Sporq

Thanks for the tutorial. I assume this works pretty much the same with the meander border tool that looks kinda like the letter H as well?

Make sure on your bracers that you pattern them for comfort of movement, especially around the wrist. I see too many that end up digging into the back of the wearer's hand, and that gets sore after a while.

I like it! What's the small metal rivet looking bit at the tip of the knife sheath?

Tippman probably went pneumatic because that's what most of their company deals in. As for the letters, My coworker has had luck taking a small lacing chisel and sharpening it to use as a swivel knife. Might try that, but I don't know if that would work for you if a scalpel isn't doing the job.

You can just wrap some denim or canvas around your finger or an object and use that. It works rather well, and with it on your finger(s) it will conform to most curves anyways.

I use packing tape a lot on the back of the leather when tooling to help prevent stretch... mostly because it's convenient. The real trick with it is to have it go beyond the edges of the piece, especially with smaller pieces. You can either rest your palm on it to hold it in place better, or tape it to your slab if you want.

Vegtan goat comes in around 2-3oz with what I have (I totally didn't buy a huge stockpile when it came in randomly at my local store >.> ) and it will burnish together with cow veg. You can find it on ebay and such sometimes.

I'd love to be able to attend (or have attended?) but I'm too far away Are there any handouts or notes I could get from the class? And you should definitely post pics somewhere.

I haven't made a leather bag for a 17" laptop...yet, but I do have a satchel for my current 17" beast, and it's pretty big. If you want, I can take pics of it with a ruler or something to give you an idea. It's just a store bought fabric one from Eddie Bauer, but it's a nice bag, and can give you an idea of the scale you'll be looking at.

For smaller patterns, I draw them out on paper, then laminate them and cut them out. A decent cheap laminator runs about $30 at Wal-mart, Target, or even Walgreens. I just randomly tried making some patterns from dollar-store cutting boards (the thin flexible plastic ones, in a 3-pack) for laying out the ends and holes on dog collars and belts. Works pretty good, sharpie wipes off easily enough with rubbing alcohol, and my punches go right through them without hurting the blades.

Your stuff looks great. I'll probably pick up a couple of things when I have spare cash. Might want to make the site's front page look a little cleaner though.

Hi, I was thinking about embarking on my first laptop bag, and Have a good idea about how I'm going to pattern it out, but I was wondering what people were using for the padding inside the laptop compartment. I was kinda thinking about using automotive headliner, since it has a nice soft side, and foam behind it, and comes in several colors. Any thoughts on this?

In my experience, copper rivets, when taken care of turn more of a caramel brown, even when used heavily (I've done a fair amount of armor repair for SCA folks who use their armor regularly) They CAN turn green however. So the stainless seems like the best way to go.

Very nice work. Makes me want to try my hand at doing a stool sometime.

The tandy maker stamps are brass, with what I assume is a delrin handle built in. My local store has an example one laying around. They're pretty decent, but a little expensive, and only really come in one size, and limited styles.

You can dye the back with the fiebings alcohol dyes too, just be sure to buff the hell out of it with a white t-shirt type cloth until no more color comes off, then seal it. I haven't had any problems with dye transfer after heavy buffing, but I hear that it can occur when sweat and moisture are involved.

I was about to make a new post, but I figured here was as good as anywhere.. I just made a paste compound out of the green buffing bar stuff from sears. Heated it on medium heat in a double boiler setup until it melted, then mixed it with around 6 tablespoons of olive oil (only because that's what I had convenient, and it was an experiment) at first, I tried rubbing the compound on while still warm, and it worked ok, but didn't seem to be getting enough of the actual green rouge onto the leather, so I randomly remembered about how you can boil leather in wax to impregnate it with the stuff, and after figuring the bar was some sort of waxy compound, proceeded to just take a piece of 3 or 4oz scrap cowhide and soak it in the heated mixture. after about a minute or two, I pulled it out, and there was a fair amount of excess on it that I rubbed off with a paper towel. What was left was what I think is a fairly good surface for stropping and polishing. I tried polishing a few stone marks out of a tandy tool that I had ground the texture out of for a cheap crowner, and it polished it to a near mirror finish. I would call that a success in my book. Might try mixing it with bee's wax instead of oil, or switching oil types. Anyone have any suggestions for improvement? After pouring the mixture into a bottle, it cooled off and turned into almost a saddle soap consistency. I'm wondering if I can just rub that into something, or even rub it on and heat with a hair dryer to get it to soak in more.

Sent you an E-mail.

Anything you are looking for in particular for trade?