shtoink

So weird! I was actually thinking the very same thing, when I had looked at the picture. It's sorta like suspenders for your boots.

I realize this is an older thread, but I did end up stumbling on a larger version of the image for the pattern in the link above. Webley Holster It might be too late to help out for the costume, but others may find it useful.

Awesome score there... I inherited most of mine and added to them as I can find them for reasonable prices. It seems that everyone is dumping them on eBay with meat-market like results. I like tools, but let's be realistic, I'm still a cheapskate.

I found that creating a spreadsheet to catalog all the stamps also helped me keep an eye on duplicates. Since Excel has a column sorting feature, you just pick one up, type the number, repeat until finished, select the column, and tell it to sort. After a certain point, you just can't seem to remember which ones you have and which you still need want to get.

I had some really serious issues with my lace maker. I purchased it "new" from the local store, but it turns out that the blade was in serious need of replacing. Luckily, I had some spare blades and was up and found it far easier to make lace instead of smaller pieces of scrap. I don't know if this is the problem with your lace maker, however the blade is the first thing I would check. Hopefully, replacement of the blade is all you need.

I love seeing simple and elegant solutions to a problem. Good work on this. I should take some pictures of my stamp storage solution, maybe someone will get some use from them. I ended up doing wool fabric over strips of foam in an accordion manner to allow for nonslip slots to slide them into. I didn't want them falling out, but I was still working out how I wanted to do a setup for the tools being used on a current project. I just might have to borrow this idea. Thank you very much for sharing!

Not to sound like I'm being dismissive, but this sounds like a non-issue. The kind of cases the flat irons come with are usually made from a woven nylon material, if they do come with one at all. It seems highly likely that it'll end up being cool, or cool enough, before traveling in any type of case anyway. You need to make a travel case, not a fireproof safe. Just make sure that it's not tossed in the case until it's had time to cool sufficiently, is all.

Tandy probably won't be the least expensive place to shop. What I did was make use of their membership program which gives you some discount on the pricing and access to the mailing list for coupons and such. Then I get to use those coupons for bigger discounts on the tools I need/want. I also will hit their big sale days, like the Black Friday sale or 4th of July sale. I also troll their bargain boxes for things that are cheap, too. As for the thickness of leather, Tandy has a page that describes the thickness of leather in ounces and a conversion to an actual length/thickness measurement. I think this only half answers your question, so I must apologize in advance if it isn't the information that you wanted.

I, for one, am grateful of the images being posted....

Phssshhh... Yeah it does...

Being on the west coast doesn't exactly guarantee anything. I'm about an hour or so away and still might be able to do anything about it.

I would like to add that if you already have a Dremel tool, the sanding drums that come with it work very well for skiving, too. Especially if you are trying to get paper thin in some places. The downside is it that it creates a ton of fleshy dust. They aren't ideal for big jobs, but can hold you over on small projects until your next allowance day. Also, don't forget to look around for places that do granite/marble counter tops or headstones for super cheap to free off cuts and scraps.

I know that RIT dye will dissolve in an alcohol based solvent, it's available in a wider range of colors, and is available in liquid and powder form. It's entirely possible to get the intense pink color you want with a RIT dye and some form of alcohol. We already know that spirit based dyes will work with leather, you just need to account for it drying out. Who knows, maybe you'll get good enough at it to come up with a color chart after figuring out your process. If you get repeatable results, that might mean a great deal for colors to apply to leather. *EDIT* I did some further researching on the subject and it turns out that RIT Dye is terrible when it comes to light fastness. It seems that the colors do not stick around long when exposed to UV light sources and a different type of dye is required for those things that will be seeing plenty of sunlight. Luckily I found at least one source with 110 colors to choose from. Dharma Trading Co. seems to have the market cornered when it comes to colors to pick from and their ability to stay that color under some harsh conditions. I have no idea if this is the best or only place to choose from, but at least it's an alternative to RIT. Dharma Trading makes some serious claims, but I figure, if it can hold up to hippies, it should have no problems with holding up to cowboys or bikers...

We get a lot of rain where I am at, too. It's not a whole bunch all at once, but rather a continued light rain for extended periods of time. The creates puddles of standing water on the roads, occasional landslides, and the squishy, soft ground you'd expect. Well, I got tired of hydroplaning on the roadways with the sanding water, dealing with muddy spots and getting stuck, and the dealing terrible control in the snow. I used to drive a front wheel drive sedan that drove great under ideal conditions, but those conditions are far a few between here. I ultimately went with a Subaru. A newish one that had the modern traction control, but old enough to have depreciated in value to be affordable. I can't say enough about the handling in outright nasty conditions Subaru has. I have had no issues with getting stuck in mud, hydroplaning, or snow. When it snowed last, I had some half bald all season tires and never bothered to put on any chains. It was such a drastic difference and easily explains why there is such a heavy saturation of Subarus in this region. It really feels like "everyone" drives on here. I don't know if they are as prevalent in your area, but I do know you guys like to rally race, and that is one of those things that Subaru is known for. This makes me think that they probably aren't that uncommon and should be available at a low cost. So, aside from carrying around a small lumber yard with you to create makeshift rail road tracks for your van, an affordable vehicle with enough room and some better traction control is probably the best bet. That is, of course, if the budget allows.

