tinabanana

thats great info, thanks everyone. I'll give it a try with the tea and see if that helps

I've had this vinagroon mixure done up for a while now, i used it a few times with limited results, i don't get the nice black like i want, more of a brownish color. My vinagroon mixure is rust color, not black, is it suppose to actually be black? Anything I can do to make it better? More vinegar or more steel wool?

I've done a handful of keychains, book covers, coaster, etc. I've also done a small scale demo seat that I keep in my shop to show customers (I do automotive upholstery) This was my first motorcycle seat and 'paid' project. I have one lined up for his buddy in a few weeks. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.

that looks good, thanks for posting it my original idea was to just carve the lightning but spoke to a few ppl and got some good advice to do it thicker, similar to yours. this is how it turned out

well good to know!

I'm pretty much a newbie, I've done a handful of project, keychain, book and a few demo peices. I got my first job doing a motorcycle seat, i've put tons of hours into it, and now im pretty confident that at the last hour, i messed it up. i must have done something out of order, because after i was done with all my detail dying, part of the skull would not take dye or vinagroon, it would just sit on top. i tried rubbing it with alcohol and then acetone, but still, it would not take the vinagroon well. so finally i just puddled the vinagroon on, and it seeped from underneath to an area it wasnt suppose too. being that its vinagroon, im pretty sure there is nothing to do to save it. as well i ended up covering the vinagroon area with black dye because it just would not cover. so that would probably rub off like crazy. any suggestion other then starting over? and what the heck made that so water proof? i antiqued and oiled before putting the black on, so it must be one of those 2 things that sealed things in

thanks but id like to see it on a leather project to see how it looks.

I have a project where the customer wants lightning bolts (realistic not, oversize cartoony ones) all around the piece. I'm just not sure how it will look on the piece, im a bit worried it might just look like cracks. does anyone have examples that i can look at?

So i just finished my first motorcycle seat. It turned out pretty nice. Im just finishing the basket weave lacing. I cant seem to get the last step done. Pushing the lacr in between the leather of the third slit. Everything is so tight, any suggestions?

i polished the head of my punch with some rouge and put it in my wax chunk and WOW, what a difference! it went from being unusable to being so easy! thanks guys!

Wwwhewww. Good thing u said something, i would have done it counter clockwise and totally messed it up!!

Cool ill give that a go

so im just starting out with tooling, im making up some practice peices for both tooling and lacing. I made this random peice with tooling on each side. The first side i used my rotary punch which made nice clean holes. Then i lined up the peice on the back and made a mark through the top holes, on the back of the other peice. Then i tried a few things, using my rotary punch from the back side, it left an imprint on the front, so thats no good. Then i make a small punch with an awl and punched from the front, that worked pretty good, but by that point my hands hurt too much to continue using the rotary punch. So i tried a hammer type punch, i didnt have the right size on hand, plus removing the punch after making the hole was impossible. Then i tried with a drill bit on my drill press, that was nice and easy, but regarless of making the hole from the front or back, it didnt make a clean hole. So what do you guys do? Here is a pic of my holes, first one with the cross is the rotary punch, the black peice is drilled from the back.

great thanks, ill have to give that a try

woupd anyone care to share what kind of instructions they send home with the clients and their new motorcycle seats ?