Bob

All I've ever used is Pure NF oil and tan cote.... I'm with you guys, why fix it, if it an't broke? However, while in Sheridan. I got talking with the lady in the booth with Bee Natural. Turns out that TL puts some stuff in their NF oil thats not so good. Pork fat.... You can see it when it settles to the bottom.... She may have been just up selling their products, but I may take a closer look at that and try their products... If it says "Pure Neatsfoot Oil" and it's NOT, then whats goes? That nice lady also said that their Neats foot oil has an additive to prevent any mold or mildew... Thats not usually a problem around here, it's usually too dry and the problem is getting enough water back into the leather. Especially if the rig comes in covered with grease and dryed out. It would be good to hear from some of you others about this point.

They sure look pretty, but how thick are they near the edges? 3/8 inch from the edge should be about .0020 - .0025 and the longest bevel you can. I'm not sure how to type what I mean. 20/1000's is what my knives are thick. The heat treatment is also critical, if the knife maker has a oven, the rockwell hardness should be 60-62.

Esantoro, it seems you been in "The City life" too long. I couldn't imagine life without a vehicle of some sort. Even a bicycle is better than nothing... A horse? Not your talking... Ever watch "City Slickers" ?? New York City? a nice place to visit, tons of things to see and do. Shop for tools till yer broke flat.... OKOK, dinner's burnin'

Jim, send me your address. I'll send you something from Canada... Kamloops BC no less. It's a great spot to visit. I have some tools I can spare... Just PM me with an address Bob

We got back here on Monday night, had an awesome time. Lots to see, cool people to meet and talk with. We even met Elton Joorisity too, oh and Bruce & Rundi, and Doug C, and Steve Mason, and well lots of people, oh we met Rod and Denise too. I over spent on tools , some say you can't have too many tools, but I'm not sure about that... I just finially got unpacked today.

I get Fred Smith's as well and like them alot. Nice work. good price for what you get.

Jim, I made a tap off to fit each of the two sizes, using the rivot press to punch in the rivots, tube rivots with the 5/16 heads.

A movie we both enjoy together, having a good laugh is "Dumb & Dumber", Jim Carey is great.

Well, I'm with your husband on this one... I like all those movies you mentioned that he likes. I don't think I consider myself "Nutz" about anything like that. We buy the movies and sure we watch them time and again. I will agree with you again about Lord of the Rings, it's a master piece of work. One I also really like is The Matrix, all three. I see something new it everytime I watch it. The wifey doesn't agree with my taste for movies, for the most part. We do watch many shows together, just not those mentioned above. Ones we watch together include, "Anne of Green Gables", Sea Biscuit, and others that give you warm fuzzy feelings about LOLOL, "Thats all I have to say about that", we do like Forest Gump too... Thanks for sharing your ideas.

Tom, that rod holder is super nice. That is just great craftmanship. Keepup with the very nice work. It's sure as heck nice to look at. I wiped my chin to avoid droulling on the keyboard...

Look at this beautiful Case and Case knife Rayban sent me. It's awesome, very well made and quality knife too. Thank you Rayban.

I use vinyl flooring from the local shop. They through out large cutoffs. It's great for patterns, you can write on the back, and cut easily with a head knife.

I used to smoke two packs aday. I liked smoking, but my health was suffering. I decided to quit, I simply changed the way I talked about it. I tried several times at first before I quit. I used to say, "gosh I dying for a smoke", oh if I could only have one" words like that.... So I changed the way I talked about it, to something like this. "I'm tired of smoking, I don't like smoking, Smoking makes me sick" Words like this are what changed my mind about smoking, it toke effort and consistancey. Even though I smoked though out the process, it took weeks to finially quite. I just changed my mind about smoking... I hope this helps you, it worked for me.

My wife says I'm somewhat of a dog at times, I look my best in the morning....

I don't have problems with that anymore. I have a SHARP awl blade from Bob Douglas, and needles that do fit the hole and no jerking it through with plyers. I used to pull hard on the thread to get a really tight stitch, thinking I had to pull it that hard. I sew the binding slightly dampened. NOT WET, spoung damp. The thread lays in nice without pulling real hard. try hard to be consistant with the same pull on the threads, it makes for a nicer stitch. Only half a wrap around the finger and pull is enough. If you still have problems, you can use those blue rubber gloves, mostly for grip on the needles, if your having to grip hard to get them through, then you hands will hurt after awhile, also they protect your skin from getting blistered. If your needles are too tight going through, then either your needle is too big, or the awl is too small, you choose. I'm using a 346 nylon bonded thread from Ludlow thread company, a slim blade awl from Bob Douglas, and most importantly a James John #1 size needle. The needle is quite easy to thread, with good thread, and it almost falls thru the hole, with only slight pressure from my finger on the END of the needle. Works like a hot dam.

