Cyberthrasher

Shouldn't be a problem since that's the base of alcohol dyes.

I got nothing, except the same problem!! I trim it off into a box. I keep thinking I'll probably use it for padding in something at some point.

Springfield has a pretty good selection of random stuff, but I'm not sure if any of it would be good for straps. Is there any reason you can't get veg-tan and dye it?

I'm embarrassed with some of these workspaces that have been shared The first one here is an overall shot showing how small of a dungeon my wife puts me in. Here's a closeup of my main desk where i do my tooling, cutting, and sometimes templating (as you can see here). The soda fridge is on the far left. This is a corner view that shows my wonderful dye rack and leather storage system, plus how I store past artwork. I slap it on the wall for reference while tooling and pretty much just leave it there. Next up is the dye/glue/finish/burnish table. It also has too much other household stuff crammed everywhere. The gray rubbermaid under it is my primary scrap storage. I'm in the middle of dying this strap, so that's why I'm templating the next one at the wrong table. Closeup view of the most ghetto stitching pony you'll ever see . It works for me for the time being. Light box (subbing as more storage at the moment), another scrap box for the little cut-offs, and some seats in various states of work. The beer fridge is on the right.

Just use a cap on the back piece instead of a post. Yeah, it will throw off your count, but I always have a couple of badly set snaps anyway, so there's always extra pieces laying around. You can also find some retailers that sell the line-24's in pieces.

I just got a bottle of it myself and agree it's pretty dark out of the bottle. I haven't tested it 50/50 yet. My thought is that you'll probably want to thin it even more, 25/75, and see if that looks better. Also remember that the lighter colors are more heavily effected by the color of your leather. A lighter section of leather will be easier to color match than the darker portions. I also use either denatured or isopropyl alcohol as a thinner. Fiebings reducer is basically a waste of money. All you need to reduce something is the base of the product. The oil dyes are alcohol based, so that's what I'm used to. I'm pretty sure the light blue is spirit based, so you may want to switch to mineral spirits for that one. Another thing to watch for, I was trying to thin some Royal Blue to a lighter shade and actually ended up with grey instead of blue. It was a nice discovery for when I need a "metal" looking color, but definitely not what I want when I'm looking for blue.

You can use some contact cement and a whipstitch, but, depending on the weight, it may not be as secure as a buckstitch. Buckstitch doesn't have as much room to move as a whipstitch or some of the other lacing techniques. Another thought is to do a buckstitch and then come back around with a whipstitch. Could look pretty cool. I've used double-loop or single loop for applying things too.

Unfortunately, that's the nature of FOX (or Faux) News. They create more news then they report, and I hate to admit that a large percentage of our population believes it. Now, that's all I'm saying because I hate it when people talk politics online.

overall the collars you're doing aren't bad. But, with some refinement to the edging, they'll double their value. The pictures on your page are a little pixelated, but I saw the same thing between your site and your mom's. The main thing that really popped out at me is what I have circled in blue. The edge beveling you're attempting now is really sporadic and uneven. This happens when your edge beveler isn't held at the exact same angle throughout the length of the cut. Practice, and make sure that edge beveler is stropped too. Also, it helps to have your edges still a little moist at this point. The part I circled in red, you already know about. Having that natural portion stick out (which, by the way, is the part you'll round off with the sandpaper) really brings down the perceived quality. These collars look really good and well constructed, so I don't want to see these details ruin a customers perception of your work . Now, this picture also brings us back to your burnishing problems. I think a big part of what you're experiencing is that your edge slicker isn't able to make full contact to the leather because it's got that natural ridge in the center. Your edge slicker has a rounded channel for the leather. With that ridge, neither the sides or the top are able to make contact with the surface of the slicker. Once you get it sanded nice and round and smooth, then slicked with either your edge slicker or dremel burnisher, you should have a nice round and slick edge that will only take dye on that portion. I didn't point any of this out in the picture, but you have sections where you were trying to dye the edge and it bled down into the main collar. A well burnished edge won't let it bleed past the edge because the fibers are so compacted. Again, this really helps with the finished look and the perceived quality. Point of comparison for value, I have a friend who has asked me for a custom collar for his English Bulldog at 1.75" x 22". I told him $80. When he went and compared he came back and said that that's about how much plain ones were without the custom tooled name on it.

