billybopp

I had the same experience with Tandy. Not knowing any better at the time, I tried using the awl as it was ... Totally frustrating. It didn't take long to figure out that something was wrong! It then took a LOT of work to make the damned thing usable. And I still didn't like the way it worked. So ... I bought three different sizes of Seiwa awls from goodsjapan, and they arrived in a reasonably sharp state. http://www.goodsjapan.jp/category/awls/catId=4252437 A little extra sharpening and stropping made them quite good. The blades are a little shorter than some and straight sided, but they will easily go through over 1/2 inch of leather. If you do order from goodsjapan, just be prepared for a potentially long wait with the free shipping option. Paid shipping is much faster and worthwhile if you're in a hurry. There are other sources for awl blades and awls that are said to be good and ready to use upon arrival. Barry King has some. Sheridan Leather sells Douglas blades that are supposed to be good as well. Hope that helps Bill

Nice work, Raven! Is that the pattern that was giving you fits a while back?

Looks good!!

I do hope you're not down long enough to watch all that, Claire! But nonetheless, enjoy!! Bill

Agreed, Claire ... Ian and Nigel both have done fantastic youtube videos ... Both have been extremely helpful to me. Arthur Porter has some excellent videos about making bags, choosing sewing machines and such. http://www.youtube.com/user/MrDallas1953/videos Chief, who is on here frequently, has some helpful videos. http://www.youtube.com/user/Chief31794/videos Bruce Cheaney does a variety of topics. http://www.youtube.com/user/cheaneysaddles/videos Springfield Leather Company has a number of good videos. http://www.youtube.com/user/SpringfieldLeatherCo/videos And, of course, Tandy has some good videos too. They try a little too hard to sell you their products, but the techniques and practices are pretty much sound. http://www.youtube.com/user/TandyLeatherFactory/videos I have watched many, if not most of the videos from all of the above, and found most helpful to at least some degree. Billl

Really nice! I particularly love the fact that your horse is shoed. Bill

Nice lookin' strap!!

My working space is pretty limited, and I have to clear some space in the kitchen when cutting up hides. So, when I need to cut strips of any kind, I tend to make several more than I need, and often several sizes, as you mentioned, and then cut them to length when needed. It's not so hard to find storage for a few strips of leather and not so easy to clear out the kitchen floor when needed! Sharp blades are essential. Blades have more cutting area than the thickness of most leather being cut, so you can re-position the blade a few times and get more out of them ( particularly helpful when you've forgotten to buy spares ). SLC has a good video on use of the strap cutter, and suggest that you can use an injector type razor blade as a replacement for purpose made strap cutter blades, but I have not yet tried that myself. As chrstn53 suggests, the black river laser setup gauge is a really nice simple tool for getting the cutter set up correctly every time. The rule on the cutting arm seems to be accurate on mine, but I don't completely trust it. Hope that helps. Bill

Really nice! ... And it looks like just 2 tools for the design?

I try to avoid knots. If do backstitch 2-3 holes on a line of stitching that runs from point A to point B, really just for appearances so that the beginning of the line looks like the end. If stitching all the way around an item, such as a guitar strap, then I do not backstitch at the beginning since the ending will overlap it by 2-3 holes. Bill

Very cool indeed!!

Looks good! Wonder how it would look with a mildly contrasting leather sandwiched in behind the brogue pieces?

Really really nice work! Wow.

I bet it don't taste anything like butterscotch!

It is probably related to the reasons why men's clothing buttons from one side, and women's the other. Years ago I wondered about this, and did a little searching and found two reasons for that. Either or both might be correct. When men wore swords on a regular basis, they generally wore them on the left side so having clothing button up right over left made it easier to access a sword than if the other way around. The other reason I found was that women were more likely to have a chambermaid help them dress, so clothing that buttoned up left over right made it easier for the chambermaid to do the buttoning when right handed. Belts may have evolved directionality for the same sort of reasons. But who knows!!

Looks good! Finally getting comfortable with that new sewing machine??

I'm not an expert on Iwata .. I use Paasche, but a quick look at retail prices shows the compressor alone selling for $250ish, and airbrushes generally sell for over $100 and sometimes over $200. Unfortunately I can't identify them from the pictures, but they both look to be dual action, which is the more versatile type even if a little steeper learning curve. The only possible "gotcha" is that the spray pattern may not be suited to your needs. Some spray a very tight pattern, others a wider pattern, and most can be readily re-fitted with relatively inexpensive parts. Iwata is certainly a well respected brand. It looks like a good deal to me. Bill

Looks really good! I always have a tough time with getting the fabric to lie right when going around rounded corners and it look like you nailed that. Fabric tape is indeed useful stuff. Fold your fabric edge, iron it to get a crisp straight line, lay the tape between the two sides of the fabric and iron again to heat-set it. It will give you a nice straight folded edge to work with. Bill

Leather dyes straight from the bottle are pretty strong stuff. You can get better control of them, and somewhat brighter shades, by diluting them and then building up color in layers. Fiebings dye reducer does a great job, and I've read that you can use denatured alcohol to dilute as well but haven't yet tried it myself. My greens are mostly on leaves, where I use a heavily diluted yellow first (something like 10:1) with diluted green (about 3:1) on top of it and get some pretty nice colors that way atop veg tanned leather. "Painting" with dye is much like working with watercolors in that it's built up in layers and is never opaque, so underlying colors will show through and change the colors with overlying layers. Used the right way, it makes for some very nice stuff! You'll not get the really brilliant colors with dye that you can with acrylic. Dye simply has a different look and seems always to be a bit more muted, but you can do pretty well with it and keep the look of leather. Since dyes penetrate, they are always the choice for anything that might see hard use. Surface scratches are not so much a problem. Acrylics can be easily damaged since they mostly lie on the surface, but give brilliant colors. Bill

Thanks Glendon! I thought I had seen some other interiors, but didn't manage to find them when I went looking for them. Chappyron, you might consider giving Springfield a call and let them know what you are doing. You just might talk them into giving you a price break for a good cause, or for a volume purchase. It's worth a try! Bill

I can't help you with motor info, but thanks for posting the pictures. I received a request just this week for a collar with handle, and have been thinking about how to make it. Your pictures are a big help!! Bill

I know Springfield carries oxalic acid, as does Sheridan if you can't find it locally.

The bag looks good, so do the cuffs!

Try http://springfieldleather.com/326/Wallet-Interiors/

My best advice for dip dyeing is to do it outside if possible, and put down a big ol' sheet of plastic or a tarp to catch any drips or in case of a spill. If you have one, a silicone baking pan (which isn't very good for baking) works well since dye doesn't stick to it. It takes a lot of dye to fill even a relatively small container, so buy it by the quart unless you're going something really small. Have a place to hang the dyed piece over the container to catch the inevitable drip. Oh... And wear rubber gloves!! Messy, maybe. Effective, heck yeah! Bill