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This is fine if it's still fresh. If you wait a few hours, all the volatile solvents have evaporated and you need to take a different approach. It looks like that was implied, but not laid out explicitly in the quote above about using isopropyl alcohol to clean it up. You'll certainly want to get to quickly, if that is how you plan to take care of it.

It looks like a type of stitching pony to me. No idea what it was specifically used to make, but I think I have worked out how it was used. What I am seeing is that the wedge in the corner is removed and center between the arms. The loop end of the rope is hooked around the sliding peg in the wedge and the rest of the rope passes through the pulley. It looks like the board sitting behind the wedge is actually a seat and the angled piece towards the back is a stop for the seat. I can't make out where the end of the rope is anchored to in order to keep tension on the arms, but it might be missing, obscured tied to your ankle when seated in it. It looks like that groove towards the front, between the arms is to accommodate excess hanging down inside. Is there any other information you can provide? Maybe even a test with pictures of it to see if I was correct about my theory on how it was set up for use?

I got a couple images taken with my cell phone after finishing up a recent test knife. As I mentioned in the previous post, this one is Snakewood. As a reminder, these are cell phone pictures and not exactly the best quality, but it should give you a decent idea of how things have gone. As usual, these are clickable thumbnails that will open the full sized image.

I would argue that cherry is too soft to work. Oak or Walnut are hard enough, but the grain is too open and course to be work right. It would end up scratching or tearing the leather. If you can locate some Cocobolo or Lignum Vitae board that is about 3/4" thick or so, it would be a good start. Those woods are very dense, hard, and strong. They will polish up very nicely and should be capable of taking the abuse you give it by forcing strips of leather through it.

The good news, I based it off of my hands and I have big hands. That was one of the issues with the very first functioning prototype, it was big and would have been a very uncomfortable stretch for anyone with smaller hand. The barrel was close to 3" long, but I hadn't noticed that it was big until I had someone with smaller hands attempt to use it. It was kind of like watching a little kid attempt to ride a 10 speed. "Make shorter barrel" immediately went to the top of my list of revisions that needed to be addressed. More good news, my yoke design is flexible enough to accommodate small hands with the very same yoke. I had a few women try out one of my knives and they had no issues with controlling or gripping the knife. So, as long as the yoke is appropriately sized, there shouldn't be any issues. On a side note: One of my most dreaded fears is having everything exactly how I want it and then screwing it up later after discovering that part of my process needs to be modified. A good example of this happened just recently. I worked very hard at perfecting the finish on the yoke shaft and keeping with looking nice while putting some threads on the end that connects to the yoke. I managed to mar it up pretty good when attaching the yoke to the yoke shaft. I was able to clean it up some, but the damage was done and I clearly needed to revise my process once more. The previous revision to my process happened after doing something very similar. I had a nice and polish finish on the yoke shaft and marred up the finish getting threads on the yoke shaft. Talk about frustration... I had some very choice words to say at the moment and I almost threw it across the room after that. That's all part of the designing and testing, though. Sometimes getting from step 1 to step two requires you to invent a whole subset of steps. Clearly, it isn't always smooth sailing... When I get the chance, I'll post a few more pictures of the current one being constructed. I used the Snakewood barrel in the photos above, just to give you a hint at what it'll look like.

To be honest, the type of leather may not be that critical. The key here, I think, is the color and thickness of the leather. Most likely any leather that is thin and soft, similar to denim maybe, will allow a free movement and should fit the bill. Goat or sheep can be colored like that and still be soft and durable, too. This leaves you with a few options and you probably don't need too much leather to get the job done. You also have the room for experimentation and testing, just in case your first try doesn't work out the way you like. I have to agree with TwinOaks that it looks to be a simple tube shape that was sewn inside out and then inverted to place the seem inside. The embellishments are then added afterwards with similarly colored threads to anchor it to the leather.