That was a Gibson. I was working security at that show and the guitar player handed me his guitar to play at one point I've been meaning to get one of my own, but the thinline tele keeps crying out my name. I'll let Silk verify, but it looks like a basic blanket stitch to me. I only know that because my wife keeps on making blankets for friends that have babies and I have to see it all the time.

Oops! Just realized that amp handle prototype isn't on there. I posted it to my blues group as a teaser picture It's all scrap bin stuff, so nothing to be too proud of in this state, but you can kind of see the shape and smoothness of the edges. I have some closeup pictures somewhere at home.

I saw that you're my newest like!! Bob attaches his canvas to a motorized system, but I'd say until you get a larger setup and more experience, the dremel burnisher would be a much better alternative for you. I use my canvas by hand rubbing briskly. If I ever get enough space and resources, I'd probably definitely have a motorized unit the size of his as well . Right now I'm working out of a corner of my basement, so space is tight. Oh yeah, take a look at the prototype amp handle I have on there, as well as the latest tooled black belt, and look at the edges on them. Those were both done with the procedure I laid out above. The amp handle isn't a finished product, but it will give you an good idea of the edges smoothness and shape. The belt is finished though with dye and Resolene (front back and all around since the customer wears a lot of khakis for work).

Ah, thanks to the others for filling in some of it. With their comments, I'm going to jump straight to the grits. The number on the sand paper relates to how course it is. The lower the number, the more material it removes. A 150 grit sandpaper will remove enough material to shape the edge of your leather (after edge beveling) and start the smoothing process. The 400 grit wet/dry paper (it can be used wet without falling apart) will really smooth things out without removing a whole loot of material. You can probably get both of these at your local hardware store, but you may have to go to an auto store for the 400 grit wet/dry. You have to bevel the edge though in order to start getting that round shape. It knocks off the corners of the edge and leaves a flat spot in the middle. This is where the sand paper comes in to start shaping things. I should add that I just use a piece of the sandpaper curled up in my fingers to match the curve of the edge when I'm doing this. It's what works for me. With practice, there's not reason you can't get all of these steps in an hour. I do all my edge work on 50" guitar straps in about an hour to an hour and a half, including dyeing. But, if that hour includes the entire time to make the collar you're going to have to find ways of streamlining stuff. For the beeswax, I have a block of it that I rub down the edge so it makes a groove in the block and then rub the edge briskly with my denim/canvas to basically burnish the wax into the low spots and crevices of the leather. If you have a buildup of wax, you'll probably have to use 2 cloths. One to remove the excess and another to do the final rubbing. Hidepounder goes over a lot of this in his tutorial in the "how do I do that" section of the forum, and then from there it's just a lot of experimentation to figure out what works best for you. I'm always adjusting my procedure or trying new things as I hear about them.

First thing on my list is "I have been told you always put any oils conditioners or saddle soap very last because other products wont penetrate." You may be confused about the nature of oils/conditioners. These products penetrate the leather themselves and do not offer any real protection. But, any of your waxy conditioners can stop proper coverage of any additional products. The oils on the other hand, when left to sit, shouldn't be an issue. What are you using for a conditioner? You can't beat good old pure neatsfoot oil for this step. It's a tried and true product that should serve you well. How smooth are you sanding your edges prior to burnishing? Before edge slicking, your edge should be pretty dang smooth and already formed to the proper shape. i usually hit mine with a 150 grit to start forming the round edge I like (after using an edge beveler) and then follow it up with 400 grit wet/dry. From there, a little glycerin soap and my dremel burnisher, dye the edge (don't worry about it penetrating like the rest of your product), rub it down with beeswax and a piece of denim/canvas to a nice glassy shine. Remember, the edge burnishing products are only meant to really lubricate things and make the fibers lay down, not be absorbed by the leather. usually, I actually apply my finish to the complete project and my edges as the very last step. I was looking at Fiebings Leather Sheen for another member who was considering it and, after reading the description on the can, I pretty much came to the conclusion that this is not a permanent finish. It's more of a temporary finish/conditioner to be used on the end product as part of a continuous maintenance routine. The key part that led me to that was "Shines and conditions leather with a flexible wax finish". To me that sounds more like the kind of thing you'd tell your customer to use after you've already applied a more permanent finish over your dye (like saddle-lac, resolene, clear-lac, etc...) I'm actually at the day job now, so I'm going to defer to others to fill in the gaps that I've left out.

