Nuttish

To be honest, I'm still working on a strategy for retanned Horween like Dublin, Legacy, and CXL. John Culliton invented Dublin and Essex to be "rustic", which explains why sides have marks you wouldn't see in other tannages. So I'm considering doing nothing to these leathers unless the piece requires paint. Experiments so far involve sanding up to 400 and using a Barry King 00 round bottom edger on the bottom to cut the fuzzies off. Then maybe some saddle soap, but frankly the natural edges are consistent with Dublin's ethos.

Yes, I work extensively with Dublin. I find it very difficult to burnish. It will sand relatively smoothly but doesn't hold a shine. Edges tend to haze and "crinkle". What are you doing right that I'm not!

There's another similar thread going. Be careful about fine detail on soft leather. It can cut the grain. You have an additional option of hot stamping with or without foil.

Dublin is easy to burnish? Do tell.

You can deboss both with an arbor press. 1+ ton should be sufficient. I purchased a hot stamper for less than what my Famco arbor press cost. It gives better results and does not require as much pressure, so it is possible to get more detail without cutting the grain with fine lines. You can also deboss with foil. Neat. You cannot whack a hand die hard enough with a mallet to satisfactorily mark chromed tanned leather in my experience. I wouldn't waste my money if I could go back in time. You can have a dozen or more dies suitable for an arbor press or hot stamping machine made by Owosso out of 3/8" magnesium for less than one of the dies made by some of the "makers mark" outfits that advertise, post, or are mentioned here. This only requires you to be able to do your design in a vector graphics program.

I use a Blanchard French paring knife for skiving and evening out skives after I hit them with a French edger. It's definitely not high speed steel. It's some kind of high carbon steel that I wouldn't even say is particularly high quality. I also wouldn't say that Vergez-Blanchard is a very conscientious machine shop, but that's neither here nor there since the knife is a good design and sharpens easily. I just have to strop it frequently and run it over an 8000 grit water stone here and there. Bottom view of knife with cuts — the steel discolored within a week of me sanding and oiling it — the knife was also very poorly ground at the factory, requiring a substantial amount of work on the bottom side. Top view — note discolored steel and crummy grind. Monica, the knife is not "handed", so it works well on either side. As for skiving with round knives, look down at your fingers and ask yourself how much you like them. You like them, right? I think I've suggested this to others, but have a look at Jeff Peachey's site. He's a bookbinder, but uses tools any of us would find useful. He extensively discusses the merits of different alloys and knife designs. http://jeffpeachey.com/tag/bookbinding-tools/

Laser cut 1/8" acrylic. PM me and I'll hook you up with a source.

W&C is one of only a few American tanneries left. They're very busy and have only three sales reps. It's sometimes hard to get through to Kylie, the *woman* at W&C, but she has always been very helpful to me even when I'm making small orders trying new things out. And as for timing, I find it very surprising that a week to ship is unreasonable enough to cancel a transaction and that not being informed about several day delays when they're working to capacity such that you're getting things directly from their production line makes you feel like you were being jerked around. My last order took a week to process because one tannage was only expected to come out of production several days after I placed my order. Fine with me. To be clear, I'm not associated with W&C, I just find some of their products to be superior and worth buying, and their service to be perfectly adequate. I guess it's a matter of expectations. I don't expect B to B orders from a busy plant to ship next day.

Not to rain on your parade, but unless they've gone electronic since I went to law school, no briefcase will be big enough to carry around your casebooks for the day. Big ups if you're more looking for a project to reward yourself with. I just penned a screed about how miserable I've been practicing law for 14 years, but I'm sure people have told you that one common effect of a legal education is turning a person into an asshole, etc.