I'd have to find a way to make my yoke fit the craftool standard knife. Not impossible, but a different direction than I am going at the moment. The yokes I made are very comfortable. The design started out as an attempt to find an ergonomic for my hand and evolved from there. The other factor was that the material I was working with started out as a cylinder and I was just working with what I hand on hand. As it stands, making the yoke still remains the most time consuming part of making these knives. I haven't found a way to machine them that doesn't require equipment I already have. I could probably do it in multiple steps with a CNC mill, but that is something I don't have at this point. They do feel different than the standard shapes used on other knives, but this whole endeavor, yokes included, has been an effort to find a solution for a problem that is not addressed by any other knives on the market. Hand fatigue.

The sheer volume of information presented here can be overwhelming. The best thing I can suggest is to start in sections that might interest you and just read through the threads. Holsters are not something I am familiar with, but using the search feature for the forum and looking though the previous posted threads can give you a great deal of information. As far as making getting patterns, there are several books available for doing exactly that. One of the big things to overcome is the gun in which you are going to be patterning the holster for. I have seen threads that explain how to do it without one of the dummy blue guns, but it looks as thought the blue gun method is the easiest way. It comes down to this. A custom holster is exactly that, and it would be very difficult to just use a generic pattern and have it work or let alone work well. You'd be hard pressed to find another person in here who's going to just hand over a pattern, however you will find plenty of guys in here willing to help guide you in your efforts to making your own.

Sick!

Since there are many variables for even one model of rifle, it might be best to make your own pattern based on what you intend to have attached to your rifle. I know that "The Art of Making Leather Cases, Volume 3" by Al Stohlman deals with making rifle cases. The whole series is a good source of information, but vol 3 deals with larger cases and cases for rifles specifically. I wish I had a better answer for you, but if it is going to be a custom scabbard, then you are left with only a few options. Buy one and hope you can make it work, pay someone to custom make one, or custom make one yourself. I suspect you will be most happy with making your own if you are asking about how to get that done in here.

I have to second the whole 'searching for a funeral home or counter top sales place' thing. There are quite a few locally, for me, and a couple that just take the 'scraps' out to a bin marked "FREE". The scraps come in various sizes, colors, and shapes, but if they are free and usable, does it matter?

I think that any solvent strong enough to remove the gum-trag will also be strong enough to disturb the consistency of the color. I haven't tried to remove gum-trag before, but I would imagine that it's sort like a glue and soaks into the leather, bonding with the fibers.

On a side note, I noticed that a cheap tube flaring tool might work as a starting point for a rein rounder. You'd obviously need to clean it up, but it'd give you a starting point for a low cost.

This may be due to the type of wood being used. If you went with a very dense, tight grained wood like a Desert Ironwood, Lignum Vitae, or even Cocobolo, you'd be able to get near metal-like strength and also be able to give it a very smooth finish. I'd stay away from an open grain wood similar to Oak, Mahogany, or Walnut. The grain is to rough and may end up damaging the leather by scraping it rather than polish it. You'd need to find some way to reinforce the center section with either a metal brace or another chunk of wood screwed into the outer most top and bottom. The addition of some guides to keep the top half aligned with the bottom half will keep it from flexing or sliding while pulling the leather through the holes, too. The idea is to overbuild it a little and reinforce the more flexible areas to keep it as rigid as possible. Depending on which species of wood you go with, there may not be much of a cost savings. It also depends on tools available to you. Some of you might be better setup for working with metal, some wood, and some have it all covered. I have a personal bias towards well build wooden tools, though. It's very doable in wood, it just takes a little different approach to deal with the differences between the materials you choose to make it from. I would argue that the wood might actually be easier to work with as rounding and polishing all the holes you make into a chunk of steel will be quite time consuming, but a little finesse with a Dremel tool and the material can removed faster and cleaned up nicely in less time. You may even be able to use a router to round out the edges of some holes, too. I might be able to work up a quick drawing to help those of you incline to DIY one of these in wood. I have a few ideas that might work, but a picture or two seems to do a much better job explaining things than paragraphs of words alone. Just let me know if any of you are interested.