Better late than never...

This might be a long shot and have limitations, but it might be possible to mock up your patterns with thin cardboard. Stuff like ceral boxes. It'll behave similar to leather, well more so than paper, but you won't be wasting leather if you mess up. It'll give you an idea where you'll need to cut reliefs or prepare for overlaps and such. The best part is success means you have a pattern to use for the real thing. Keep in mind that I have not actually attempted this type of project, however I have used the cardboard trick with success. The are even reusable, if the need arises.

I can second the eBay sighting for them. I have run across a couple of them while looking through the items that a seller has listed. I think that "rivet" was the key search term, though.

It'll be close to 3 hours from the Vancouver area to the regular meeting place that list on the site. I may need to check it out, too. Thanks for posting the link.

That makes way more sense than what I was thinking. I hadn't even considered starting with something that wasn't flat.

I could be wrong, but the first thing that comes to mind is bonded leather. I can't see any way for the consistent results with even thickness and surface condition. There is the possibility of multiple thin layers being sandwiched and bonded together inside a very smooth mold and under high pressure. I just don't know enough about leather to do much more than speculate on how much stretch is possible.

Don't forget about the possibility of an allergic reaction from the cocabolo. Not everyone is allergic and it can vary in degree of severity. It's something to do with the oils in the wood, so just keep that in mind until you know exactly where your sensitivity to cocabolo lies. A good friend of mine is extremely allergic and found out the hard way while trying to make a bowl from cocabolo. His hands looked like hundreds of bees had stung them just from the chips coming into contact with them. Luckily he was wearing a respirator. If it did that to his hands, imagine what the fine dust would do to his lungs. As for me, I have no issues whatsoever. I actually find the smell of cocabolo being turned or cut very pleasant. Almost cinnamon smell. Also, some other very nice woods to make a slicker from would be snake wood and lignum vitae. I know there are many others that could work, but those are just two of my favorites that have yet to be mentioned.

I found this website that lists models by serial number. It's actually quite a sizable database of information.

Oh Man! I forgot about that aspect... I know that there is protective gear available to prevent that sort of thing now. I know all too well what the bite from a 65# recurve feels like on the forearm, I can only imagine what it would be like on the chesticles. On the original topic, I am very glad to see popular media bringing a classic sport back into the spotlight. I find archery fun and relaxing, not just challenging.

My daughter, oldest son, and myself are involved in the local 4H Archery program. We got started towards the end of the summer last year and now my youngest son is requesting to get involved. He met the minimum age requirements, but lacked the maturity and interest when we started last year. It's been loads of fun and we're all looking forward to it starting up again in a couple months. I started out my son and daughter with bare bow recurves, so that they would learn "the hard way" before getting the option to move on to sights and compounds. My son decided to move on to a compound bow, but my daughter still holds to the bare recurve. She's quite the force to be reckoned with, too. She's currently 10 and manages to wield a 20 lb bow with ease. Oddly, there were only 5 or 6 other kids that used bows with a heavier draw and all were much older then she. My oldest son show a significant improvement when using the compound with a sight. The dark ages of learning archery? I've heard horror stories from some of the parents and instructors. It's very possible you weren't being shown proper technique, as the string really shouldn't come in contact with your arm at all, but that's neither here or there.

I was letting my brain grind away at this one silently in the background and a thought occurred to me, if you are not successful in getting the punch you need, then I hope you have access to tools. A grinder, a vice, a hacksaw, and maybe a few other things. If you don't, then maybe call in some favors. Anyway, let me get to the point before I wander off too far mentally. If you look at a punch, it's basically a tube bent to a certain shape and sharpened on one end, right? Well, if you get some steel pipe that's about 6" long, you can squish one end in a vice and grind an edge onto it. You'll need to find something to put in the end being squished to prevent it from collapsing all the way closed or warping too severely. It should be something that can handle the forces involved and be the width of the final hole desired. A rough guess is that if you squish a 3/8" pipe to about 1/8", it should be about 1/2"in length. Mind you, that's a rough guess. Once you have it the shape you want, take it to the grinder and carefully place an edge to cut with on it. You can clean up the cutting edge with a sharpening stone and test it out. I think that some thin walled, galvanized pipe might work for a while and it wouldn't hurt to cap off the other end so you can beat on it. It's possible that some scaps of wood cut to the desired hole width will work for preventing the end from collapsing, but make sure it's a hardwood and not something soft like pine. I wouldn't expect the tool to last you a long time, but should suffice long enough for the project at least.