FlHobbyist

Thank you so much. I now remember seeing an illustration somewhere of the wigglers on the side of the bud, though I forget where. And, I also remember I have both of Stohlman's books on figure carving, I should have checked there first before getting frustrated and panicking ~sigh Thanks, Bob

To update this thread; Tandy now sells a corner cutter. Seems to me the price was around 30 or 40, but it is progress. I continue to be very happy with the cheap set of corner cutters I got from China. However, one needs to be lucky when ordering stuff like this from China, as I also ordered a set of belt end cutters from china that were quite dull when delivered. Someday, I'll have to figure out how to sharpen them.

Wouldn't one need an infinite number of straight lines to form a perfect circle? I understand how to make a circle with a compass, though I don't know how to make one from geometry alone, other than making a polygon with an infinite number of sides.

When my subscription to LCSJ started, I opened it up and saw a pattern that I want to use on a case for an Fire tablet. As a challenge I decided to start carving it now, as I continue to make progress with tooling and carving. I'm somewhat pleased with the results, with the exception of the decorative cuts. I think I've figured out how to do the leaves, but the flower petals are a complete mystery to me. You can see various ideas I tried on each petal, but none of them were ideal. So, here are my questions and observations: 1) Decorative cuts on the Leaves I've labeled the leaves in the order I did them. I think that by the time I was doing leaf F that they were starting to look pretty good. Any advice on how to make the cuts or tooling on the leaves look better would be welcome. 2) Decorative cuts on the Petals As you can see, I'm at a loss what to do here. I tried various ideas, and didn't like the results with the exception of the one that I didn't do any extra cuts. 3) Decorative cuts on the Bulbs The original from what I could glean, had spirals and circles. My skill isn't quite there, and worse I really couldn't make out what he had done. A reasonable question would be, why don't I follow the photo in the journal? The answer is the only photo is a very small 1x1.5 inch photo and my eyes were straining to get any useful info off of the picture. Though I am pretty happy I figured out how to do the petals. Any other tips, comment, advice or questions are welcome. Thanks, Bob

The items in this list have been sold. I'll be back in around 4 or 5 months with more extras and upgraded items for sale. This thread is ready for archive or deletion. Thanks

The Leather Wranglers Swivel Knife, and the Barry King Swivel Blade are sold.

Yes, they are all still available.

Hackbarth tools are sold.

The time has come to reduce my duplicate tools. The pdf contains the details but here are the highlights: 9 Hackbarth tools for between $25.00 and $32.00 each 2 Welker tools for $30.00 each Tandy Medium Damascus Round Knife for $35.00 Leather Wranglers swivel knife for 135.00 Shipping: I only ship to US address using the Priority Boxes. Shipping is $5.00 Payment: I only have a paypal account. Discounts: a) Buy more than $50.00 and shipping is free Buy more than 100.00 and a 10% discount will apply. Please contact me for any questions or orders. Thank you Bob LeatherWork for Sale.pdf

I love it, it reminds me of Brain Salad Surgery

That 8372 sold in October, so I'm thinking this knowledge is of limited value to OP.

Many thanks, I've been actively collecting the pre 63 stamps and this helps quite a bit. Especially with the figure carving stamps, it is very hard to tell is a no letter stamp was available for a particular number or not.

My Leather Wranglers Mini Lui came in today and here are my initial impressions. It is a beautiful knife with the custom Hawaian Koa wood handle. Not only did I think it was a beauty, more importantly my wife thought it was a beauty too. She really liked the look of it both because of the workmanship and the unique design. The knife was a little smaller than I had mentally pictured it to be (see photo). I have a small Osbourne and I had expected it to be about the same size. The Mini Lui is about 3/4 the size of the Osbourne, however this suits me just fine because I think it will be easier to control as I continue to learn about leather crafting. Now for the good part, and what everyone so far has commented on. I can't believe how sharp this knife is! My path with round knives has been somewhat torturous. In June I thought I got "lucky" and bought a Damascus blade from Tandy with a managers special for $65.00 (current price $40.00 and continuing to drop like a rock) At the same time I bought a small Al Stohlman round knife for $24.00. I learned how to sharpen round knives with that small Stohlman knife. I got it razor sharp, but as has been reported here many times, it simply won't hold its edge for more than a foot or so of cutting, which isn't too good if one wants to cut out a purse, much less a saddle. I upgraded to a small Osbourne that was (I thought) pretty sharp. It had the advantage of keeping its edge. It and the small tandy blade were both sharpened to the same degree. They would move through 3/4 leather pretty easily except on corners, and they could be used on 8/9 leather but I had to bear down on them both a little. However, with the Mini Lui going through the 8/9 leather was very similar to cutting through a cardboard box with a razor knife. When cutting through the thicker leather the Mini Lui even makes a satisfying sound similar to cardboard being cut with a razor knife, and it glides through without me having to put any muscle into it. Even though I am an amateur, I do like nice things, and the Mini Lui was worth every penny it cost me. With a little luck, I'm going to buy a full size Deter sometime next year. Bob