I had to think on this one a little bit, but, to be honest, my first thought was the oxalic acid. After reading the results from that I started to ponder what the solution the pigment is actually suspended in. A couple minutes of searching got me this... Quoted from that page: "...the ink is based on propanol, butanol, and diacetone alcohols..." "Sharpie ink that has dried for more than several hours can be removed with acetone and other ketones and esters, such as ethyl acetate, but acetone and other organic solvents may damage the surface of a material." Since it was bare veg-tan, it'll readily absorb the sharpie ink just as it would water, so it's safe to assume that it has gone further than just the surface. My thoughts are that using acetone may actually cause the pigment to dissolve and spread further unless you can find a way to get it wet and then a way to pull the solvent and the pigment out of the leather. That lead to this train of thought, but I have nothing more than theory at this point. If you have the entire piece whetted down like it was being cased, the application of acetone will not cause the pigment to readily spread through the leather as it would when dry. The fibers surrounding the effected area would already be saturated with water, so the acetone would be contained, so to speak. The next step would be to add acetone to the top of the area with the ink, wait a couple seconds and apply dry paper towels to pull out your dissolved pigment. Rubbing would be bad, as it'll most likely just drive the pigment further into the leather. If you have read this far, I would highly suggest testing out the whole thing on some scrap. recreate your accident and then proceed with the steps outlined above. I know that pure acetone can be attained from a beauty supply store that deal with nails and is sold as a nail polish remover. I must stress that this is just theory, as I don't have any acetone on hand to test this theory out with. Also, if any part of this sounds hair-brained to those with more practical experience with this sort of thing, please do not hesitate to speak up. The whole idea is based on preventing the acetone from making the mess spread further by containing it with the water and the action of pulling the dissolved pigment out of the leather with dry paper towels. Acetone, for those not familiar, is very good at causing plastics to melt, finishes to dissolve, and brain cells to die. It's quite flammable and the vapors from it smell awful. Use this in a well ventilated area. It will also be very likely to strip all the oils from your leather and dry it out, so reintroducing oils with something like neatsfoot will be necessary.

Well, I stand corrected... I think I was thrown off about the scale with the first image. After that, I sort of locked in on one thought and prevented anything else from entering.

I should also mention that if you are having issues skiving thin leather thinner, that a sanding drum bit and a dremel will do a really nice job without hacking holes right through it.

Here is what I had in mind. The image I attached should make it a bit clearer than my wordy explanation. Hopefully the image I quickly hacked together will do the job I need it to. If you cut out one just like the image and one of just the triangle, you'll have all the parts you need. The greyed tabs are what you would skive paper thin and fold over to be glued down to the triangle that will make the back side of the bookmark. If you get something thin and that the glue will not stick to, like a piece of wax paper or a very thin cutting board, you can place that between your layers of leather. To aid in the folded flaps staying the shape you want them to be, you can use a small hand roller to flatten a crease into it prior to placing everything in position. It will also help to use the same roller to apply pressure when gluing it up. That pressure helps with making a good glue joint. As for the type of glue, you can use the Tandy Leather Weld, but I personally find that TiteBond III works the best for applications such as this. It becomes highly water resistant when dry, which most of the other HPVA type glues do not. Since it isn't a bag or holding any weight, simply using glue instead of sewing it should be sufficient. This should also reduce any extra bulk near the edges aiding in dislodging the bookmark when it's a backpack, purse, or something similar. Defeats the purpose of having the bookmark if it keeps falling out, right?

Tandy is the only one I know of. I generally avoid even leaving the house on Black Friday. Far too many crazed weirdos out there taking unnecessary risks for my taste.