Man, don't be surprised when you start seeing some similar backgrounding on my stuff I love it!!

Get a hold of Chancey. He did the door panels for a friends truck last year, and I know he's given some thought to a full on rework. My thoughts, for the seat I'd go as light as possible and still be able to tool it (and make it last). Maybe a 3/4 oz, then position your tooling so that you'll be able to kind of wet-mold the curves by wetting things. For seams, I would skive and do a rolled edge, then do the cross lacing. The rolled edge would make it look pretty sweet with no edge sticking out.

The stitching doesn't look too bad. Need to get you an edge beveler to round the edges and that modeling spoon for the edge of your beveled cuts. See how they rolled up on you a little bit? You can use the modeling spoon to smooth that back down. But, this is your first finished product and you ROCKED IT!! I really love the bird you added in there too.

I love that new leather smell when I open the box, so I believe you there

Like I mentioned, a lot of them are stamps that were designed to be used in a repetitive nature and they just stamped them once, moved to the next third of the collar, stamped again, etc.... Now, a couple of them look good, but for the most part it just looks like they could have done so much more. On top of that, some of the ones that are of a subject that moves are repeated across the collar in a straight line. I think I remember a dragon fly on one for instance. That shouldn't be perfectly centered across the board, it should be turned and spun sporadically around. That one in particular would look really nice with some decorative swivel cuts showing movement, kind of like a wind trail behind it. The human eye doesn't like seeing things in a perfect symmetrical straight line all the time. Where we see curves, we don't want them lined up (like the hearts). If we see a subject that moves, it shouldn't look like the old caveman to human progression. We want to see lines that flow and mimic nature. If it's just a straight line all the time, it looks too sterile. All of this is completely my artistic interpretation and completely up for experimentation. I'm just saying to trust your eyes. If something just seems "off", then figure out why. A lot of what I'm saying is discussed when researching the "Hogarth line of beauty". Do a google search and you'll see lots of information. Very critical stuff when it comes to human perception. Here's a wiki link to get you started http://en.wikipedia....lysis_of_Beauty basically, he found that EVERYTHING humans interpret as beautiful follows a specific pattern, and everything beautiful in nature has a specific curve to it, which is what's been named the Hogarth Line of Beauty. It's the gentle sloping lazy S curve that we see all over in leather, pinstriping, classical art, victorian and baroque art, horses, deer, even my MOTORCYCLE!!! (as I'm staring at a picture of it on my desktop) . Test it out and look for things in every day life that you're attracted to and see if you can find that lazy s curve in it's form. You'll be amazed. Ok, that's enough of the art lesson for tonight - I'm getting to the tired rambling portion.

My wife may go for the alternative

I have a lot of troubles explaining it, but Paul Burnett has some good tutorials on modeling that really go into it (and why him and Stohlman stopped using the dotted line method), plus some of his other ones on the page mention his method. http://paintingcow.com/content/index.php/publications/free_lesson_sign_up/

Yeah, almost everything i see there is still just an off-the-shelf stamp from Tandy or other manufacturers that they painted whatever color they liked. If you did the exact same stamp layout with the exact same colors, then I'd say you have a copying issue, but they don't have any claim on coloring the standard stamps available. In fact, I'm not really impressed with their use of the stamps. Go for it, get crazy, extend the pattern (especially the stamps that were designed to be used as a pattern and not a single impression), make it your own!! . If you're afraid of copying their use of conchos, don't be, since they're using the standard placement of those as well. Tom, this is twice recently we've typed basically the same thing at the same time - get off my schedule!!

We have a couple members who use it religiously, but I don't know about sharpie. I do know that they swear by it's use as a finish. I say if it works for them, cool. Resolene and ClearLac work for me, so that's what I use Without trying to sway you either way on mopnglo vs resolene, just ask yourself if you're experienced enough to want to experiment with the off-label use of a product.

With that, I'd say as long as you're not doing hearts and butterflies, then there shouldn't be anything to worry about. We've all colored our tooling at some point.