bruce johnson

Two words - "servo motor". Adjustable dial for top end motor speed. More control for me at low speed too.

If you have already tried this one, then ignore my suggestion. The brightest spot I have found at Weaver's is advice from Vernon. They sell/sold the 374 and I have found Vernon to be very approachable and helpful. I was looking to buy a 205-64 several years ago from another source, and ran it by Vernon to get a second opinion. He was dead on with his advice - "It is a solid machine, will do everything you need it to do, you will break some needles though, and if you don't like it, I'll buy it from you for that price". He also wasn't sure if some of the accessories for the 374 would fit the 64 (like the two rail edge guide plate), and offered free return shipping if it wouldn't. It fit. I would ask Vernon if you haven't already. That said, my experience with my Adler. Sounds like you might have some kind of hook/needle spacing issue. That was the problem with mine when it skipped, and a spacer ring shim (made from cereal box cardboard) for the whole bobbin assembly fixed it up. It moved the hook closer to the needle and reduced the pierced thread and skipped stitches. One of the mechanics that helped me troubleshoot that (Vernon or Ferdco, forget which) told me that once an Adler skips a stitch, it tends to kink the bottom thread and not loop well, and makes it harder for the next one to catch, feeds yet another kink if it doesn't catch, and so on. Take the throatplate off and cycle it by hand to see how close the hook is to the needle, how it loops, etc. Then again, most have my fixes have come from changing needles. Art's advice is always change needles first. Make sure that the right size needle is in for the thread size, and all that too. Hope this helps.

Great work - again, Brent. So how's the new shop working out? What is coming out the door looks good. Seems like everybody has posted some pretty outstanding work in the last several months. Is this one for a show or a customer?

Doug, Looks really good. I like the carving, and the lacing sets it off well. My wife is thinking she is needing one now...

Rusty, What I can find about James Frew is that he moved to Harrison AR in 1888 and established the Frew Saddlery. It was in business for over 40 years. He died in 1939. I do a few restorations. I have a couple of my own restorations in the living room. First off with the age of this saddle I would restore it to original. I wouldn't think about riding it. The tree is probably not sized for most modern horses, the saddle has some history, and I'd honor that. If you have the stamp for the pattern that was originally used, no reason not to use it. I would try to save as much of the old leather as I could. Clean and condition, then give it some time to see what needs to be replaced. I have been surprised on a few how the old leather came back to be presentable. When you start replacing, it can be hard to match colors and the "patina", and more saddles have lost character from replacing pieces that from just leaving something. We know it is at least 80 years old, let that character show. If it is missing parts, then do those parts with the same techniques as much as possible. If you want to build one to ride with basket stamping and fancy dees, then buy a tree that is going to work. Build from new and let someone find it in 80 years and restore yours. My thoughts.

Tim, Great deal. Now time for another of Bruce's musical quotes From Dave Stamey, who packed for a while. He has written several packing songs. This is the intro he gives to one of them. "If someone dies in the mountains, lay them face down over a log until rigor mortis sets in. Then you can pack them out over a mule easier."

I guess I have never used soft nylon. If I am handsewing something I need a sticky thread for I mostly use the bonded poly I use in my machines and run it over the beeswax. Otherwise I buy the coarser handsewing thread on the spool from Weaver. I haven't had the problem of it untwisting or unraveling and bunching unless I cut a strand with an awl.

Steve, I am seriously considering a big splitter. Depending on how the year progresses, end of this year or after the first maybe. I got the nickle tour of the new one from Artisan at the show. There are also an Artisan folk or two here on the forum, and I hope they can fill us all in with the 25 cent tour. Apparently they got the blade material figured out. What I saw in the demo looked good. You can run the motor or clutch it with the motor off and hand wheel the work through. The down side about demos, show horses, and sale horses, you always show what they do best. Jerry was cutting little 3-4" wide pieces of what looked like chrometan or oiled leather with it. He was shaving off cigarette paper thicknesses. Probably like opening sunflower seeds with a jackhammer for this monster. I have two bench splitters that laugh at that too. I can pull 7" or so of that material through my 10" Chase easy enough. I asked him about splitting wide pieces of vegtan. He said it would. (Artisan guys and gals - That would be a good demo. The guy who only needs to split 4" chrometan probably doesn't have the 20" high on his list. The guy who might run skirts or a binder cover through one does. Show us the cool stuff it does). There are some old shops that have the old wide handwheeled splitters too. Usually those are spoken for long before they are ever considered for sale though.

