cjdevito

I'm anything but a seasoned pro, but I heartily second Aaron's recommendation. I love my SK3. Best leather related purchase I've made.

I honestly love the RTC. It's become my go-to product for both finishes and resists.

Yeah, I'm sitting here trying to figure out why the original poster's experience happened and I only have one idea. OP, how heavy was the coat of supershene you applied? I've actually done what you have, used the tandy gel as an all-over color with no resist and when I've done it, it came out very even. I'm wondering if you really used a lot of the supershene in one coat, that might explain what happened on your project, both the streaking and the milky bits. I'm just guessing though. You might try using a very light initial coat of finish, let it dry, then come back with a second coat.

I mostly agree with you, the exceptions being their two pro line finishes. The conditioning creme pulls up a ton of color, more than anything else I've tried, but it does give a nice finish. I usually use the gel and I don't have that problem, but I'm either using tandy's pro gloss finish or RTC over it most of the time (the fish in my avatar was done with RTC as a resist, tandy gel antique, and RTC as a top coat). I did just give Fiebing's paste a try for the first time this past weekend and liked the stuff; it's definitely more predictable in it's application than the gel is. Still, I used RTC as the top coat over the piece I antiqued with the paste and did get about the same amount of lift off that I would have expected if I were using it over the gel. Which is to say not much, but some.

I'd be down for a NYC meet up at some point.

I sympathize. Last year I had emergency surgery on my left elbow and forearm after contracting flesh eating bacteria. They had to flay my arm open and cut out a great deal of the muscle there, which has definitely weakened that arm a great deal. Also left me with nerve damage in the last two fingers of that hand and my grip with that hand is a shadow of what it used to be. It gets in the way when it comes to leather work but I've mostly been able to work around it. I really have a hell of a time trying to walk tools but everything else I manage okay. If you think building up the shanks on your stamping tools will help I can make two suggestions, both from my familiarity with aquariums. The first, vinyl tubing, has already been mentioned.... you should be able to buy it in varying widths from any large aquarium supply outlet and can layer one size over another until you get the thickness you want. The second is to use two-part marine epoxy, used all the time in reef aquariums for a variety of purposes. It's essentially sticky, moldable clay that you can build up and shape any way you want and it hardens to rigidness in a half hour or so. You could build custom grips to fit your hand on any of your tools and it will hold up pretty well over time. Won't be the prettiest option - your tool handles will look like they're wrapped in white or purple (depending on brand) clay, but it really will let you build up the handle exactly the way you want to.

With the pro waterstains I find I have to use a damp sponge on dampened leather. If I don't, it goes on unevenly and much too dark. First time I used one was saddle tan and I made the mistake of using it full strength, end result was a dark red. The blue is especially bad at going on evenly without dampening first. I've had a completely different experience with the pro black than olds cool, though. That one I has gone on like a dream when I've used it, full black with no uneven-ness and no rub off.

There are a very few NYers here. I'm in Brooklyn.

My own experience with it is that one coat will work, 2 is better, and 3 is overkill. I believe MikeSmith identified the issue, though - the fiebing's antique is not acrylic and the RTC won't block much of it. It does work very well with tandy's acrylic gel antiques, though.

If you don't mind and still have the price list, I'd like to see it as well. I haven't heard anything further from springfield leather since I posted about it in january, so looks like I'll have to buy direct.

With the eco-flo hi-lites I find you have to first buff the hell out of them. After that, either spray on the finish or apply a light surface coat with a slightly dampened sponge. Once that tries come back with another coat or two. You'll still get some of the color pulled off with the finish, but you minimize it to a great extent.

I agree with Billymac. I'd be interested in seeing these.

I honestly find that SuperShene makes a crappy resist when used with Tandy's gel antiques. Anything less than three coats of it just lets too much dye through, and even with three coats the resisted areas still pick up a bit of the dye color. Block Out is better with the gel antique, but again, I wouldn't trust it with anything less than three coats. On the other hand, I recently gave BeeNatural's RTC Sheridan Resist a try with the gel antique and it did a superior job to anything else I've tried. Two coats seems plenty, three almost completely stops all penetration into the uncut/tooled resisted areas. The carved betta in my avatar was done on undyed leather with three coats of the RTC followed by dark brown gel antique. Here, let me attach the full size shot so you can see it better. A lot of people here have low opinions of the tandy gel antique (compared to the paste made by Fiebings) but I've found it just takes experimentation to get the hang of. And using the right resist, and enough of it.

What did you use for the resist and the antique this time? Just curious. They also still sell the physical, printed patterns for a few bucks more. Convenient way to sidestep the print shop and/or the jigsaw http://www.tandyleatherfactory.com/en-usd/home/department/leather-craft-patterns/6033-00.aspx

Very nice Renee. For what it's worth I see a lot of things about this bag that you've improved on since doing that notepad holder.... the lacing looks neater, the tooling looks good, and you definitely seem to have gotten the hang of resisting & antiquing. Not that the notepad holder didn't look great, just that I can see visible progress in your work from that project to this one.

