bruce johnson

There were good makers and poor ones throughout history. I really don't think there can be much generalization. What changed is that most older saddles were made to a quality and durability standard for the most part with a few catalog exceptions (Sears and Montgomery Ward). When horses went from a tool to a hobby then some rider's expectations changed. Cowboys needed users. Casual riders were different. They wanted something affordable to go ride down the trail for an hour or around a ring, not 4-8 hour days. Enter the pricepoint saddles. Materials? Maybe the hides were thicker, maybe they were tanned differently. Some of those old guys talk about drowning your leather until it stopped bubbling, then put into a sweat box to case for a day to be able to work it. Was it any better or worse? Who knows. The fact is that leather is a perishable product and leather weakens over time. Would I strap a hundred year old saddle on now and trust the rigging - oh hell no. The cattle business has changed - younger cattle, less brands and scars, and smaller hides. Leather has changed and tanning has changed. Those old needle and awl machines and waxed linen thread held a ton of saddles together. Nothing to sneeze at there. Saddle trees. - some are fiberglass covered wood, some are rawhide covered wood, and some are molded composites. At one time you could not sell a fiberglass covered tree to a great basin buckaroo - had to be rawhided and some buyers were specific as to who needed to make the tree. Likewise it was a hard sell to get a Texas roper to buy a rawhide tree - had to be fiberglassed. Both are right. The casual rider either didn't care. They'd buy a brand name saddle from a store and not care what kind of tree it had or who made it. Makers - Those older saddles were generally shorter seats and had a pretty ground seat in them. They were made for longer day users. New ones from a quality maker - sure. Production saddles - maybe to no. Ground seat, stirrup set, balance points - they all affect the ride. You can sit in anything for an hour but 5 hours changes that equation. The good makers know that. Good ones were good then and good ones are good now. Horse's backs have changed, riders have changed, materials have changed, information explosion has changed a lot of stuff too.

Wayne - The back side stitch in a closed eye machine will almost never look as clean as the top side straight out of the machine. That is yet another reason they make overstitchers. Bringing back a picture I did several years ago here for the forum. In the example below, the double layer was sewn on my 1245. The left side is the bottom stitch immediately after sewing. The right side is the same, but has been rolled with an overstitcher that matches the stitch length. That sets the stitches, and rounds them up by pushing down into the needle holes. The production stuff didn't get rolled much but once I got past that - if it was the back stitch was visible and my name was on it then it was rolled.

You bet. Most of those old stamp rocks were not smooth or surfaced on the bottom. I was taught early on the put it on something besides a bare tabletop. One reason is to muffle sound but you don’t want something that absorbs a lot of the stamp force . One common suggestion is a sand bed. I had one bench I could do that with - worked great. I’ve also used poster board. My current rock is a granite inspection plate inlet into the bench. It sits on a matching size piece of 4 oz chrome tan leather underneath. It’ll never be pulled out but absorbs sound and stamp bounce.

They delivered it with a lawn mower?

Did it for years. Diluted out Elmers about 50:50 with water. It makes a hard edge, not always the most flexible with that ratio. That was my mix for stuff that didn't need to flex - saddle horns, stirrups, belts. Wallets and things that flexed a lot I used Feibings LeatherSheen or an acrylic floor wax. With the Elmers especially you need to burnish with a wood slicker or white canvas. I found out the hard way that denim scraps from old jeans bled blue color into the glue.

Fred - Nice modifications and upgrades on an old trooper. These originals are definitely the way to fly. When the knockoffs first came out I bought a few thinking I could leave them to set widths. It would have been a good plan if they would have been square. Maybe one was. When I get them in sets now, they go on Ms Rundi's Table of Bargains at the leather shows for $5. The more recent ones seem to be more square but once in a while I still get some trash can fillers. I set mine up with single edge razor blades too. Those blades will cut softer leather cleanly and I used them up to light skirting before I saw the light with a good plough gauge.

