RandyScott

Windy, Bones from cow and pig contain large amounts of fat and grease. Tends to mess up your leatherwork. The effort it takes to 'degrease' the bones is simply not worth the time nor aggravation. I have the TLF 'plastic bone' folder and I have one that I made from cocobolo. I learned that cocobolo is tough stuff especially when you are cutting and shaping with hand tools, i.e., hand saw, wood rasp and sandpaper. Additionally, it is time consuming. So for less that $4 one can walk into a fabric store and purchase a folder. Or one can pay the price at Hidecrafter or purchase one from young Cornelious above and have a quality tool. I am glad I made mine for the experience of making the tool. But it's not an experience I wish to endure a second time.

Tazzman, give it a week or so and then if you have not received a notice, drop Barbara Lourdes an email. Her email address is on the home page toward the bottom just above the maps. Or, if you are dieing to get into the member section (like I was), drop her an email now.

I have the same plastic folder and had the same problem. So, out to the garage and dig through my stack of sandpaper. Started with about 180 and went up through to around 1500 grit. Smoothed the sharp edges (by the way, surprise to me, that little knobby thing with the grooves is to be used as an edge burnisher will pull off or detach from the other piece!). Finished it off by polishing it with automotive polish compound. I then worked on the edge burnisher and smoothed its sharp edges

Up to 2000 grit 'sandpaper' can be obtained at most auto supply stores, i.e., NAPA, Advance Auto Parts, Pep Boys, O'Reilly, local auto supply stores, etc.. Get the wet/dry stuff for metal, not the stuff for working wood. the stuff for wood is typically brown or sand color, the stuff for metal is typically grey, could be another color also. The label will help, key word on the label is 'Aluminum Oxide' or 'Silicon Carbide or Oxide'. I am at work so depending on my memory.

Johanna, I think the link to Shop Talk is incorrect. Clicking on the 'Shop Talk' link takes you to http://proleptic.com/ vs http://www.proleptic.net/ Randy

Hi folks, I have been lurking on this site for a while and made a post or two when I thought it would be helpful. I am a noob at leatherwork. I have no artistic ability so my stuff will be very, very simple and that is ok with me... ya remember the old Dirty Harry admonition? A man's gotta know his limitations! There was great info available on this site and I hope the folks who have been and are working to recover and restore the data are successful. Randy

Hide Crafters carries a slew of Hurst's videos ranging in price from $6.95 to $19.95 according to their catalog. The catalog is in a pdf format and the file is huge (approx 17mb) so it downloads best on DSL or be very patient. You will need Acrobat Reader to open a pdf but it is free and I think the link is offered on the Hide Crafter web site.

KnifeNetwork.com is having some issues migrating to new servers this weekend. Should be back up soon. I made my stitcing pony from the tutorial for less than $20 USD on a Saturday morning. BTW the tutorial author is Chuck Burrows of Wild Rose Trading Company, www.wrtcleather.com. I tried the site this morning and the site is down also. I think it may be hosted by the same ISP that hosts KnifeNetworks. Hopefully the ISP will resolve the server issues and everyone will be back onlne soon.

The topic of thread length has come up before and will again. I, also a noobe or beginner, just could not accept 'it depends' till I work out the ratio of thread seam length to thread length, sewed my first seam and promptly forgot the ratio. It really does 'depend' on many variables such as weight of leather, total pieces to be joined, stitches per inch, etc.. To determine thread length one adds up the various distances or thickness of each leg of each stitch. For example, using 2 pieces of 8 ounce for a total thickness of 16 ounces or 16/64 = 1/4" thick, 4 stitches per inch for 1 inch and using a saddle stitch I estimate about 4" to the linear seam inch. Note that the thread requirement consists of a fixed and a variable measure. The fixed is the seam length. The variable is the stitches per inch. 8 SPI will require more thread than 4. And don't forget, as I did, that you need extra thread so that when reaching the end of the seam you have sufficient thread to manouver thread and needle. It really is frustrating to have 4 stitches left and not enough thread because I forgot to add an extra 12" per side for handling. Or, use the span method. A span being the width of your outspread arms - roughly 5 to 6 feet for most folks. This amount of thread allows one to sew with two needles and an awl and never drop the needles nor awl, allows one to pull and seat the thread without having to drop and pick up anything. IF one runs out of thread, tie it off and start with a fresh thread. The Al Lohman book The Art of Handsewing Leather and available at a reasonable price from any leather supplier details the technique of this method, tieing off and many others. Those who use 'rules of thumb' have developed those rules through experience and repitition, i.e., they use the same stitch method, weight of leather, piece count, etc., over and over and develop their unique and individual 'rule of thumb'. And finally, initially you gave a seam length of 28 inches. Using, as an example, a 4 to 1 ratio: 4 x 28 = 112" + 12" + 12" + 6" = 142" or almost 12 feet of thread. The 12" is for working room when the seam is almosts finished and the 6" is for the amount of thread required to lock the thread to the needles. Then again, I as a noobe or beginner, could be wrong. Regardless, I do wish you the best of luck on this journey. Also, if this comes across as 'preachy', I sincerely apologize. My intent was to convey my journey through this topic. Randy