Sam Browne stud: http://www.tandyleatherfactory.com/en-usd/product/sam-browne-buttons-washers-1309-057.aspx The round stud goes through a slotted hole in a leather strap, slipping it in and out fastens and unfastens. If you look at the briefcase photo, the small middle strap between the two buckle straps is secured with a sam browne stud. Not sure offhand as to the actual pocket dimensions, but it's big. It runs the full width of the bag and about 2/3rds of it's height. As to how protected it is, it's an open pocket of mid-weight veg tan (the pocket is the same weight as the bag back).

The buckles are actually used to open and close it, although it could be altered. As-is, though, the bag is designed with a sam browne stud in addition to the buckles... you could leave the buckles unfastened and just fasten the stud. There's also a full size pocket on the back you could use for things you want to get at quickly without having to go through the hassle of opening the buckles each time you need to access them.

I have that one, actually. As well as his 'Small Patterns Pack'. His instructions file in both cases is actually a very good walk through and I wouldn't hesitate to recommend either. I just wish there was more out there.

I agree with you. If someone out there wanted to try to put together patterns or even more advanced kits (say, unpunched base leather pieces cut to the pattern & instructions) I'd likely be first in line to buy them. Unfortunately for me there's no tandy closer than several hours away, and no local leatherwork resources I've been able to find in my area. So for me the learning process is just read then try to do and learn from experience as I go. So anything that provides a sort of 'guided learning' experience is worthwhile in my book.

I'd hoped to snap some photos of the kit for you WScott over the weekend but I've been ill and just haven't found the time. I'll try to describe the gussets for you, though.... First, it's a double gusset. From front to back you have the front of the bag, then the first gusset, then a divider, then another gusset, then the back of the bag, then a full size pocket on the back of the bag. Each gusset is three pieces, two sides and a bottom. The sides pieces actually wrap around the bottom corners of the bag and cover a couple of inches of the bottom on either side. Then the bottom piece of the gusset attaches between them, and probably covers about 75% of the length of the bottom (with the reamining 25% being the wrap around ends of the side pieces). As for an opinion on the overall kit, I'm not sure yet. Just as an FYI, counting straps and tabs there's over 30 pieces of leather in this box. It's a degree of complication far beyond anything else from Tandy I've seen. I think at this point my biggest reservation about the kit is that lots of slots and rivet holes are already cut, locking the purchaser into using the exact arrangement of straps and tabs and anchors that the kit intends (unless they're willing to cut other pieces of leather to duplicate the pattern parts without the slots etc). Most of that arrangement is fairly sensible, but I've noticed a few things I wouldn't have done on my own that I'll have to live with if I make the kit as-is. Chief amongst them is an alternate fastening point under the handle to turn the briefcase into a backpack; not a feature I'd ever use. It does include a couple of tooling patterns. A fish (that doesn't appear at first glance to actually fit the dimensions of where it's supposed to go), a geometric design and a flaming skull. Because nothing says you're a professional like a flaming skull on your briefcase, I suppose

Funny enough, the package arrived tonight. Haven't had a chance to do much more than glance at it yet, but the kit parts are probably the nicest leather I've seen from tandy. Which still doesn't make them anything to write home about, but nothing like some of the really awful pieces I've gotten in some of their other kits. Of course it could just be my luck... next person to get one might end up with the typical lower quality they're known for.

Last fall I did my first entirely from scratch project using the Dispatch Rider briefcase pattern Tandy has up in leathercraftlibrary.com and it came out okay, but lots of things about it I wasn't happy with. Thought it was a good learning experience though and was planning to do another in a few weeks to see if I could improve upon it now that I'd made it once. But I ordered this kit when it came on sale the other night. It's basically the dispatch rider bag updated and modernized, and I really want to see where and how exactly they've changed the design. I mostly want to use it to make templates off the pieces and use it as another learning experience. I do have Stohlman's case books and had considered trying to use what I've learned from them to lay out a briefcase design of my own, but I'd be lying if I said I'd rather do that than just try making adjustments to an existing pattern. I'm sure this kit will have all the usual shortfalls of Tandy's kits - crap leather, large holes, etc - but for me looking at it as a physical lesson in design & pattern making instead of as just a briefcase, the price they want for it is acceptable.

When I'm dyeing with eco-flo stuff, the usual way I do it is to first lightly dampen the leather then apply a small amount of the dye to a damp-but-not-soggy sponge. You get a light coat this way, but it's the best way I've found to get the dye on evenly. If you need it darker after the first pass, apply a bit more dye and make another pass at the leather. Sheepswool as suggested definitely works better than a dauber. I still prefer the damp sponge, personally, but try both routes and see which one you prefer.

You could get this effect with the tandy gel antique, if you really wanted to use that. Resist the floral carving and the basketweave, apply the gel. The gel dark brown is about that color when applied heavily to unresisted areas. Both the gel and the paste aren't really coloring the unresisted leather so much as accumulating/pooling in the cuts and tool marks. But also, with the gel especially you'll usually get some bleed through of the antique dye color into the resisted areas if you don't apply multiple coats of your resist.

While I'm only a novice at tooling, I do love my SK3 swivel knife from leather wranglers. I consider it worth every penny I paid.