I've got a Ferdco 2000 so essentially similar in many respects to a Cobra class 4. Also have a 1245 flat bed machine for strap work and small projects. Between those I could do anything I needed from interiors and card wallets to saddles. When I moved away from leatherwork to leather tools and my wife retired she took up leatherwork for fun and makes a few things to sell. She was intimidated by the 2000 and loves the 1245. She used a 26 in some classes she took at the shows the last few years. In January she decided she wanted a 26 and we ordered ahead to pick one up at the Prescott show in February. She loves it, and the side benefit is that it got her over the fear of the 2000 also. Bigger thread and more layers she might go to the 2000 now, but most of her bag and wallet work is done on the 26. She's using 138 top and bottom last time I checked.

Back when I was shopping machines money was a factor. Any powered machine that could reliably sew a saddle was either a relic that came with a spare machine for parts or cost around $6000 to buy new. My dream machine then was and still is - Ferdco 2000 with the original diamond hole bottom foot and all the accessory feet and plates. Leased mine for 5 years and paid $1 at the end to own it. Added a servo motor when they became more available. Still tight after at least $800K worth of stuff through it.

Looks great Kevin, I'm a fan of the look of snapping turtle as well.

Probably so… LOL. I found these on a quick search.

No, they are for using a mecate rein on a snaffle bit instead of flat reins. The rmecate is looped around the right slobber strap and through the hole and the knot makes a bind, the end is brought back to make a workable rein length and the tail is looped around and through the left side slobber strap with a bind over the tail, then brought back for the rider to tuck into their belt to use as a lead or a safety line to the horse in case you get bucked off. These are realistically a big country piece of gear. They are a weak link according to some to break if need be. Others want them a heavier for signal (the horse feels the slobber strap raise before bit pressure). Finally if the horse slobbers they help keep the mecate protected.

I’m with Cattleman (and many leather knife makers) - cut on HDPE or UHMW, knives glide, don’t dig in and will turn easily. I probably fix 2 round knives a month that someone has twisted off the point trying to turn on self healing mats or LDPE. I like LDPE for a punch surface. Allows the edge to penetrate for a clean cut without damaging the edge. My opinion

Looks like really clean work again Tom!

Looks like fun …. Next year for us maybe

You will figure out what will sell after a few times and what sells one time may not the next. There is no rhyme or reason, be flexible and don't give up on an item for a least a few events. Having a range of products helps - variety of items and a variety of price points for cash and carry - physical examples of work for custom orders. You may not have every product in the lineup ready at every show but after the third person asks if you make an XYZ, I'd have at least one or two examples or "for sales" at the next show. From a seller point of view - Be able to take card payments, be able to take card payments, be able to take card payments - on the spot - Square, Klover, whatever. POS system and not writing card numbers down to process later. - Have business cards, a brochure, or something you can hand out to everyone. Professional looking business cards, not punch outs done on your computer. If you do brochures, you can buy nice brochure paper and D-I-Y looks pretty good. I give away 6" rulers with all my logo and info imprinted. You have a different market focus but something they need can take home and call you later. - Packaging - to be honest, I buy reusable shopping bags printed with my logo for less money than plain brown paper bags. - Logo stickers - If you asked me about stickers 6 years ago you would have gotten a quizzical look. That's exactly what I did in Prescott AZ when asked at the second show we did there. Since then I have given away about 4000 large ones and 3500 small ones. I see them in on-line pictures everywhere - coffee cups, stamping rocks, shop refrigerators, Yetis, sewing machines, you name it. People like stickers. Those stickers and rulers I give away for free pay me back. - Know your competition and don't be afraid to refer customers to them. At one of the first leather shows, I wanted some peanut brittle colored elephant for seat inlays and bucking rolls. One guy had a few smaller pieces. He walked me over to his competitor's booth and helped me pick out a bigger panel that would yield better. Everybody was friends and the customer (me) was taken care of. If you get an inquiry for something out of your wheelhouse, know who to send them to. Customers will appreciate it and more than likely next time you'll be their first stop for the stuff you do have.

