CountryStyle

Thank you so much! This is a huge help!

Hello, I am writing this post to ask for any helpful hints or tips with finger carving. I have seen the post describing what finger carving is with some examples, but am wanting some tips on how to hone the skills needed to do it successfully. Also, any pictures or examples you can post would be greatly appreciated, as I will use these to practice. Thank you in advance for any help you can provide.

Great idea and thanks for sharing! be sure to share any of your other home-made ideas, I love this stuff!

I probably won't try to make this bag but wanted to say thank you for sharing. It's a big deal when someone goes out of their way to help others understand how things are made and constructed. I have only been working with leather for about 2 years now and have just recently put together a briefcase. However, the turmoil and reluctance to do so was pretty painful, simply because I really didn't know how to go about putting one together. This will help a lot of folks.

Hello everyone, I am just now really researching sharpening my tools, and I am wondering about how to maintain a strop. For now, I have been using just a piece of scrap leather and charging it with white rouge. It seems that after I strop a few times on it, it loses its effectiveness because it gets the dark grey buildup on it. Do I need to toss the piece and charge up a new piece of leather when this happens? Do i need to simply try to recharge the old piece on top of the dark grey? Is there a way to clean it off or remove the old rouge? I'm sure this info is on here somewhere, and I did search for it, but to no avail. Thank you in advance for any help you can provide!

I have now used this maul to make two wallets and I absolutely love it. Perfect size for general tooling. Doesn't get too heavy for the repeating tasks yet is heavy enough to give a good dead blow for say basket weave.

My pleasure.

Here is a link for some free patterns that I stumbled on while browsing today. Enjoy. http://www.otbpatterns.com/leathercraft-patterns.php

That came out very nice! I just finished my first bag as well and there are many imperfections. That being said I really am pleased with how it came out. I learned a whole lot in its construction and my next one will definitely come out better.

For its size, it has a good heft to it (it is solid metal and nylon construction) but relative to the Tandy maul, it is lighter.

I just wanted to post some pictures of a maul I purchased from aliexpress.com for about $27. It is all stainless steel and nylon. When I got it I was actually impressed with the quality. It is a smaller maul, good for tooling. It is shown next to the medium sized maul I bought from Tandy. It took about two or three weeks to come in, but I think it was a good deal.

looks great for a second project! the biggest part of learning any craft is getting out of your comfort zone and tackling projects like this! great job!

very cool stuff, I'm never that creative when I'm in a creative mood! lol

You have certainly developed your own unique style, which is important to me. I noticed that you like to keep things relatively simple. Some well thought out and carefully placed carving can really enhance a piece while still keeping it simple. Have you developed any carving skills yet? Great job!

There are a lot of great things about these pieces, but I particularly like your edge work!

This is a piece I did for a local stone guy. I asked him if he could spare a piece of scrap stone for me to do my pounding on and he obliged, so I did this piece for him.

Welcome brother, you will learn a lot here. Be sure and learn how to effectively use the search feature. Search for "how to search" to find a helpful post.

A Christmas gift for my father in law with his brand on the front.

Billy, Welcome from Lowell, NW Arkansas!

Very nice for winging it. Great job! What kind of leather did you use?

Y'all are busy! Very nice work!

The tooling is very clean, nice!

First of all I think the bag looks great, a fine work of art. Second, I'm with you, I am starting to like the ecoflo waterstains and also their all in one's can make a nice antiqued effect when you rub them in on top of a water stain. I am really wanting to try out the eco-flo antique paste. Anywho, I have a question. Do you apply neatsfoot before or after dying/staining? How do you get the neatsfoot to apply evenly? It turns out splotchy when I do it. ( could be because I am using a neatsfoot oil compound instead of straight neatsfoot oil?). Anyways, again, great work!

That turned out very nice. My wife was in the Walmart in Rogers Ar. today and said that the Hog fans were EVERYWHERE! Lol its going to be crazy, first game of the season is tomorrow. You won't catch me near fayetteville on gameday, i can't deal with the traffic and crowds.

I think you can, but I haven't looked too far into it yet. Did a rough search about it and it seems like there are ways, but not sure about what tools to use to do it.