Rayban, I recently got two new awl blades from Bob Douglas. That was the smartest thing I've done in recent years. Are they ever nice and sharp. I wanted a small awl hole and asked him about it. He suggested a "Slim blade" of the two sizes he makes. They cost 25 dollars each, worth every penny. The handles, well I got a couple new ones from Tandy, and they work fine. Cheap too.

The lie detectorJohn was a salesman's delight when it came to any kind of unusual gimmick. His wife Marsha had long ago given up trying to get him to change. One day, John came home with another one of his unusual purchases. It was a robot that John claimed was actually a lie detector. It was just about 5:30 that afternoon when Tommy, their 11 year old son returned home from school. Tommy was over 2 hours late. "Where have you been? Why are you over 2 hours late getting home?" they asked. "Several of us went to the library to work on an extra credit Project" said Tommy. The Robot then walked around the table and slapped Tommy, knocking him completely out of his chair. "Son, this robot is a lie detector, now tell us where you went after school." "We went to Bobby's house and watched a movie." "What did you watch?" asked Marsha. "The Ten Commandments." answered Tommy. The Robot went around to Tommy and once again slapped him, knocking him off his chair. With lip quivering, Tommy got up, sat down and said, "I'm sorry I lied. We really watched a tape called Sex Queen." "I'm ashamed of you son," said John. "When I was your age, I never lied to my parents." The robot then walked around to John and delivered a roundhouse right that nearly knocked him out of his chair. Marsha was bent double laughing, almost in tears. "Boy, did you ever ask for that one! And you can't be too mad with Tommy.... After all, he is YOUR son!" The Robot immediately walked around to Marsha, and slapped her three times!...

Well, what I've found works good is to put the two legs together with the roughout sides out. At this point don't put on the leg straps yet. I put the two legs together exactly and drive a nail thru the stitching into the table in three points. Firstly on the belts somewhere. I use a light duty 1 inch nail. Again at the top of hte leg where the buckles go, and somewhere down at the bottom where the fringes go. It's not that critical where you nail as much as it don't move on you. Then I mark a light pencil line where I want the fringes to start, all the way down and around to the bottom in a long curve. I have a pattern to do this with. I start at the top behind the belt and use a steel ruler with a cork back, just like Beaver does, and cut both legs with a head knife at the same time. Going around the bottom edge you will have to adjust the width of your strings a fraction each time, wider at the bottom to account for the longer distance. It's so you can finish the last few fringes with the same amount of material the full lenght of the fringes. I hope you have good success, just use a sharp knife and you shouldn't have any troubles. Press down hard with the ruler and the cork backing down against the leather, helps keep it from moving.

This is what I've been busy with the last while. All comments are welcome.

I've been using weldwood contact cement for years and years. I can't say I've even tried barge... weldwood works good and dries fast, besides it's cheap. Here we pay 23 bucks a gallon, most hardware shops have it.

Ashley, very nice workmanship. You done an excellant job. Keep up with the good work...

OK well here's the promised stirrups, finished a couple weeks ago. Finally got around to posting them. These are sewn on a machine. Look at the earlier posting and see how it's done. Without a stirrup plate. 1.5 hours work into these.

Steve, thats a nice site. It's easy to navigate nicely laid out. The main page takes a bit long to load the pictures. I may be the server or too large pictures. I'm not sure, an expert can help with that. The phone is easy to find and email link is handy too. Thats good. You might consider a guest book for folks to leave comments. people like doing the guest book thing. Over all, it's awesome. Nice workmanship too.

I've had a wreck here a few times too, but not any more. The pattern I used had a short radius. I found it better to make the curve longer. I have never glued anything here, often the material used won't stick well with glue anyway. So I made the curve longer and used shoe tacks. I use a walking foot machine "Pro 2000" and pull the tacks out as I go around the corners, tacks about 1 - 1.5 inches apart. I've never had a stirrup plate, so I can't comment on that whether it would help or not. I have been doing it in this fashion for some time now with success. Sew the top piece to the gusset first, then trim the exess off on the bench, you won't have to nail or tack this step, just hold it in place and sew it. Trim the edge after and finish the edges. Then line up and nail that to the backing piece and top stitch. Put the first two nails "Clinch tacks, nailed into your rock" in the two top corners first, then work your way down to the corners making sure that they are even, pulling the gusset out to meet the backing and nailing it down. It helps me if I pull and stretch the leather here, only in the bottom corners. Sew it and trim the excess off on the bench. This is how I do it and it works.

I've been using Simply Accounting for over 20 yrs. I use it cause it's simple to use and understand. Besides, I was trained using this program, it simply works for me the best for keeping track of payables and receivables. I don't use the inventory portion. I just expense all inventory supplies, regardless of stock. That keeps it easy. I'm sure if you were to contact your local chamber of commerce they would be able to help you out with training on a program that would work for you. There are actually several good ones out there that do the same thing. I hope that helps you out.