Canuck

I Have a Fortuna Bell skiver clone for sale. It is in good working condition. The bell knife is a Fortuna 96 with a lot of life left. It has the desired metal dog feed instead of the ceramic wheel. The self sharpener works well. I've had the machine for a year and has done me good service. I have made sure that it was well lubricated. This is the head only, you will need a table and motor. I am asking $450 plus shipping and handling. The reason I'm selling it is that I just acquired a new Consew bell knife skiver. I am located in Southern Ontario. The skiver weighs approx. 95lbs. PM me for more details

I made clicker dies using the backside of bandsaw blades This was done by using scrap plywood as a base, scrap 1/4" plywood to make a template and wrapping the blade around the template. Foam rubber from packaging is used inside the die to make sure the leather comes out of the die. I use scarp pieces of leather for other projects like wallets and the like. I use solar panels to provide electricity to run my lights and computer in the shop. Surplus stores will sell plastic cutting boards by the pound. Old railway rails for anvils I've made jigs out of scrap pieces of wood. Goodwill stores for old leather coats, and furs, as well as belts for the hardware. I use the file folders for patterns too as mentioned before. Great thread thanks for the ideas

Hi Andy. The machin is OK, I've put a lot of work into it and soon it will be operational. Simards don't have any, or carry this size of blade. If you have any spares that would be great.

Update, Dan at Randalls Machinery was very helpfull. He has some refurbished blades that may work. He can also re-sharpen the blades I currently have for a decent price and I may just go ahead and go that route. I will update this later

Thanks for the links. Unfortunately Randall number only works in the States. I have a call in with a Texas dealer but haven't heard back. Both Artisan and Hoffman Brothers were helpful but they don't carry the size I require. The standard appears to be 80mm OD and 40 ID mine are 64mm OD and 39mm ID. It might be possible to have the 80mm machined down to 65mm I would have to check that out. Specialty blades would make me a set but the initial set-up fee would be $1200-1500. then the cost of machining. I nixed them. I will keep plugging away. In the meantime I'll have a look at dressing the blades I do have.

Thanks, I have a call into them. They didn't have parts for the Randall strap cutter on the web page.

I purchased a manual strap cutter late last year. As always, one is told that it can do more and is in better condition then it actually is. I have refurbished it and had spacers made so that I can cut multiple straps in numerous widths. It has been modified so that it can be taken apart quickly and easily to change out the bushing spacers. The top roller is one solid piece. It has more grooves cut into it to facilitate the different positions of blades. I now need cutting blades that look like this. I have contacted a Disston head office but they don't make this item. Wondering if anyone has a source for these. Thanks Robert

I now live in Stratford, Ontario. I grew up in Northern Ontario. My former career was a stager manager of opera (Hurtin' songs done in Italian)....This allowed me to travel to many communities in Canada and abroad. I also have MS and this has slowed my involvement in theatre. I now build kilts and work out of my home. This is a full time venture. A number of years ago I was asked if I would make a kilt out of leather. I took on the project and am now reputed to be one of the best leather kilt makers in the world...who wouda tunk.... Cheers Robert

I have the 105-25RM. It is meant for sewing moccasins. I don't use it for that. I use it to top stitch my kilt straps and belts. It has a lever to disengage the feed dog. My machine works extremly well. I have eased up the tension on the presser foot as it tends to mark the leather.

Gladiator style kilts? lots of hardware and hours of setting the studs..... Thanks for the compliments.

Continuing on the theme of leftovers (on another post) I did this one as a joke. I was bored at a Highland games this past summer. Another vendor was sporting a new line of sporrans. I made this up in my solar powered shop. Upon it's completion I ventured over to his display and set it amongst his Traditional sporrans. I caught his attention and asked "John since when did you start selling pink sporrans?" He Answered in a thick Scot's brogue "aye dinnae sell pink sporrans! What ya on about?" I pointed at his display and he noticed my creation... We howled with laughter. The thing is, I ended up selling four of these that weekend! who woulda thunk?

I had another request for a leather kilt that was a bit off the wall. The company colours were black and pink. Apparently pole dancing is all the rage out west in lotus land and I made a pink and black leather kilt. She was extremely happy...it was a big hit. Put on your sunglasses!

Over a year ago I was asked what I did with my scraps. Well I have a number of projects and generally I have about 3% waste, so I really don't have leftovers. Which is OK. The fellow asked if I would build a multicolour leather kilt. I said sure, should be a piece of cake! WRONG! It took me a year to assemble the scraps that were big enough to make pleats. So here is the end result. Sorry the last pic is out of focus. Took me about three times as long to build. Not doing that again

Thanks for getting us back online. I will repost some of the photos that I have on file. Cheers Robert

In a products catolouge I found this http://www.aaronmartin.com/product.php?cat...amp;submit=View and this http://www.aaronmartin.com/product.php?cat...amp;submit=View Now the wholesale price is cheaper but even that was out of my range. Tandy has the crafttool press on sale for $94 Canadian but the throat is too narrow to handle some punches. So I cut off the foot and built a new base. I adapted a hand punch to fit in the press. I made a parrallel centering guide and used bungy cords for tension to hold the work in place. In the end I spent in total about $150 and a day in the shop to come up with something similar for a fraction of the cost. The hand press will be converted to a foot press and a guage will be added for spacing but here are the photos for reference.