Northmount

The dots look like contamination with iron filings. The tannin (tannic acid) in the leather plus iron make these dots. Check out the vinegaroon process used to dye leather black. Need to keep all metal filings away from your leather working area. You can use lemon juice or oxalic acid to bleach the dots out. Some people use a q-tip or paint brush to treat just the spot. You can bleach the whole surface if necessary. Do a search for oxalic acid here and you will find lots of posts. Good luck with your big project. In about 1961 I got into leatherwork because my grandfather gave me an old saddle that needed a lot of repair. The saddle got left behind in one of our moves, so never ever got fixed and I haven't ventured into saddle making or repair. I envy you and compliment you on being brave enough to try on your own. CTG

Yup, when your hands and fingers get sore enough, you'll definitely accelerate your savings! CTG

There is a thickness table here. http://www.tandyleatherfactory.ca/en-cad/home/infoandservices/leatherguide/leatherguide.aspx CTG

Try this link. http://www.tools4leather.com/01_ma_series_III_clicker.htm I think they are expensive, but it is small and can sit on your bench. CTG

I'm finding updates real slow at the moment, whether it is increased site traffic this time of day or something else. I did get a couple SQL errors today, one when loading a picture from a thumbnail, the other when selecting a link from related similar topics. Both worked when retrying the link. CTG

Display is blue. Each post is on a relatively narrow strip. No message # like non-mobile. Thumbnails okay, and open okay. Minimal poster info, which is probably best for mobiles. No signature displayed. Thumbnails line up down the left side. I'm sure you know most of this since you must be picking what you think fits for the template. I viewing from an iPad in landscape mode. I think it is looking pretty good. Don't forget the color! CTG

Seems fine this morning. Keep up the great work. I and many others appreciate it. CTG

Very nice combination. Gives me some new ideas. CTG

I have used LePage PRES-TITE GREEN water based contact cement. Non-toxic, non-flammable, low odour. About $10 for a pint. It is a little slower drying than the nasty solvent based, and gives just a tiny bit of chance to reposition if you haven't gone too far, but not very much. CTG

You can have a makers mark put on a branding iron. Then you can brand grain or flesh side of any leather. You can also do pyrography on any leather. There are warnings about using chrome tanned. I'd use a good exhaust fan and a cross draft to keep the smoke away regardless of the type of leather. I have seen some really nice pyrography on leather. CTG

You can cover all the slats with thin leather, even make the blinds multi colour. If you get wild enough with the colours, she might never ask to have you fix anything ever again! You could go even further by laying out a pattern (sort of like patch work) for each side so the blind shows a different pattern inside and out when closed. It could even say "GO AWAY" when closed, or something even more startling. Could have a lot of fun with this project. CTG

For small articles, easy to go around with one length of lace. For larger perimeters, skive the ends of the lace and do a wet join (glue). For items like your belt, join the lace so you only have the beginning and ending to hide, or if going all the way around, just have the ends to hide on that final join. If the item is thick enough, you can slice into the leather from the edge, so you now have two layers and can bury the ends there. You can make a narrow slit in the back side to bring your needle out through, cut the lace, poke it down and glue the slit back together. For lighter stuff, you are stuck with hiding ends under the lace braid itself. Try to do it on the edge, under the braid rather than on the back. CTG

See https://www.acklandsgrainger.com/AGIPortalWeb/WebSource/Main/globalSearch.do?%7BglobalApp.quickSearchSearchType%7D=&%7BglobalApp.quickSearchCriteria%7D=Arch+punch Just bought a few. Good quality steel. Made in India. CTG

Princess Auto presses are made in China. No name brand. Take a look in Harbor Freight. Also do a search here for presses. There are a few threads I recall, including a link to a PDF about using hydraulic presses for clicking. I bought the Princess Auto 20 ton press a few months ago. It was on sale for the same price as a 10 ton so i couldn't resist it. Now need to get some dies made. My son has been using it doing mechanical repairs since I put it in his shop. Ran out of space here! CTG

Your and your cohorts' work and time are greatly appreciated. Testing and making everything work with tablets and mobile devices is a lot of work too! Would be nice if all browsers actually followed the standards. My iPad is behaving quite nicely with your new templates. CTG

Nice job. You have certainly been bitten by the leather bug. Keep it up! CTG

If you are using MS Outlook for email, email it to yourself and let Outlook resize it for you. Else look through the computer help section and find help there. One program you can use is IrfanView http://www.irfanview.com/main_download_engl.htm. Resize to max 800 pixels wide. CTG

I think a $5 or $10 minimum charge is quite reasonable. $2 or $3 hardly makes it worthwhile to do the bookkeeping, look after sales tax, file income tax and all those pesky time consuming things that goes with being in business. People these days think nothing of dropping $10 on things of absolutely no lasting value. The work and repairs we do have much longer term value than a bag of popcorn or a soft drink at the movies. If you aren't going to charge for reasonable value, then skip the charge and just do it for free. No bookkeeping, no taxes ... Put a tip jar on the counter, just like a box for pennies that people don't want and leave for someone else to make up those few cents difference to round out a nickel or dime. If you don't want the tips, give it to a charity end of each week. Let them do the accounting. Over 20 years ago in a computer business, we decided that the only way to price the small bits and pieces was to start at $5. It didn't make sense to mark up 30% on a $1.39 item when you look at all the time and costs that go into ordering, picking up, stocking, etc. It sure made pricing a lot more simple and no one ever complained. Only high volume sales can make money on $1 items. And we are not high volume sellers. Think about it. Remember our work has lasting value. Keep that in your mind when working and pricing your time, labor, talents, skills, etc. CTG

Yes they do. There is some good wallet info in this post: http://leatherworker.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=41902&hl=+wallet%20+pattern#entry260881. There is also a reference to a pattern near the end of that thread. If you copy an old wallet, pick a simple one. Some have too many pieces and would be quite bulky when made of leather. There is a tutorial here: http://leatherworker.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=38359&hl=wallet Enjoy. CTG

Looks like gallery pictures are working now. Last I tried looking at comments this morning, on the right column beside the gallery, it was still having a problem. I know some of the headaches they are going through with this upgrade. They will have them solved before long. In the meantime, hang in there. Computers and related systems have sure changed since the 60s when I first started working with them. Then I had a long break for 15 to 20 years, then back as a user, then 10 years later, had to set up windows ntserver 3.51 for my distributed control systems lab in a tech school. My 13 year old son did most of it. He was one of the first in Calgary to successfully install nt3.5. Took him many tries, but finally located all the drivers to make it work. After he set up the server for my lab, then I just had to maintain it, lucky for me! Then had about 10 years in a computer sales and service business, then back to just a user. Still do a touch of programming, but glad I don't have to keep up to date with all the software changes.

Take a look at this thread: http://leatherworker.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=40290 CTG

Are you logged in? I haven't had any such responses. CTG

Like you did ... Option I missed is moving the pulley itself. So when the belt is straight down from the head pulley and not attached to the motor, does it hang in the middle of the slot, or against one side? If it hangs against the side, widening the slot like you are doing is the easiest thing to do. Then the motor pulley/ motor should be moved to align with the head pulley. CTG

Some motors have the mounting bracket slotted where the table bolts go through. You should be able to get about 1/2" of adjustment there ... hopefully in the right direction. Some motor housings are like extruded aluminum, slots that have a recess for nuts inside the extrusion. If your motor is like this, then you can loosen up the mounting bracket attachments on the motor and slide them over a little. The last resort is to drill new holes in the table. CTG

Something else that helps is Fiebings Liquid Saddle Soap. If I remember right, I used the saddle soap first, followed by the oxalic acid. CTG