Chavez

Hi Suicide, Have you bought a machine yet? I'm looking at the Boss at the moment. The size seems great, but not sure if it has to be fixed to a bench. I would prefer a "portable" solution, e.g. attach the machine to a cutting-board base so I can remove it from my table when not using it... But is it going to be stable enough?

Hi and welcome to the forum. Leatherwork is a great hobby, but it might take a while before you start making profits=) Be ready to layoff a couple of £k just to get the basic tools

Barry King might do a discount on the recommended set, but you are still looking at about $20-25 per tool. Unfortunately there's no cheap way to get good tools With BKs, at least you won't waste money on bad tools just to replace them in a year's time.

Hi! Can somebody please help me with a couple of questions about cutting boards? I'm currently using a regular wooden cutting board for cutting & punching leather. As I'm soon going to order some dixon punches, I would prefer to buy a pro cutting board so I don't damage them, however I'm not sure what size to go for and whether to get a small punching block or a whole cutting board. I've got the following choice: Osborne nylon cutting block (round; 3" diameter & 1" thick). Osborne vynil cutting pad 10x10x1/2 in. Tandy "professional cutting board" 12x18x1 in. The difference in price is quite big (£20, 40 & 90 correspondingly), so I'd be grateful for any feedback about these boards. Are they much better than just regular wooden boards for cutting? And is the tandy board worth the money? Thanks!

A couple of tricks from a newbie that I picked up on this forum: For dyeing I use wool daubers and apply as follows: 1 coat horizontal, 1 coat vertical, 1 coat diagonal. Apply another diagonal coat (perpendicular to coat 3) if needed. Make sure to keep the dauber wet with dye, don't let them dry out. The result is not perfectly even, but it is even enough to look great and the very slight difference in the colour depth gives leather a very nice "live" look. For finishing, hot waxing and resolene seem to crack when flexed (at least I couldn't get a consistent result that wouldn't crack). Leather sheen seems alright for tooled leather, though it darkens it quite a bit. I've tried Aussie recently and it will most likely become my favourite. Just need to test it a bit more. A 33-33-33 mix of resolene, atom wax and water is my choice for the edges, however, it seems to perform pretty well if used on carved grain side too. Just make sure you don't overapply it if its gonna be flexed. For smooth leather carnauba+mink oil seem to do the job quite well. Atom wax & Aussie can also be used here. I'm still to try bag kote.

Welcome to the forum!

I'm probably wrong here, but I think I've read somewhere that neat-lac (no longer produced) and close alternatives can't be sold in the UK due to banned chemicals in these laquers. Don't know if its true, but how else would you explain why these producs can't be bought here? If you find a source, can you please post it here cause I'd like to try it too =) By the way, is there a supplier of bag-kote in the UK? Can't find this one either.

The pony looks great! Definitely much better than the one I have=) You might want to try to fit a quick release bolt instead of a regular one though.

Hi. For paints, I believe that acrylics are the most popular. Not sure if you can use anything else. For dyes, spirit based (including so-called "oil dyes") seem to have better penetration, however, there's a recent thread in the finishes sections about getting good results with water-based dyes. Here it is: http://leatherworker...showtopic=38260 PPS I'm not a pro by the way=) Just collating the dye info I've read on this forum.

Thanks sylvia! Very interesting to learn about the english point . The prices seems great: had they been $5 higher, they would have attracted a $30 tax+fees for us UK buyers =)

Thanks! How do dremels compare to cheaper (say, draper or silverline) and more expensive (proxxon) alternatives? Never owned a dremel, so don't really know what to look for. It looks like there are only dremel 300 and 4000 for sale nowadays. 300 is half the price of 4000 and 4000 costs the same as a proxxon. Proxxons seem to have much better reviews than dremels 4000 and seem to be more reliable, but as I said I know nothing about these tools=( Would you recommend sticking to dremel or get something else? If I understand correctly, its just a question of reliability cause all accessories are interchangeable and they all do 5k-20k rpm. Thans again!