Someone asked me for more info privately, so here it is. Famco Model S 2 ton press with 35:1 leverage. Ram modified to take a sleeve and more manageable ram extension. I turned the extension from a short length of steel rod and bored it for tapping on an engine lathe. The sleeve is just a smaller diameter rod bored out to accommodate the rod threaded into the extension. The ram is drilled and tapped for a set screw that holds the sleeve and extension rod in place. The sleeve has a hole drilled in the side to accommodate the set screw. One end of Famco rams is usually tapped for a tool, but you can flip them over and use the other end for this mod. Chuck it up on the lathe in a 4 jaw chuck so you can get it dead center and bore it slightly oversize to the extension sleeve. Now you can much more easily align your die to your work. You can also use the sleeve without extension to set rivets. The set screw holds it in place.

This takes (20 minutes in) a machine shop. Detailed instructions if you wish. Sorry, every single thing in my shop is covered in plaster dust because I'm a dummy.

You could get a French paring knife a la the Blanchard, but paring is hard to do nicely. A French edger is easier to us and works very well. Some people can do it with a skiving knife. Check out Jeff Peachey.

Late to the thread. You can only but Hermann Oak from the tannery in what are probably impractical quantities. They will split for you but I doubt any distributors will. Wickett & Craig doesn't have minimums and will split anything to any weight at a reasonable price and with quick turnaround. I personally think their bridle is much nicer than HO.

HO English bridle is ready to go. You can lightly dress it if you wish. I've not seen the black bleed. I have no idea about their browns, which appear from my swatch book to contain quite a lot of red. Sure you can seal the flesh but HO is fairly nicely pasted so burnishing in some white beeswax works quite well. Their western bridle may be better suited for your project. It's got a more durable finish IMO.

I should add that cutting oxblood isn't going to "brighten" it. It will probably end up a light magenta.

That's what one application of Fiebing's oxblood looks like. If you want a brighter red, you're not looking for oxblood. If anything, that's not saturated enough for actual oxblood. You're certainly not limited to dyes specifically marketed for leather. Anything that works on wool will also work on leather. The question is how you apply it and what change in the leather's temper you wish for or can tolerate. I certainly wouldn't boil leather, but mordanted leather may not require it. Look at the range of colors you can get from madder with different mordants. Or see if a fiber reactive dye from somewhere like Pro Chem would work.

How much larger that the width of the strap should the rings be?

That looks like Hermann Oak English tan bridle. That might explain why 3 applications of a waxy greasy boot dressing didn't make it a lot darker. Please post a better photo of the cracks you're talking about. Is the grain actually torn or is it just creased? There will frequently be creases that form where the grain is stretched and compressed near the hole a belt is worn on. A saddler should weigh in. Does the grain on billet straps tear around the buckles?

Contact Owasso in Owasso Michigan. They make letterpress plates and huge numbers of commercial leather embossing dies. Joe will be able to tell you what kind of die to order and how to set your art up. Magnesium dies are suitable for hot/hot foil stamping as well as cold embossing if you mount them to a little piece of steel so they don't deform. This is by far the cheapest way to have dies made. Delrin can't compete for cost or durability.

You can try a butt stitch as taught in the Valerie Michaels book. It's a pain to open your holes at the correct angle and depth and I don't think it's particularly strong, but it's an answer.

You can cold emboss W&C harness with a die and arbor press. You will get nicer and more durable marks with a hot foil stamper. Barge cement will work nicely.

We've all grotesquely misused tools. This is a great opportunity to justify buying some nice sharpening stones :-)

Rope is the traditional manner of making that handle. You won't have to wet it if you buy the correct weight. It's not practical to buy a different split for every project, but if you're making things that require pieces less than several inches wide I would heartily recommend getting a pull splitter. Have a look at the osborne 86 for an example of a good new one. And then get a 90 year old Chase pattern machine.

7 or 8 are perfectly suitable for wallets and personal leather goods. It all depends on what you wish to make in what style and for whom. Those irons are an amazing deal. It doesn't matter if they're crummy you just can't get anything at that price. Heck, at that price I wouldn't feel so bad about grinding my irons down to thin them. The steel is probably easier to work with ;-)

I wear nitrile gloves when this happens. They're essential in the summer with crummy AC in the shop. 400 for $20 at Costco. No better deal anywhere.