Tex, Seems like Jeremiah's size numbers for the edgers run about 1-2 size numbers up from some of the other makers. If Jeremiah's #5 Bisonette is too small for the skirts, then it looks like you got an option. Some of those Bisonettes from Osborne are pretty wide. Carefully enlarging the hole should work, and leave enough blade to keep some strength. I saw a Bisonette a guy modified (unintentionally) and ended up doing horn covers with it. I've been kicking around adding one to my next order to try it.

Andrew, That is what I like to hear - a happy customer!!! Now you know why I traded to or ordered servo motors for my machines. I don't make holsters, but I use the holster plate for gussets on things like ropebags and saddle bags. The raised center gives me someplace for the gusset to lay down into. Otherwise I have been known to sew across a wrinkle on a corner and say bad words. I use the stirrup plate for sewing some stirrups, but mostly for sewing gussets into purses, brief cases, and shaving kits. The rounded top shortens up that turn radius and makes those corners go much easier. The narrower ridge to the left of the needle slot lets you get close to the wood on stirrups. It also doesn't push over the gusset on the bag corners.

LBum, Those are the style I was referring to. I just have trouble getting down in that slot to strop and get a decent thin edge. I used the rouge on a string deal, rouge on the edge of hard cardboard, and on the wider ones I used rouge on the edges of firm thin leather. Those Osbornes seemed to be the best in that style edger too. Some of them are sharpened at a pretty steep bevel. Looks like some makers cut that slot with a wheel. If they lose the "hollow" and go on through, or you sharpen them up a few times and get past it, you have a steeper draggy edge. In my hands that led to chatter marks on softer leather. For the time I spent tuning them up, I am time = money ahead to use the more open end style of edger.

I have a leather thickness gauge I use. It is one of the dial gauges that TLF sells for about $30 or so. I hang it mostly by my splitters, but also use it when reducing thickness with the beltsander or bell knife skiver. Pretty handy tool to have for me. About the only time I mark for the sander is when I use the sander to "gouge" folds for checkbooks, pad holders, and that sort of thing. I mark out the margins of the gouge area on the flesh side and go to grinding. I use french edgers for thicker leather when I really need to thin a gouge, but the beltsander makes a smoother transition than the stairstep a french edger leaves. Then you skive that down. You can grind off 3 thin ones with the belt sander in that same amount of time.

Simply. A splitter would be the best. You'll probably get some advice to use a round knife or skiver. If you haven't done that before with these, it isn't simple to get good results. Probably the simplest, and a method I still use on some things is a benchtop belt sander with a coarse grit belt. Keep it moving a bit, but I have almost zero scorching with the beltsander. I think the coarse grit is eating the leather off faster than it is polishing and heating up. Works well in my hands, this is also how I skive folds in belts and straps. Is that cheating?

Start a new thread JW. Those cinches are drop-dead gorgeous, and I want to hear you talk about them!!

Yep, nice convex edges. and I find them much easier to sharpen/strop than the other slotted style edgers. On the bisonette you need to be careful to use the right radius or you will enlarge the hole and make the cuts progressively wider. Also need to be carefull on the bisonettes so you are not running into the opposite edge if you are using power equipment. My wife prefers the bisonettes, the forward edge is like training wheels. Other than that, I'll go back to the slotted ones when they pry my cold dead hands off any of these I have. (Not an original phrase).

Hilly, In no particular order - Ron Edmonds (Rons Tools - www.ronstools.com) Round bottom edgers. Barry King - bisonette edgers. Jeremiah Watt(www.ranch2arena.com) round bottom edgers, bisonette edgers, Vizzard pattern edgers. Bob Douglas may still have some left, but is out and wasn't planning to make any more of some sizes. You won't go wrong with any of these guys' tools. Be aware that size numbers are not interchangable between makers.

Thanks for showing a picture of it Russ. When you were describing them, I was having trouble visualizing it. Now I know I have seen them, and didn't know what they were.

