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Kevin

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Everything posted by Kevin

  1. Depends on what you mean by moccasin weight, deerskin,no, Walter Dwyer type moccasin, yes, that weight anyway. One of the problems with these machines is they like to sew FAST, the speed is what gives them momentum, look at a Campbell and the weight of the handwheel is what gives it momentum. I'm wondering if a 3/4 horse servo motor would do the trick. Then you could go slow but still have plenty of torque supposedly.
  2. Just looks like an old safety razor blade to me. Try the grocery store or drug store.
  3. I think because it's too fussy to hold that many layers together at one time. You have 5 things to keep straight. Sewing it twice seems like more work, but you're not having to fight every stitch.
  4. I just looked at your website, very nice work, very nice videos.
  5. If I were going to spend that much money, I'd get the Campbell-Randall splitter.
  6. Tom Taylor used to have a saddlemaking school in Pennsylvania in the '70s. The last time I heard the name he was in Texas, if it's the same person. That's all I know.
  7. Weaver's has black in two weights.
  8. I also have used heat shrink tubing, masking tape and once I had an extra foot, a grinder. If I have something that needs real precision, I mark the stitches with a pricking wheel and lighten the pressure and hand feed it.
  9. What kind of a cast iron stand?
  10. Eeel was used a lot in the '80's, but it wrecked the magnetic strip on credit cards for some reason.
  11. On the old needle and awl machines, the manuals said to do it to pull a tighter stitch. I assume it is the same on newer machines, I do it .
  12. You can cut the finisher down to just what you might need, I have about 8' at home and 5' at work. I had a grinder on a short leg of a finisher and I've seen work benches built on just the legs. I think I used to have a vice mounted on a leg also.
  13. I use leather dye or Ritz dye. You can tan leather without chemicals, just chop down some trees, strip off the bark, grind it up and make a liqueur and soak away.
  14. Mostly I try not to knot. It can telegraph through and make a lump, but sometimes I do.
  15. It's pretty whatever it is, maybe Moses Smucker will buy it.
  16. That is cool Bruce, thanks for the name.
  17. Ten years ago i ordered a smasher for somebody and I would have been embarrassed for my trashman to see it. I got one for the shop yesterday and it was beautiful.
  18. Ken Chapman is a nice, nice guy, he'll try to do anything he can for you. I talked to Joseph Dixon (not his name but a direct descendant) a few years ago and he told me his father had tried modernizing their manufacturing methods and it didn't work so he was going back to the old ways. I think the black paint is just so they don't have to finish the whole tool. I have several irons with black paint and have never had any problems with them, the oldest being about 22years old and used in a shop situation with others besides just me using them. The last few I bought did not have paint on them.
  19. I have always found that they just sew better when feeding your material toward the machine. Yes it sews in any direction, but since the thread goes through the needle left to right and that's the way the needle is configured, when you go against the flow, it's not the ideal situation. At least that's my theory.
  20. I have a post machine I put on an old Singer treadle stand. You just have to put a larger pulley on the machine, its too hard to pedal otherwise.
  21. One more hint, make the hole small enough that you have to force the rivet through it, this holds the rivet still while you work. Try holding a rivet between your fingers and peen it and you'll see what I'm talking about.
  22. Funny thing is, I learned to build saddles in Whitewood, SD, I never even would have considered working on English tack, as in the thought just never would have even occurred to me, but life happens. When I quit my job in '89, a guy from Texas that had been building the bronc saddles at Barstow Pro Rodeo came and took my place. Turns out he worked for the saddle school I went to and had taught saddlemaking at Pine Ridge. He had also lived in Whitewood right next to where I had lived (at a different time). Then I went back to work at the same place and we worked together for 20 years.
  23. Remember, the Weavers don't own Weaver's anymore, they are just the front now. It seems like they have tried to keep changes to a minimum, but they do experiment around some. For a while they were shipping leather shrink wrapped in plastic, but I got some the other day and they've gone back to boxes. I used to use their "english bridle leather" for halter repair, but it got too soft and fleshy in the middle, so now I use the Hermann Oak and buy sides which is very wasteful for me. It sounds like I'm bashing, but I buy probably seventy five percent of my materials from them.
  24. I'll just add this, I bought a counterfeit guitar directly from China and my computer hasn't been right ever since. I have Norton 360 and I've run dozens of scans and not found anything.
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