KAW

rawhide1 It looks like to me that your first interweave came out right (non colored string) and why your second one is not is you are trying to make it one pass shorter than the first interweave and on a 6 bight knot it doesn,t come out right, you end up at your standing end every 2 rounds. If you make 1 more ring of colored interweave like you made your first or 1 less it will come out correct, it might tighten it up some but that is what it looks like to me, if you go 1 shorter you may have to make 1 more interweave to fill the gap, hope this helps KAW

Most of the time I slip the hair with clean hot water, when doing it this way you must have a fresh green fleshed hide or it doesn't work very well ,if at all. When I make my hides in lime I like to use as fresh a hide as I can and flesh them, also the naster the lime solution is the better for me and warmed to about 80 100 degrees work best for me, I try to make my hide in the summer when it is warm. when I scraped my hides with a knife I would clean the hell out of them flesh them REALLY good, brush the hair out good with a comb, streach them a tight as I could, then clip most of the hair as close to the hide as I could with a big set of clippers, then scrape the rest with a sharp knife and it is very important to get the hide as tight as you can so you dont get wrinkles in it. I like to streach them like Alan said in a hoop like these. I like to do it with the water now because it is quick and clean and If you want to work alittle you can do more than one hide at a time once the water is at temp. These are some things that work for me depending on the hide and situation. The better the hide to start with the better the string can be in the end if everything goes well.

This is my favorite cutter Wayne Jueschke out of Elko made it but I'm not sure if he make this one any more ,the collars are adjusted by turning the knob on the back, that way I can make very fine adjustments. If you are going to be making alot of rawhide string I would advise having a good splitter also. this is the splitter I use the most, it uses razors ,when one gets dull you can just pop another one in it, Monte Severe made it along time ago and but doesn't make them anymore but there are many out there to choose from that are nearly the same.

Heres a fancy one I made a few years ago. I like to make them out of the best string I can and put good heavy burners in them, I will dig around for some pictures of some others, more working ones and scan them when I get more time.

Rob, it could be a number of things how long have you had the hides before you started to lime them, some times in real hot weather parts of the hide can start to dry before you realize it , it also could be your lime isn't getting evenly distributed, in hot weather I like to move the hide alot in the water to keep the lime even and to keep the temp of the hide close to the same through out it seems if you just let it set in a tub in real hot summer weather the top can get alot hotter than the bottom and the lime ussally works quicker when its warm and exspecialy if you have hard water, these are just acouple things it could be and some things that have worked for me in the past hope it will help you some. KAW Willey

Unicornwoman, sorry it took me so long but I haven't been on the computer much, you can use vinegar to set it, but I use alot of calf hides for button strings and try to dye as much with natural dyes over ritz and other dyes and don't have much of a bleeding problem and most of the time I will try to dye the whole hide when green so I get as deep of penatration as I can from the start and get a consistant color and if I do it that way it is alot easier to keep all my strings for a certin project consistant, I try to stay away from dying my rawhide if I can but some people just have to have the color, personally I like rawhide natural, but there are alot of people that like the colors.

Alan, nice tutorial, when you start braid down and are turning back make sure you go past your foundation so when you start your turn backs to make pairs you dont slip off your ends when interweaving and it allows you to counter twist the ends if you start to twist, the biggest thing with twist is to prevent it before it happens, for me I am consaintly checking for twists and correcting them as I go. I use both methods alot. For working bosals I use the braiding method most of the time because it goes alittle faster, for finer collecter stuff I like to use the sprial method cause it works better for me with more strings, I also like to bury my ends staggered on each end so when your interweaving through the center you don't pull out your ends and if a horse rubs it on something (which happens some times no matter how careful you are.) it less likely to come out and won't leave any bumps where it contacts the horse, these are afew things I do and some things to think about when building using gear so things function properly. Your strings are looking good and consistiant, how have you been makin your hides? Hope this helps some, KAW Kevin A Willey

He oughta like that.

