing. Even if you didn't add anything to the leather, and just rubbed it with something smooth it would start to be burnished. Additives fill the voids, and help to make a less porous surface which will take a better polishing.

So what happens to old stitching horses? Do they go out to pasture, or the glue factory?

It is just a camera strap. Figure out what length would be best for her, and watch how it fits around the neck. Too stiff, or rough edges will get really annoying after just a short time carrying the camera. Depending on the camera weight, a narrower strap will usually be better than a wide one, as it will have less of a tendency to rub her the wrong way. A cloth neck pad could also be incorporated. Take a trip to a camera store, and see what is available commercially for ideas.

Hold off on the power tools, you can easily go from an easy touch up to a whole reworking of the cutting edge with one slip. Dressing the inside is just to remove any burrs, no real stock removal. Punches generally are not that hard, so I would dress any bad spots with a good file, then touch it up with a stone, or two. The shank can be dressed on a bench grinder to remove all of those potential eye poppers. The top should have a chamfer around the edge, with a slight crown. When you use it make sure that you have an appropriate surface under the punch; poundo board, plastic cutting board, lead block, or what I use, a block of end grain wood. Don't punch across the grain, always use end grain. This will give you easy, and clean cuts.

OK, my Engrish translating is a little rusty, but I will take a stab at this one. I think Billio is asking about the lacing layout (possibly got translated as calculated), and if there is a difference in size between the top, and bottom. Is there foam involved?

In regards to buying versus making. I am a machinist, and do some blacksmithing, so I know that some of us get a lot of satisfaction in making tools that we use. Also a project like this is "easy" for me since I have the skills, tools, and materials available. Yes it is often times less expensive, but sometimes we choose to go a different path.

Hey Whit, there are several ways that these could be done. With modern technology press dies could be made with lasers, CNC routers/machining centers, molded/cast, etc. It would come down to economics, and how long the dies are expected to last. In the old days a wooden master pattern would be made, then it was used to make the mold which was then cast. The casting would take some polishing to be ready to use. Another way would be for a tool, and die maker to basically carve it out of a chunk of metal. Castings would usually be for mass production , the tool maker approach would be for precision, as it is a very expensive way to do it. Today a design can be input into a CAD/CAM computer program the sent to a CNC machining center, laser, router, etc. They still require a little dressing up, but a ton of labor is saved. There are folks on the forum here that can do this die making for you. Some dies are done in Delrin which is a very stiff, hard plastic that works very nicely.

Any good tool steel should work fine. If you use a stainless go with a 400 series like 440C which is heat treatable. For a plain steel a good choice would be 1095 spring steel. You can buy spring steels from McMaster Carr that are already heat treated to a blue (springy) temper. 1095 can be hardened so hard that it becomes very brittle. Easy to harden. Heat to nonmagnetic, and quench in some oil. Polish, then heat till it gets to a straw color, quench again. Should be good to go at that point. Do not heat past blue, or it will be softer . Old small jeweler's files files can be reshaped, and tempered down to a less brittle condition. All of these will hold a good edge. Of course this all depends on what tools you have available.

I have a suede Kepi that I have worn extensively since 1979. Bought it at a leather shop on Pier 39 in San Francisco. I believe that they used a latigo for the bill, don't do that. When it gets around 90 here it gets soft,and droops down. It weighs about a pound total, and it gets really uncomfortable to wear during warmer weather-under 80 is best. I generally wear it now during the winter since I moved to the desert . When it is 100+ it is just too hot on the head, since it doesn't breath. A suggestion would be to buy a cheap cloth one, and take it apart for a pattern. There were several variations on the Kepi, or Forage cap as it was also known. Some have a rather long upper section that flops to the front, while others were snugger fitting. One other thing I would change is adding a sweat band in the front. Over the years, and lots of warmer weather, the sweat has rotted out the front some. I am going to cut the bad section out, and install a cloth type insert that will be removable to clean. If I could figure out how to resize the pictures I would post them. Send me an email, and I will send them that way. They are around 2.4Mb each so you can see the details better.

I would rather get a good used lathe than a throwaway one from HF. That's just my opinion. Being a machinist, and one who is very disturbed by the loss of manufacturing jobs to China, I have a hard time buying anything made there. Like most things, all you have to do is look around, and ask around for them . They will start popping up in due time. With the loss of so many shops, used lathes are fairly abundant. In the end it isn't the lathe that is expensive, it is the tooling to make it do what you want it to do that can add up. Chucks, centers, collets, cutters, etc....... When you buy a used late they often come with a bunch of tooling.

Thanks Skald for the avatar info, as he doesn't look Indian to me. I thought he was some form of Yeti, or abominable snowman from your neck of the woods. It is a very striking picture. Good luck with your endeavor.

Hey Skald, do a search for noise, or apartment. There were quite a few suggestions recently tossed out to another member with the same problem. Is there a garage space, or possibly a community recreation room available? Here in the States we have senior centers that have rooms, as well as groups that work on various crafts like leather, wood, lapidary, etc. Some let non-seniors in to use the facilities for a small fee. Love your avatar. Who is it?

Use it as a marketing gimmic. Call it dragon skin or something. I think that the pattern could actually be cool for some projects. Why make something that looks like what everyone else does?

If it wasn't so bulky I could see this as an option for handicapped folks. If ya only have one arm it is kind of hard to do any hammering. I wouldn't say that it helped his work any. Looks like it pounded the snot out it.

Welcome fellow Nevadan. Lots of info here concerning saddle , tack, and other horse stuff. Personally I don't mess with them beasts Have a happy, and safe new year .

The Stohlman books are good, and show a lot of different techniques. There are several Tandy Leather stores in Texas, find the closest one to you, and run on over there. They have many books that they sell, and I would suggest cruising through some to see which ones have the info that you are looking for. Lots of pictures help, as some books are vague in their text only descriptions. With that being said, a lot of leather working is by feel. Tandy also offers classes that you may also want to look into. The forums here are also a great resource to learn from. There is also an oft forgotten resource for printed material. They are called libraries. Yes, the same ones from our predigital age youth. They have huge collections of books in them, and get this-they let you borrow them for a period of time for FREE. How cool is that?