TwinOaks

Yes, I've had this happen on two occasions. It appears that there is a slightly different method between tanneries. Some of my pieces have initially turned blue, then faded to black after the oil was applied. ( You did remember to oil it didn't you?) But no matter what, some leather turned blue and stayed that way. There is, however, a pretty quick fix. TRY THIS ON A SCRAP FIRST: Give the leather a quick wash with (unsweetened) black tea. One of the other members noted that tea is very high in tannins. Then, reapply the vinegaroon. Your leather should blacken. Even if it doesn't blacken completely, you'll have a chemically colored faded in/out blue on black pattern that folks will be REALLY curious as to how you did it.

There's another aspect of the quality that Marlon mentioned....namely, how symmetrical the stamp is. Ever see the 'sale's that Tandy's been promoting? Ever wonder why they're trying to get rid of a whole lot of stamps? It's because several lots of them are poorly made; QC has apparently been outsourced too. Most of my 'new' b/w stamps are asymmetrical. I went through every d443 stamp in the Montgomery store before finding one that was even close to being cut the same on both sides. The 'geometric dots' set I bought won't make a stamped circle for anything. So take your triweave and mark one side of it (sharpie, nail polish, etc.) Then on a piece of scrap, get a GOOD impression with it. Next, rotate the stamp 120 degrees (1/3 of a circle) and place it back in the impression. Repeat. Does it match up PERFECTLY? If not, that's a good reason why the pattern doesn't line up right.

Hey Marlon, Rubber cement thinning on it's own....the only reason I can think of for this is that there's more solvent staying in the bottle than is being removed. RC has a pretty high volatility, and the partial pressure in the bottle may be playing a role here. I suggest setting out a test batch and letting it breath for a couple of hours, letting some of the VOCs escape. That should more or less equalize the mix. Of course, I'm FARRRRRR from being a chemist, so I may be totally off track here.

Getting the arrowhead is possible with all of the basketweave stamps I believe. Set up a center line, then stagger the stamp down the line at a fixed angle. This will make one side of the arrowhead. On the opposite side of the centerline, mirror the image. I don't have a pic handy, but there is one in the '08 Tandy catalogue, page 47 . It's one of the borders. It should look something like this: / \ / \ / \ Mike

Holly, I COMPLETELY understand your frustration with the situation. Last weekend I had to tell my daughter that she couldn't go over to the neighbor's house to play with their kid. It seems their 9 year old girl thinks my 6 year old son is a great punching bag. The parent's response? "Oh, [child's name] would never do that!" My boy is also accused of hitting (as in punch) their garage door hard enough to dent it. Yes, I said dent it. Now he's strong, but come on!!! Here's my suggestion: Step 1. Allow the boys to play together outside. They don't come in your house, Ethan doesn't go inside theirs. That should limit any percieved attempts at maniacle ravings and brainwashing attempts against children. This more or less protects both sets of parents. Step 2. On the next occasion that you have to speak with these neighbors, tell them that you're expanding your leather working and would like to include BDSM items, and ask if they have any suggestions or requests- and here's the hard part....do it with a straight face. There, problem solved! I know this probably didn't help much, but I hope you got a chuckle out of it.

Seeing how you've constructed those, I have to wonder if you should be using 'pull the dot' snaps in place of line 24s. (presuming, of course, that you used L 24s on the mock up) Dependent on the snugness of the pouch, you might end snatching the whole thing off your belt in a real world scenario.

No, you're not overthinking it. I've run into the same thing, but I opted to line it with glazed pigskin split. It's really thin and doesn't seem to impair the mag draw. Another option is to double the back of the magpouch, stitching one to the other to conceal the rivet's base, which is cleverly hidden between them. Use lighter weight leather if you're worried about bulk. More work, but better looking usually is. Of course, lining it is easier....oh, wait...nevermind. If you make the pouch first, then realize you do want a liner, well, a paint stir stick is just about the right width for a 1911 mag pouch to get it smooth.

Shorts had a similar question on vinegarooning a holster that wasn't taking dye well. I thought that the vin. would push some of the dye back out of the leather. I think she reported something along those lines, but I don't want to speak for her. My observations with vinegaroon is that the surface of the leather takes a nice finish due to the tallows and oils being forced to the surface. It takes a little coaxing, a little leather conditioner, and a good bit of rubbing/heat to push them back into place. Now, on to your question. Vinegaroon first on some scrap, then try deglazing it where you want the paint to stick. That should give you good adhesion for the paint. Then, add sealer over the paint. If you intend to add sealer over the whole thing (which doesn't seem necessary IMO) I think Neat-lac should work well on the vin'd leather....but could eat your paint, dependant on it's solvent. DISCLAIMER: Please note I said try this on scrap. I don't know if anything will stick on top of the vin'd leather, and I really don't want you messing up a sheath in the process of learning. For the deglazing of the pinstripe(?) try rubbing alchohol. There's my guess at it, let's see what others say.