I am assuming you are using it as a walking tool. If you tip it at all in either direction, you will get chatter marks from the end impressions. It is nearly impossible to hold exactly vertical and also get even pressure from every hit. If this stamp was a walking tool then the ends should be chamfered or curved up to avoid chatters. I've got no idea the original intention and lack of thought if it is supposed to walk. If so it should be like good bevelers and curved up on the ends to glide and avoid chattering. You can use it by hand to slide over and burnish after stamping but those marks are nearly impossible to totally clean up. If you are doing a single impression like a "crease" in a flower petal radiating from the center that chatter mark is your friend. Was that the original intent? I don't know. What I can say is when I started making handled push bevelers, about the third day I had inquiries for push double bevelers to address this issue. You can get more pressure on a handled tool than pressing a stamp by hand. Good for quilted patterns. One or two passes and go to the next line

Always glad to help people spend money! Here is an early Celtic rope stamp thing I did from 2009, the early days of leatherworker.net. I came across this picture tonight looking for something else. As I recall Bert or Ernie (one of the "Clay's") set up a challenge with a Celtic pattern. I tried it with rope. This was pretty rough but I learned a bunch about beveling, sliding the rope stamp around curves and making sharp bends with that stamp. I did a bunch of the cowboy headstalls with that border also and an example of I used tipped impressions on the curve - keep the outside full impression and tip to narrow up the inside curve. the beveler will clean up the inside. The other is a quick and dirty example of ending a rope.

Actually I haven't stamped for a few years. Once the tool deal took off I just didn't have time for managing tools and doing/selling leatherwork both. Tools won out. I used a Barry King rope stamp when the 2012 reply was made above. The beveler is a Craftool that I ground the face out with a Dremel to make it concave and fit the rope end curve. Basically a checkered crowner stamp. I started out using HideCrafter and Craftool rope stamps. Because of material and construction those stamps tended to bend up on the ends after a while and eventually would break when they were bent back one time too many. I was going through 5 to 10 of those rope stamps a year. I got with Barry to make a copy of them. He eventually made it a stock stamp. That stamp held up well. I got a couple other rope stamps through the years. One particular rope stamp had a bevel built into the end of the stamp (possible a CLT stamp) and it is really dimensional. Richard Brooks duplicated it a couple years ago and I sold several of his versions on my website. Richard has since stopped making stamps and rivet setters. They were taking too much time away from his core business.

This is something that is heavy and hard to ship but still pretty sought after by some people, especially if you have several rolls for it.

Can’t help with the DVDs but sorry to hear he passed away. Several years ago he got some period tools from me and we had some good conversations

depends on how loose. If there is enough of a gap fill it with epoxy or thick cyanoacrylate with a needle dispenser. Leave it sit at least 24 hours to cure.

Not surprising at all, I have known Clay for a long time. Always a standup guy and one of the bright spots at any leather show. What a many people don't know is what an outstanding leather carver he is also.

At this point I don’t do outside sharpening anymore. I’m still working a full time day job for another 329 days. I resharpen anything bought from me but between tools I am getting ready for sale and doing the other stuff with this business I don’t have the spare time for other work right now. Sorry

Paulette, Yes, I joined this forum on the first day. We've had changes over the years, social media wasn't much if anything back then but we see how much of a force that is now. Still this group is solid and searchable for topics from several years ago. I have shared with Tyler how I made reins and I am sure that he will do a good job for you.

I kept them paired up for equal thicknesses and feel. As far as thickness, yes that is what I meant. I bought 7/8 or 8/9 oz sides. Shallow is the top of the back to belly dimension. The "break" is where the leaher goes from firm to more stretchy. A 3rd generation leather distributor showed me how to check that. Basically fold the side up from the bottom and where it naturally wants to fold is the "break". Above that is firmer leather. Latigo is oiled and depending on source may be waxed as well. I dipped mine in olive oil for added oil and weight and then let them hang for a day before I worked them.