whinewine

I have some upholstery leather from which I've made a bunch of drawstring pouches/dice bags. The color of the leather is a light grey-ish, blah! type color, and that's the problem: the pouches don't sell because of the color. Is there a spray-on finish that is available to change the color to a more vibrant (or at least, different,) color? The leather is upholstery leather- finished & unable to accept spirit or oil dyes- it's the same type of leather as one would find in automobile seats. I know there are spray-on fabric & vinyl dyes out there, but I haven't been able to determine if there are dyes for real leather out there. Because they are drawstring pouches, there will be some flexing, but certainly not a horrendously great amount. I appreciate any help you guys (& ladies) can give. Thank you. Russ

Bag Kote & Tan Kote are NOT water resistant. They will spot. Just something to keep in mind. I've not used Pecard's, so I can't speak for their products. russ

It sticks in my mind (perhaps incorrectly, who knows...) that certain background tools, like the A104 (which I don't like & do not use) & perhaps the bargrounders should be used when the leather is drier than is proper for, say bevelers, pear shaders & the like. This way, the pattern is not mashed down into deep, separate, choppy elements, but flow nicely into the overall pattern of a smoothly flowing background. So, to modify my earlier post about casing: coolness to the cheek, BUT the leather should be somewhat drier when using certain background tools (A104).

Just an aside: Home Depot gives anyone who has ever served in the military 10% off their purchases. All one needs to do is show a current military ID or a copy of their DD-214. That's a very nice gesture on their part & I think it shows support for veterans!

[quote Osborne needs a website :D Osborne does have a website: www.csosborne.com They just don't sell to the general public.

A pretty quick & easy way to determine if the leather is cased just right is, after wetting it, WAIT TILL THE LEATHER RETURNS TO ITS NATURAL COLOR!!!! Put it up to your cheek: if it feels cool on your cheek, it is cased properly! The hardest thing is to resist the temptation to add more water- you think it's drying out, but it isn't. The key is the coolness on the cheek. Dry leather won't feel cool, but properly cased leather will. Hope this helps.

I just picked up a bottle of black yesterday & am anxious to try it to see how it crocks (hopefully it won't). The literature recommends all the other eco colors be sprayed, with the exception of the black, which should be used with some sort of applicator (dauber or wool piece). I also picked up a colored highliter in purple & a bottle of eco all-in-one in cherry chocolate. My son used the cherry chocolate on a piece of scrap, but i'm not terribly impressed with the first impression. I'll need to play with it some more. The others may or may not be promising: I won't know till I actually do play with them.

the perma-loc needles are great with latigo-type lace. with use, lace tips seem to become more & more flexible & to continue on, you have to either dip them into a glue or lacquer to harden them up or re-cut the tip. permalocs just screw on. i've used them since the '70s, when they were known as 'life-eye' needles. tandy has 3 different sizes, the middle size being the most commonly used for latigo. i don't use the smallest for anything other than the 1mm & 2mm round lacing, they are way too thick for flat lace.

maybe it's something a good flogging would bring out!

Super nice! Russ

Art: I will do that, if I get the order. I just turned over the prototype last week & the whole regiment will need to see it. I refuse to get a whole side just for a few pouches, considering W/C's prices are in excess of $6++ per square foot, compared to the normal veg tan I often buy.

I'm sorry: in my rant I did forget to add that SCA should not be held liable, just like the boy scouts/girl scouts/social service agencies should not be held liable for the actions of the pervs who manage to crawl under the radar. It is only when the organizations have knowledge of the goings on (as in the recent Catholic Church lawsuits) & instead of taking action, merely transfer the predator to another position, or parish, then valid lawsuits can & should be instituted & upheld. (& no, I'm not busting the Catholics- I was raised as a Catholic- but predators are predators, & when the bishops have full knowledge but are too gutless to act, that is just wrong!)