I think it's time to let the cat out of the bag. I have been working at trying my hand out on a start-to-finish design process. I set myself up with some design limitations and goals in mind and the results look very promising. I had very specific reasons for going about things the way I did and I will explain that later. I also had to identify and overcome a number of problems as the came up. Things that dealt with limitations of the chosen materials or oversights in tolerances of internal parts. Some my other troubles came about due to finding proper ways to organize my steps in machining or finding a certain tool that does the job more efficiently. Since I am just one person and this is a personal project done on my free time, it won't be a matter of taking requests and making them my the hundreds. This is just my attempts at finding a current issue with an existing tool available and finding a possible solution. As a student with a Mechanical Engineering program, it's all about learning. This was the reason I was trying to enlist the help of others for advice or preferences as the provided certain details that I may need to focus on over others. In an effort to keep from being to typically long winded about things, I'll provide some pictures and a general overview of my goals and what has happened up to this point. I wanted to design a new knife out of a different material that would be both beautiful to look at and pleasing to work with. What I saw with the currently available swivel knives is that they are all metal and are usually heavily knurled for grip. This knurling can be aggressive and uncomfortable to the hand and the other issue is hand fatigue. That was a huge point for me. As I had asked around and one of the most common things that came up was hands getting tired after prolonged use and cold from the metal (some metals more than others). Aluminum and Brass will pull the heat from your hand quickly and if you have even the slightest hint of arthritis, it's going to aggravate it. Aside from the aluminum, the other commonly used metals are pretty heavy and many will equate the weight of an object to its level of quality. It's something that has to be put aside, as the weight of a swivel knife has no bearing on how well it will cut. Your hand is the driving force and a heavier knife means more work your hand needs to do to keep it moving and stable. What I came up with is a common material that we have been using for a very long time, but I chose to use it in a new way. Wood. Specifically exotic hard wood, but still wood. The idea is that it will be lighter than the metal, feel nice in the hand, be lovely to look at, and reduce hand fatigue. The trick is getting it to survive the machining process and become a usable tool. One of the major problems has been the barrels splitting when cutting them or inserting the bearings. This led me to try out different species of woods and I am sticking to those very tight grain structures that aren't brittle. The first two images are of the first functional prototype. The third image is of what was usable from the second prototype that broke and parts built to create a third prototype. These two are made from the same African Blackwood, which accounts for their similarity, and are out in the wild undergoing long term testing that I just don't have the expertise to do. The third picture was taken before I replaced the setscrews with nicer, more professional looking ones. The next two images are of a shorter version (2") made from Bacote and the bigger one made from Snakewood (2.25"). From the testing so far, the feedback has shown that these knives perform phenomenally well and are a joy to use. Also, reduced hand fatigue, which translates to longer times being able to cut leather without your hands paying the price. Just click the images to open up a full size picture. Functional Prototype 1 (P1): Functional Prototype 2/3 (P2/3): Barrels for further prototypes: New barrels and P2/3 for comparison: At this point I am just sharing what has transpired. I have still been testing out different lengths and diameters, but there is a limit to the minimum diameter I can make based on the limitations of the materials used and the size of the bearings I am using. This means that about 0.5" on the barrel is the smallest i can go. I may do up some blueprints with dimensions and notes for those that feel like making your own, but that'll be later. I will probably be making a few to sell, however I want to work the last few bugs and optimize the production process without a reduction in the level of quality before I hit that point. If I don't, they'll need to sell for far more than I think they should to cover the time I spend machining the internal parts. The post did get lengthy, and I am sorry for that. I actually left out a great deal of the boring details and failed experiments I made in the process. Feel free to chime in with your thoughts, but I mainly wanted to further explain the purpose of my original post and share some eye candy.

I hate to burst your bubble, but that's actually a myth and sales of the Chevy Nova were quite good south of the border. There are actually several lists of car names that didn't translate well to other languages or just sounded ridiculous to everyone but those that were making it. I did take some time to dig up two of them. (here and here)

You can have that added in for free when you order 100 units in China. I couldn't resist...

As someone who finds it interesting to find new and unexpected uses for things, I want to share a very plentiful source for patterns for carving designs. I hadn't seen anyone mention the Dover publication before, but had seen a couple mentions of coloring books in general. The Dover Publications company is one particular company that produces some of the most amazing coloring books. They have a wide range of categories, from fantasy to historical, and from flora to fauna, and the level of detail is just the right balance for working it into leather carving. If you follow the link above, you can see some examples of the books they provide. As I had said earlier, I know that coloring books had been mentioned for carving/tooling patterns, but the quality and variety is so consistently good with these guys that it merited being mentioned in a separate topic. Funny thing is, I have found a quite a few of these books through second hand shops and the bulk of them are not even colored in.

I believe it is a guidon holster. They are used for parades or extended carrying of flags and guidons. There are quite a few different variations on it, but they all to pretty much the same job. An example can be seen here.