Thanks Bob! That is some very helpful info.

Since we're talking about dremels and burnishing, I thought I'd cut into the thread . I am quite keen on trying out one of those leather burnishers but I don't have a dremel=) I do have a handheld drill, but it might be a bit too heavy for burnishing edges. Is it worth buying a dremel & a few burnishing bits or would I be ok burnishing by hand? What dremel model to go for? There seem to be hundreds of them=) Thank you!

Hi Alison and welcome to the forum! This is a great place to learn about leatherwork. There's a surprising amount of brits joining in the last couple of months! =)

Thanks Sylvia! I was thinking of cutting straight from the template (instead of transferring it onto leather with a pen/stylus. Let me know if it works=) I understand that the holes in the template only allow you to mark the center of the hole on the strap, so you have to center the hole yourself later? or can you just "punch through" the template? Oh, and pardon my lack of knowledge (i'm only a newbie here:)) , but what's the difference between an english end and a regular pointed end? As far as I know, english end is a bit longer and a bit sharper? Is there any practical difference in cutting & grooving them or is it just a matter of how they look ?

Thanks! Is there much use from smooth bevellers vs checkered ones? Would the 12-seed flower center be good for most projects? I don;t really know the differences between them=) I guess I'll get a few more craftool pear shaders as well for other carving as they should be of decent quality and I can't afford all my tools to be BK yet=)

Thanks for sharing the link, Sylvia. How useful are the strap end templates? Has anyone used them?

I'm sure that pros will correct me if I'm wrong, but I would not trust belly leather when making a collar... Belly leather is good for wet molding masks and practicing swivel knife cuts and it should not be used anywhere where strength is required as it is likely to stretch and deform. Perhaps butts or shoulders will be a better idea.

Congrats on your first sale! Thats a nice looking collar. I think I'm at least half a year away from mine=) Need to improve before I can even ask for any consideration in return for my products! I also was after a new wallet, iphone case and a briefcase when I was starting leathercraft=) £1k later I still can't make a wallet I want, I'm nowhere near briefcases and I've only made one prototype iphone case which I have to wear cause the old one I bought in a shop 2 years ago fell apart. But every time I look in a mirror and see the case I made on the belt I made, I feel that the money was well spent =) But I'll need to plug this money sinkhole sooner or later=)

Hi! Does anyone stamp IDs on their products? What stamps do you use? How do you keep the numbers aligned? I was thinking of something like these 4mm stamps (they are cheap and madfrom steel) but not sure if their impression would be good enough. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GROZ-NUMBER-STAMPS-4MM-DIAMETER-NEW-SET-4MM-STEEL-STAMPS-/290610374985?pt=UK_Crafts_RubberStamping_RL&hash=item43a9ba6949. Would it be easy to align them, say, along a block of wood? Thanks!

Hi again! Apologies for flooding the forum with hundreds of questions but there's noone else to ask really. Can anyone suggest any must-have stamps outside Barry King's recommended set? I'm thinking of a pair of seeders and perhaps some bigger backgrounders or maybe smooth bevellers? I understand that different people use different tools for different projects but could you please let me know what tools you use the most that are not included in the basic set? Thanks again for all your help! Chavez.

Wow!

Thats a very interesting thread you started, Ray =) Are there any alternatives to card machines to take card payments on the go? I know there's a card reader gadget & app for an iphone, but as far as I remember, the comission the provider charges is huge. Perhaps one can use their paypal account & mobile interenet access to process a payment with a smartphone?

Nice cover! I like your way of attachingthe kindle to it. My ideas to attach the kindle to my cover failed miserably so I just went for a sleeve instead=)

It is addictive, isn't it. I already overrun my starter budget 4 times since I started in October and I'm still lacking some of the most basic tools. Hopefully it will all pay off when I start trading part time=)