Springfield is your best bet. There are other suppliers out there that offer more or less 1 stop shopping, but their quality and price are much more expensive. Springfield is a big step above tandy on most items and they are cheaper. Other advantages of slc is they will sell leather by the square foot, and they carry a fair number of exotics online.If your looking for stamps, your best bet is to head to ebay. In general if you are a little patient (i.e. willing to wait a week or two) you can buy a group lot of stamps in the neighborhood of $3.00 apiece. This has the advantage of getting a lot of stamps cheap, but you will probably end up with duplicates. There are rumors of stamps going for 1.00 each at ebay, I have yet to see that and I've been watching pretty intently since May. There are other low price alternatives available such as Craigslist, garage sales, and flea markets but I know nothing about those markets.

Yes

I have Barry King's and I'm pretty happy with it. Several here have also recommended Bearman's, though I don't have a link for him right now.Barry King: http://www.barrykingtools.com/handtools.htm

I really like your work. It is very creative.

Thanks for posting tanda4. I agree with your observations about the people that I have bought from, and I'll be checking out a couple of the others.

Thanks Cyberthrasher for weighing in, you've given us some room for thought. This is what I was talking about. For those that are curious there are 2 big post about this on the boards. There is a sticky in How do I do that, and there is the post about wallets that cyberthrasher mentioned. No doubt there are others that I have missed so far. You're right I deserved a cuff on the ear for saying this. I need to research and think about this more. So many things to learn... I just mentioned them for completeness, I agree with your observations about them completely..For the moment I'm going to focus on skiving the edges and putting a piece of veg tan in the middle, until I have this technique mastered... Bob

I'm pretty much a newcomer to leatherwork also, however this is a topic that interests me quite a bit. Here are the various suggestions I've seen, though I'm quite interested what someone with experience has to say. Edging methods and ideas for exotics: 1) Do nothing - It sort of looks like crap, but I've seen people doing this. 2) Hide the edge by sewing a piece of fabric over it. If done well, this is a pretty good method. If done poorly, it looks like crap. If you have a sewing machine it is pretty feasible. Hand sewing fabric over the edges seems like it would be a lot of work. 3) Braid - I have a feeling that in certain instances this might work, the rest of the time it would look amateurish. 4) Skive flesh sides of the edges and then glue the edges to a piece of veg tan that runs down the middle. Then burnish the veg tan as normal. This is the method I am experimenting with. My first piece (ostrich) ended up so, so doing this. Skiving the flesh side of the exotic is harder than it looks, I'm still looking for the right knife, though for right now I'm practicing with a skife (Osbourne 925). 5) I've read here somewhere that the big commercial houses have some sort of heat machine that will put edges on just about anything. Very little has been reported here, but no doubt the magical machine would cost an arm and leg. Also, the few reports here of the edges produced this way indicates they are of poor quality. I think 4 is the most valid way, if a way to skive the exotic can be perfected. Bob

You can also do a search for completed items on eBay. This link may, or may not work: http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=Baird+Leather+Secrets&_in_kw=1&_ex_kw=&_sacat=0&_okw=&_oexkw=&_adv=1&LH_Complete=1&_udlo=&_udhi=&_ftrt=901&_ftrv=1&_sabdlo=&_sabdhi=&_samilow=&_samihi=&_sadis=200&_fpos=&_fsct=&LH_SALE_CURRENCY=0&_sop=12&_dmd=1&_ipg=50 Be prepared, it is going for a lot less that I thought it would be going for. Some of the time you ride the bear, other times the bear rides you.

It's a tough one to call. Book values go crazy when a new edition comes out and it usually takes awhile for things to settle down. One suggestion would be to take it to Abe Books, play up the rarity of the edition you have, and then list it at your guesstimate. Tandy will get those who 'just want the book', but you may attract some interest from collectors.

Welcome to the board! Check out Tandy Leather Company: http://www.tandyleatherfactory.com/en-usd/home/home.aspx and Springfield Leather Company: http://springfieldleather.com/ Both offer beginners kits and plenty of supplies. Tandy is the bigger company and has outlets all over the US. Springfield in general has better prices on most items. I bought my initial kit off of Amazon, though it was a Tandy kit. Good Luck, Bob

Thanks for the tips and ideas. I though I was the only one who had problems with the thread catching on the wing nut.

Thanks to those who have made suggestions. I tried the skife knife because it was quick and easy to acquire. I wasn't entirely impressed with it, I got the one made by Osbourne, and I have to say it was as flimsy as could be and it is a trip putting in the razor blades. Luv them paper cuts. Maybe with practice it could be used. I haven't gotten up the gumption to call Paul yet, while money isn't the highest criteria it is a consideration, especially since I don't yet have his head knife and I only have 1 of his swivel knives. I'm thinking of calling Bruce Johnson and seeing if a French Edger isn't what I need. Thanks again, and the quest goes on.