Macca

Wise words sir

Definitely interested in good quality tools Ren.

Thanks for sharing the info. Do you have any links to the irons you posted in the picture & the other higher quality Chinese makers ? Very interested in these ones, not so much the shiny, polished one (that looks like it needs sharpened)

The jaws lock with the hardware Trox, I can confirm that, I have one. The jaws lock but adapt to the thickness of the piece you are working on, thats what the lever arrangement is for Very clever design.

Newer ones are like that, cheaper to make I guess. I have to ask though, how the heck is it flying out of your hand ? How hard are you hitting it ???? I have the old & new versions & I can't say I've noticed much difference in use, but then, I don't try & use them as punches, only to put enough of a mark to guide my awl, not punch through all the way.

great post Walter, thanks for you efforts ! Hello to all the old familiar faces, hope you are all doing well

http://www.gemata.it/a_3_EN_2_1.html & no, you don't get desktop versions..

Damm, thats a huge loss Fingers crossed they can get back on their feet.

Do the replies so far not give you a strong enough hint that this idea is ridiculous ? Why am I even bothering, I've just seen who the OP is

hmmm, only other thing I can suggest is maybe youtube ?

want to show me somewhere else in the world you get taught Euro leather working techniques by an ex Hermes artisan for less ? look at what the students produce, looks like good value to me if thats the quality you can potentially produce afterwards Courses are always sold out, might not be cheap, but seems there are enough people who consider it good value Valerie Michael also offers a shorter course, cost per day is pretty much the same & you have today for materials on top https://www.leathercourses.co.uk/product/bags-design-construction-of-leather-bags/ anyway, back on topic. I doubt those books are going to cover what you need, its really so much easier being taught in person, especially for making bags, reading is one thing, someone teaching you as you do it is so much better. I'd try & hunt out a class or two local to you.

The classes are aways full, the students produce some fantastic work, Its one of the few places in the world that you can learn this type of leather working, wouldn't say the cost was outrageous at all

The euro ones Ray posted about above are much better than those tandy ones

they are not from the same tannery, Hermes get their lamb & calf from different tanneries (& now own most of their tanneries) those are either distributor or retail labels where did the pictures come from ?

You don't really need to see it on the left, with enough practice you will use the same angle every time when pushing the awl through. that just sounds bizarre

you cut them to size & it can only be used at an angle, the clamping requires your weight on it to work as for annoying, thats all down too your technique, I find the vertical ones infuriating !

Great work Joe thanks for posting this

ok

Difficult to accurately date the blanchards, they run the same patterns for many years. But this one is quite new (relatively !), could be 25 years old, could be 50. Its the last version of the old pattern, before they switched to the newer lever style. Not sure if the blade is the original, looks very new, but that doesn't really matter. its the 15cm version, which is good news. Value, 150 Euro + in Europe. to sharpen it, only do the inside of the blade (side with the blanchard mark), you want a very small angle so should expect to see a taper from about 10 - 15mm out from the edge.

I used an iPhone as well,so I can't hide behind that Just down to me then !

hmm, Joe takes better pictures than me ! heres some of the dixons. 7SPI 8SPI 9SPI 10SPI 12SPI I guess that covers most of what you can get now. just for fun, heres a couple they no longer make... 15SPI 16 SPI really struggled to take pictures that shows the accuracy of the machining, but the dixons are spot on the SPI they should be

I'll take a few pictures of the dixons against a ruler, you will see they are very precise on the SPI

so blanchard are tpi, dixons are spi means the blanchards are even more expensive than the dixons as you have to go up a size to get the same spi.

Maybe it's just a bad angle on the picture, but that looks as though you would get 6 and a little bit SPI with that iron, not 7. I'd have returned that, guess this is the issue David has seen with his. For comparison , I just checked a few Dixons irons and they are absolutely spot on