Regis

Bought a nice soft brown leather jacket for my wife at a fairly nice ladies store. They wrapped and boxed the other items and gave me a box & wrapping for the leather jacket. They said they were instructed by the maker not to wrap until one day before giving as a gift because the leather would dry out too much and harm the leather. After thinking about it a little, it made some sense. Their normal wrapping is to fold item in tissue paper, then box, and wrap. I guess the tissue could suck the moisture out of the leather if left for long time but, would a week or two be harmful? Not complaining 'cuz, at least they care enough to point out that excess drying leather could be bad. Any thoughts?

Welcome Troy. That is a very nice case and tooling. Just make a couple molded ones for 2 of my sons but, they wanted clip on's. I like your's better. Glad you're here and looking forward to seeing more of your work.

Steve, Welcome and this is a great online place to hone your skills. And, as for traveling, I think there was a post recently about Peter having a class comming up in Ft Worth so you might want to check that.

I've always keep a string loaded with rouge attached to my jewelers bench for a multitude of small polishing tasks. BUT, never thought of if for keeping edger sharp. Thanks. Attached to bench allows you to pull string tight while polishing.

Welcome. Glad to have you join and to see your work. A lot of nice tooling on that one.

Brass, First welcome to leatherworker.net, glad to have you. Your tooling looks good to me so one of the floral carvers will have to chime in to be more specific. Only thing I would guess (if beveled deep enough) is to round them somewhat with a modeling tool.

I like it. The shepard faces all look pretty good from what I can see. Human faces are difficult, especially when small.

Welcome George. Glad to have you join and hope that computer hangs in there.

ClayB & Mrs ClayB, As everyone said, very nice. Is that antique only or did you do anything else? Looks like the color I get with the new med brown gel.

Freak, I watched along and you really turned out a very nice peice of work. Your friend's FIL will sure be pleased with it.

Welcome Claudia and Randy. That is a beautiful peice of work and some amazing sewing. Looking forward to seeing more of your artwork

I have a lot of miscelaneous peices of leather and would like to actually measure and mark the weight on each peice (yep, should have marked to begin with :deadhorse: ). When I put a caliper on the leather, I get a pretty wide range of size depending on how snug I close the caliper. Is there a rule-of-thumb or other guidance for measuring? Or, do you place a rule along side and eye it? Is veg & chrome measured the same? Seems to be a lot more 'fluff' in chrome tanned. Thanks Regis

Jarl, First, welcome to the forum. Looks like a nice machine. Definately a leather needle and you probably can fine a walking foot to fit your machine and that will help a lot. I can not tell you how thick of leather you can sew but, with a leather needle and walking foot, probably 2 layers of 3/4oz at least and you can do a lot with that. You'll have more difficulty with very soft leather (e.g. lamb) than you will with veg tanned. Best of luch and looking forward to seeing some of your work.

Does anybody here use the holster needle plate for an Artisan or Juki? If you do, where/how does it help? Thanks, Regis

Dink, I am also a big Artisan fan BUT, are you looking for a portable? Or do you have room for a larger machine in your trailer. If you really need a portable, then, include the Sailrite ultrafeed LS and clones in your search. For $400-$900 you can sew up to 3/8"+ pretty reliable. It is pure pleasure to sew on my Artisan 3000 but, my noisy little Consew portable (with sailrite balance wheel) fits the portable bill and sews very nice.

I wonder why it is $160+ on Amazon and $24 on ebay?? Maybe hand leatherbound vs paperback???

Tom, Do not ignor the possibility that you did nothing wrong. The girl/boy could have inadvertantly got some chemical on it. Perhaps in the water or they tried to clean or who knows what?? Regis

Bruce, Happy birthday Hope the boss gave you the week off

Aaron, Sounds like you are trying to volunteer to do the judging! It'll probably be pretty easy only a hundred or so photo's all taken to show the same views with the same lighting not to mention the same complexity of design. Glad someone is trying to step up to this simple & easy task. Just kidding of course. I believe the initial objective was just to find out the level of interest and perhaps how many actual skill levels are represented. Dangling some drawing prizes was to keep the 1st/fact-finding contest attempt from being a contest between 4 or 5 top entries. Hope you participate so we can see your work. Regis

Nick, ' was just getting to know you (on the phone) and you're leaving. Thanks for the friendly service and helpful tips while ordering besides your online help here. Hopefully your replacement gets into this forum too. There is a replacement moving in, isn't there?

Same problem in the southeast for many hours drive (outside Atlant & Orlando/Tampa areas anyways). That is a good reason we need to encourage young folk so there can be more guilds and more teachers accross the country. Until then, I sure like some of the online tutorials found here. If we could just get that 1st hand look/critique/dialog as we progress on a project.

Excellent. I'd antique. Looks like sailfish, marlin, and swordfish. Is that correct? I've avoided belts for myself 'cuz I can not figure out a design that long [lol].

Excellent design and very nice stitching along your texturing. What are the approximate dimensions of your tool bags?

Kate, I have now got the nak of using the rubber and it is very easy. I did learn (like you originally said) 2or 3 coats are required. On this, I brushed the brown after spraying the black. Had some preval sprayer problems so had to touch-up daub but, the latex worked perfect. I also found that I can apply the latex a lot easier now after a few attemps (just like anything else, practice). Still don't understand the bluish hue in photo....it's really black, in person. Thank you for your tutorial as it will save me a lot as my coloring complexity grows.

Pat, welcome to this great forum. I'm sure you'll get some more experienced help but, from my view, I'd put a sheen (flat or shiney) on it , put it in the frame and discard the glass. I looking forward to seeing your work...photo's photo's. Great question and glad to have you here