I have recently shown a prototype belt pouch to an interested party, who would like to have personalized veg tan pouches for his entire highland pipe regiment. The prototype is a mahogany & the only problem is that he wants them in black. They will be worn on WHITE BELTS, so dyeing them by hand is not an option, because of the crocking problem. I am also planning on using black drum dyed veg tan. They will have no carving- there will be a stag's head surrounded by a wreath of leaves & the name of the regiment stamped above & below the crest. Alignment would be the only problem that I can see. Since they're close, I'll use wickett & craig.

Johanna: I should point out that one reason so many kids don't tell is that the predator "grooms" his/her victims. "Grooming" is the process by which the predator gives the child things, often expensive things, tells him or her that he/she is the most beautiful, most special, coolest (or most whatever) person, tells the child 'secrets', treats the child as though the child is an adult, treats the child with respect, and makes the child feel like the most special individual in the entire world. Very often, children have a very low self esteem & this is what the predator feeds on. He gives the child something that may be lacking in the home, & because the kid is now 'groomed', he is more willing to trust the adult "in charge". Grooming is not a one time affair- it can take months & often years. Predation is a slow but insidious process, but the predator has all the time in the world, and if he doesn't have victims yet, he still has his fantasies as he grooms them in anticipation of conquest. Because the predator fills needs & because the child now trusts the adult & because the adult is an authority figure, these things tend to go unreported & the predator continues, victim after victim after victim, until he is finally caught. This is a very simplified explanation, btw, but grooming is a key component of this particular type of predation. (There are other types which I won't go into, like sick families that view their youngest children as more sexual partners).:ranting:

Unfortunately, the pervs still creep among us. They're very good at masking their activities-- for example, a pedefile will often marry a woman with small children to get at the objects of their real desires- the children. Having worked for, and retired from a Commonwealth prison system, I have seen & dealt with many. They're very often not generally what one thinks of as ' dirty old men'. They are very often 'respectable community leaders', i.e., pastors, priests, boy scout leaders, church elders, state policemen, politicians and the like, who mouth pious platitudes, deflecting their venom on 'those others', all the while doing the nasty with those who are most vulnerable, those who have been taught to respect adults, those who have been taught to respect authority= children. Children will listen to, and believe, an adult in a position of authority, where a grownup would most likely say, 'wait a minute, there's something wrong with this picture!', but because a child is trusting, a child will follow blindly. :soapbox:

10oz leather seems WAY too heavy for a watchband. If you look carefully at the tip itself, it looks like there is some sort of a seam with 2 layers. I'd opt for glue &/or press (with an embossing clicker) work on this, rather than pear shading- it seems too regular for pear shading, IMHO. I would say, try to replicate this by pear shading. I'm sure everyone would like to see your results & your thoughts afterward. Good luck!

I like it! Alot!

What would be a good proportion of british tan to bick-4? I just got an 8 oz bottle of bick-4 & am willing to mix up to half that with british tan to get a nice color. If I like it, I'd simply mix up the rest in the same proportion. So my question is: to 4oz of bick-4, how much british tan should I add? Btw, I've never used bick-4, and I've never used british tan, either. This will be a new experience to combine both into a cream- sort of dye. Thank you. Russ

Steve: MIWL has been out of business for some years, so I don't think there is an online archive out there, but I may be wrong- who knows, someone may have compiled one! I do know that MIWL had compiled lists of articles by year when they were still publishing, but I don't have them handy- a number of my selections of MIWL magazines deteriorated over the years (I, having gone on to several different careers, totally away from leather, made 3 or 4 house moves... the magazines mostly ended in storage in excessively damp or dry or mouse infested surroundings). Some of my issues had totally gone to dust or had been gnawed so completely by rodents that they had to be thrown away. The remaining magazines I treasure- it was an interesting time then, & to look through the magazines & hear my older son say that something we did then is now 'so in', so current... (Ah, but enough of the 'good old days', that weren't, really particularly good...). And no, I'm not really temperamental, but I sometimes get really cranked over people getting all worked up over crap that doesn't really matter in the scheme of things & totally disregarding that which really matters- and then I vent! Unfortunately, Steve, I don't have a scanner so I can't scan any of the articles, but I hope someone out there can help you out. Wildrose: a 'jack' is a leather container made to hold liquid, such as water (only for putting out fires, 'cause you couldn't drink it- otherwise you'd get typhoid or dysentery), or ale, or mead, (which you could drink, and did) - it was generally lined with pitch, or beeswax to make it waterproof so your hard cost beer didn't dribble out all the little stitching holes & drip upon your trousers. While it may have been black, it has nothing in common with a 'blackjack'