Nice looking sheath, sodapop. If you're asking about resolene to seal the sheath....there's no need to. In all of my vinegarooned exploits, I've had an almost waxy finish on the leather as a result of the vin. application. The only thing I do is apply a leather conditioner (Aussie, since I have it) and rub it in very well. This will push some of the essential oils and tallows (fats) back into the leather where it belongs.

Hi all, I was just wondering if anyone has heard from Kevin, or knows how he's doing.

The last criticism I ever got about the time I spend on leather I answered with "You know what, Honey, you're right. I haven't seen any of my friends down at [the bar] in a while. I'm gonna run down there for an hour or so ." Since then....not a word. Funniest thing about it- somehow I forgot that I put the security chain on the door before I left.

Better yet, get a measurement of the customer. That's if you deal person to person, that is. Explain that you have to do it to make allowances in the leather, or whatever else you care to think of. That way, you eliminate "paralax errors" when reading the tape.

Since I was shopping for kids' school supplies anyway, I went ahead and purchased a 'few' extra plastic file folders. They're easy to cut with scissors or exacto type blades, take permanent marker well ( labeling what it is, and which side, etc.). Best of all, they only cost me (tax free) 78 cents each for a 17x11 piece. Then there's the pocket pieces, too. Being plastic, they're waterproof which is nice when laying the pattern down on cased leather for the tracing.

A skull design using the negative space presented by flower position- that just reaches waaaaaaaaaay out there, Spider. I LIKE IT!

Excellent holster! Those little blotches are the leather talking to you. It's saying " Put your maker's stamp right here."

Note the second pic Johanna posted...."Best of Show, Sheridan, Wyo 2003". I promise you this: If I produced work that good, I'd still drop in time to time, but I wouldn't be here as much. I'd be far too busy taking the vacations that each saddle paid for.

Well, golly. That's setting the bar pretty high- guess I better go get the pogostick. Bree, this isn't a competition, only a challenge. This only the second time I've heard of scrollwork in leather (the first was on a seat I think Shirley made) so don't feel like you're the only one who's new to this. The whole idea is to learn new skills for your leather working. Each of the 'challenges' helps less experienced members gain some exposure to different types of leathercraft. Those who do have experience just might learn something too! If nothing else, seeing the incredible craftsmanship in these works is pretty dang inspiring. Of course, seeing work like those posted is a bit daunting, if you're trying to beat it in competition, but this won't be graded. At least not officially .

F976 (craftool #) for layers of hair Modeling tools Hair knife freehand stitching groover v-gouge Here's a pic of the lioness we did as a monthly challenge. I used only the first four tools listed- thought the v-gouge could be useful, so I added it. The f976 tool was pressed and dragged, and shoved for various looks, not hammered as is in tooling. P.S. Obviously this is one of my early efforts- the pic is fine, I just carved it that blurry!

OOOOHHHs and AAAAAHHHHHHs really fall a bit short here. Awesome work! You're doing a tutorial next, right???

I found Leatherworker.net.

Seems like I read something about saliva working well because of enzymes in it. My thinking is that gum trag. might just be thinned down, plant based, artificial spit. The reason to use it instead of water is that it gums up a little better, giving more friction, which leads to better burnishing. Somebody else (Art S?...rdb, maybe) mentioned using beeswax. I used that last night on a toolpouch. I'm impressed by it, and will be using it again.

Good tips Johanna. I've got another method I can use, but I'm loathe to do it. Transmission is 110% secure, but it's really dang slow- right there with dial up. I hooked an Abacus up to the phone.

Only thing missing is a design name for it. Nice concept. It just goes to show that a lot of the really good ideas come from the folks out in the world. I'd suggest a copyright and trademark pretty soon.

ummm....not download....'use instead'. I've got it on both the computers already. I've just never taken the time to add all my bookmarks. Well, one more thing I've gotta do.....

Yeah, probably. Interesting thing is that it only happened when I uninstalled it. The prog opens a browser window ( internet exploder 7 in my case) to tell you that it's uninstalled. That's where the bomb went off, and started opening 'new tab's. I was fortunate that it didn't get loose on the desktop. I had that happen not too long ago on my old HP machine- reach over yank the plug out of the wall. Then reboot in safe mode and go find the recently modified bit of code. <sigh> I dearly wish I had the savvy to retro-infect the author of the virus. Of course, my idea for that is a lead based virus.... .......nahhh waste of money.