Deadringer, I usally dye my strings in a wider string, let them dry, then rewet them and cut my final strings along with my natural ones that way I eliminate that problem, another way I've done it is to dye the whole hide, I get the most consistant color that way. Most of my button string I make out of calf hides and I use a 5 gallon bucket 1/2 a can fresh coffee and the rest warm water and leave it till I get the shade of Brown I want then strech it and let it dry and work it when I need it, It should work about the same with roo rawhide. Do you make you own roo rawhide? I have never tried it on boughten hide only ones I made. Hope it works for you Willey

Deadringer, I make a thick mud out of fresh coffee grounds then put my string in the mud and leave it for a couple of hours to over night depending on the thickness of the string and how dark I want it to be then let it dry. I try to dye enough for the project I'm workin on so I have a consistant color.

Alan, that little tool works great for making very small strings. I made one kind of like it years ago out of Grants book and it works good, it dosent take alot of fancy tools to make good strings. Thanks for posting the pics hopefully people will see it doesn't take fancy tools to cut their own strings and do a good job. Did Wald show you that tool on your visit?

Alan How was your visit with Nate, hope it was a good one. A fella doesn't need alot of tools to cut good strings, just have his hide right.

If you can take the dementions off the horse it will be used on(if only one) or measure abuch of different ones and take an average size.

They work pretty good on small strings and on small calf hides or roo, but like any string cutter they take some practice and gettting use to.

I would use a little heavier blade to start for that size of string like a scalpel blade from a vet outfit, if you were able to split it consistantly you should be able to cut the width without to many problems except it being a little wet. If the blade is flexing, alot of times the blade isn't heavy enough and being to wet or dry will flex it or break it ( wear glasses too, I have broken alot of blades and some have hit me in the face and it only takes one!) If the moisture feels consistaint and you have sharp polished blades you shouldn't have any problems. It could also be the string streaching some, not knowing were it come from in the hide doen't help. Sounds like the moisture was consistant , I would try alittle heavier brand new blade and see how that works.

Romey, your sheaths are looking better, but thats the way its supposed to be each better than the last, right? Nice knife.

Thanks for the comments Skip, I taugt my self out of Robert Woolerys book and Bruce Grants books, those were the only books at that time , lookin at old worn out gear and I wanted to make my own gear, because I didn't like alot of the stuff out there, so I made them myself. Now there is getting to be alot of books and videos out there. The best way to learn is to cut up alot of hides and ruin alot of projects till you get something that works right for you, using it your self will help alot. I sell everything I make anymore. Rgerbitz, All my bosals have rawhide cores.

Don't do it the will look good and feel hard as hell but the first time you use it it WILL break it makes them brittle as hell, a hondo take a hell of alot of strain so make it out of the best hide you have ( good sturdy strings) and put a good stiff burner in it you can double the burner if you think it will stretch out to much , alittle stretch is ok in my opinion it takes alittle of the shock. It will save you alot of hassel if you dont do it in my opinion.

Here is another picture of the bosal with a removeable hanger.

Here is a working set of reins with a little color ( dyed rawhide with coffee) 12 srand body on the reins and a 16 romal , the latigo bosal is 3/4 16 strand 6 bight nose with no interweaves. 10 bight heel knot. Someday I'm gonna get better taking pictures.

You can make good stings with about anything as long as the moisture is right and you keep your blades sharp.

I,ve gotten hides from Hardtke before and they are also good quality.

If your not going to use it use whatever you can find the right size,( take abunch of toilet paper and twist it up into a core). HaHaHa

lookin good

If you want it really soft I would take one string of rawhide rounded then braid over it with leather till you get your desired core size As for which is better, it depends on how hard your going to use it,(hard use go with the latigo and fewer strings,less use go roo with finer strings). I get alittle roo once in awhile from Sheridan leather outfitters. tell them what you want and they will send you samples they also have latigo. Their # is 1 888 803 3030 This is just one way to go about it, Hope it helps