Ryan, Welcome to the group. Looking forward to seeing what you have developed. We've got enough people around here with different experience we can get you through about whatever you come up against, including the scariest sewing machine in Tippecanoe county. I lived up the road in Logansport for a while. I also lived across the river from you in West Lafayette for 6 years (Purdue - class of '84) too. I went back 5 years ago - I could still eat a full order of biscuits and gravy at the Triple X Drive In, followed by a Friday afternoon at Harry's Chocolate Shop. Life was simple again for a day.

Another great one. I like the lines on this one, and the seat jockey is excellent. A bell ringer for sure. Keeps us all inspired to see the great work here lately. I appreciate that several of the top end guys like yourself are sharing advice too.

You guys just keep raising the bar. Thanks for showing this one. Way cool.

I didn't have any problems with hair coming up through the stitch holes. I machine stitched all of them, and I have always used the short slick haired Brazilian hides. I get them from Saddleman's of Santa Fe, but the wholesale ones, those hides came from Texas Wholesale Leather as I recall and they were short haired too. For the stray hairs that stick out the sides, I singe them with a candle or lighter, then slick the edges. I just did a bunch of binders (winelists for a restaurant) and they all had inlay covers with no stray hairs. I think that handsewing with sticky waxed thread might pull hairs up through the holes though. You might need to slick your thread like for handsewing sheepskins. Pull it through a folded newspaper or brown bag to slick and burnish the wax to keep it from grabbing hair.

Butch, I have done a couple hundred with the hide inlaid into a one piece belt. Basically cut a wide slot and left a sewing edge to sew through the top, inlay, and liner. Some we left this edge wider and put spots on it. Some we plugged to raise the hair-on flush with the surface. We found that plugging them raised the hair-on up enough to wear from calf ropes and seat belts faster. Eventually she just ordered them unplugged. She added whatever conchos or bling the customer wanted. I probably did 50-75 like you are describing too. We glued the hair-on to a stiffer liner (5 oz or so commercial oak from Siegels) and edge sewed it. The billet ends were sandwiched over the ends of the center and sewn through. If you didn't get the bottom of the billet lined up close enough, there was a chance you could miss it and say bad words. We added conchos at the overlap to take some of the stress off just the stitchline holding things together. This is the way the sample she sent me was made, and eventually the imports could be bought for half the price I made them for. After that deal went extinct I have made some in a design that is more forgiving. I glue the hide to the liner cut to width and long enough to line the billets too. Then I just have to sew the billet tops on. I think the one piece liner makes them stronger, smoother lined, and dang sure easier to sew.

Richard, Happy Birthday from Rundi and I. Enjoy the time with the grandkids.

Steve and Greg, Thanks for more info on the brown apron split. I need to try some, it sure looks better than the grey-blue of the pearl splits.

GH, At least for me, the pearl apron splits just are the better choice. I have had guys try the cordura ones, and had nails stick through the weave and pin a guy to the hoof. I have had guys try the thinner chap leather ones with mulehide knee patches and had nails stick through the softer leathers. These same guys say they haven't had a nail penetrate mulehide. I am sure someone has, but it just seems the mulehide has stood the test of usage a little more. Any of the grained leathers are going to wear away with a rasp, and the softer ones are maybe going to open up there. The grained leathers get rough and look worse, and the roughout mulehide wears smooth and looks better. What's up with that?! The biggest complaint is that some mulehide is pretty stiff and some isn't. The stiffer stuff is a pain to deal with sticking out in front of your knee until it breaks in and drapes. I buy my mulehide from Siegels. I use the lighter weight for the body, and ask for them to pick something more to the soft side. I use the heavier weight for the leg patches. Mine are actually a stripe that cross the entire thigh rather than a patch inside and just over the knee. The stiffer and wider patch seems to give them some relief for the guys who don't use a hoof stand, and finish off on their knee or crawl under the back and finish the outside of the hoof on their thigh. I can then make the magnet covers and knife pockets from the softer light weight trimmings. I also like the larger scraps of the softer stuff for lining strainer plates. It lasts way longer than what some companies stick under there. The long pieces I cut horn wraps from, and the heavier ones I can split down to wrap easier. Finally mulehide is pretty cost effective compared to some of the other leathers.