I've never used it, but Fiebings has a deglazer... it may, possibly take off most of the finish to give an acceptable re-start. Good luck

In the May '83 issue of MIWL is the fire bucket article by Larry Coleman & Lee Hodges; in March '81 is an article on "The Leather Bottell", by David W. Frantz.

Wow! not often that I hear my name taken ( & not in vain, no less)... yes, I did write & illustrate an article on construction of a drinking jack, but that particular referenced article (Oct/November 1978) dealt with the construction of a leather covered ceramic mug, not a jack. I did, however, write an article for MIWL illustrating the construction of an actual full leather drinking jack (but, for the life of me, I cannot locate the exact issue date tonight- Sorry!). Yes, I still have that particular jack. It was an article I had written on trying to recreate something, recent and new (28 plus or minus years, ago, anyway...) that looked several hundred years old, by nuking it in a microwave oven (& yes, the results were admirable and very authentic looking). At that time, I had no access to genuine pine pitch, so I used epoxy glue to make it waterproof. Sometime after, Tandy began selling pine pitch & later discontinued it, but it is still available from a source or two on the internet. Back in the '70s, pine pitch was used to line tank cars, but since the advent of stainless steel, it is once again very hard to obtain. However, the better person to contact for jack information is Frank Zigon ( frank.zigon@verizon.net ), who also did numerous articles for MIWL, including a great article on jack construction (I can't remember which particular issue-- Sorry again!)... [Recently I did meet him at the Butler, PA iFolG show & found out that we lived less than 150 miles away from each other - what a small world we actually do live in!] Russ Holzer

Never put yourself down by calling your work 'primitive'. It is very very nice work, and elegant in its simplicity. Russ

Clay, that is so neat!!! I'm anxious to see the final result. ( I think it looks superb un-colored... but then it wouldn't be a greenman, would it?)

Regis: what is the width of the blade you're using? Part of the problem might be with the size of the blade that comes with standard swivel knives... they most often come with a wide blade, which, for larger things, is fine, but for smaller things (like oak leaves & compact, swirly things like carved coasters and bag tags) they are simply too big for a beginner to master adequately. A suggestion might be to try a 1/4" blade, perhaps a small, hollow ground blade, even. My own preference is for a 1/4" angle blade (I use both ruby and steel, depending how each feels in the particular leather I'm carving- some leathers carve better with the steel & others with the ruby), or a smaller hollow ground blade. Try a nice, sharpened 1/4" blade & I think you'll see (and feel) a world of difference in your carving. Another problem might be in the wetness of your leather when making your swivel knife cuts: too wet and too dry both create similar problems of controlling the knife & create unevenness, undercutting & overcutting (more-so if the leather is too dry- it creates a lot of drag which leads to loss of control. Leather that is too wet also leads to loss of control, not because of the drag, but because of the mushiness. ). And no, they don't make ruby blades anymore. And yes, I prefer steel over ceramic. And yes, if you drop a ceramic blade, you've just thrown away $30. They're brittle. And yes, I still, years later, have a problem with making decorative swivel cuts as nice as I would like them. And no, I have no experience with titanium blades (I lost a post I had that indicated who to contact whomever sold them- I think it was one of the Tandy stores in Texas.) If anyone has info on titanium blades, or, who has experience using them, Please post! Thank you. Russ