MADMAX22

Thanks Dave, appreciate everyones comments.

Make little paddles that are filled with sand. Should work at the ren fair lol. Any customer gets out of line and smack!

Thanks guys appreciate it. And you are correct Jbird, antelope jerkey is some good stuff.

I traced the outline onto the leather but the inside I just looked at the picture I had and played with the leather.

Well got another rifle sling finished (finally). Its a pronghorn antelope and beasketweave. Thought it turned out ok, not the best bit it should make em happy. The back once again padded with 1/4" neoprene and covered in suede (about 2/3oz), the body and strap are from 8/9oz.

Good looking work, Ive gotta get a airbrush going, the dye job is nice and even.

Sounds good, how is the tooling/dying characterisitics of the butt's

Thanks for the info, Ill have to try some out. Good leg work esantoro

The pattern for the purse is from one of the pattern packs that tandy sells. tandy pack

So far Ive used some of the pig skin as lining. The thin stuff. Also some really thin upholstery style leather. Glue it in stitch the edges or lace and your good to go atleast so far from my experiences. Ive so far done the super 77 from 3M and Ive also used this other stuff I got also a spray, it was from a fabric craft store and Igot it to use on foam. Seems to work pretty good on leather also. Anyways I usually spray it on both items and lay the liner on the leather, give it a good rub down to make sure theres good contact and everything is smooth with no bumbs or anything, then lay it inbetween foam layers then put some weight on it. This compress's everything while it drys for a bit. Then Ill take it out and let it finish drying. Trim the excess and assemble the item. Atleast this is how I made my last purse and a couple of coin purses.

Thats a nice ride, very good job of getting the leather to fit in with the bike. That skull on the tank looks bada too. I think I got a pic of me on mine in my profile page. Ive got one of those yamaha roadliners. Keep tellin myself one of these days Im gonna get a fatboy, just havnt done it yet, dont know why but allways wanted one of those beasties.

Well while we were on the topic of clothes used in leather craft, I dont know if it has been mentioned but I use the old levis (any denim really) pants that have finally bit the big one. Personally I use them to burnish edges with. They work really well generally when your doing it by hand, kind of like the guys that use canvas. Another thing I have done is wrapped them around the little rubber adaptors on your dremel tool (the ones that hold the sand paper rounds) and drop a dap of glue on the end after Ive wrapped it several times, put a stitch on each side (gotta make them slightly larger) and dont forget to wind them in the proper direction. This works for me for doing the power slicking on the edges. Atleast until I get moved into the house with a garage and stuff.

Damn chain thats alot of miles, wish I could ride that much. I ride allmost 90% of the year but NW WA state is a pain. Really nice looking seat, my boney ass couldnt handle it for more then short scouts but the work is very good looking and nice clean application of the leather on the seat. Also is that grey or black, from the pic it looks grey, if it is grey what dye did you use. It looks about the color I am looking for if I ever get around to doing my bike seat.

My self being a beginner as well will tell you what I did when I made my gerber tool/ maglight cases. Since they were allways the same size and such I would match up where I wanted to stitch. Then I would run the wheel over the lines to get my stitching and then prepunch the holes. Trial and error but after two of them I had it down. Now I would case the leather enough so that I could bend and flex it but not wet enough for true wet forming. I would put everything where it needed to go and stitch it all together. No glue or clamps, I had too prepunch the holes for this though. Once it was all stitched I would dye it and all that stuff but you could dye before hand as well.

Great idea, looks good too. Question, did it leave much or any residue on the leather. Like if you were gonna finish the belt after you do the edges would it cause any issues.

Very nice I like the scale pattern on it.

Thanks Kevin, all info is helpful and if anything reminds me to take note of something when I am searching around to find more info.

Thanks a bunch for the info and tips guys. Ahhh what did I get into lol ..... Na just kidding, I have some idea its just been a while. Im sure Ill be fully grey haired buy the end of the year. So much for that free time thing.

I use the lavasoft programs and the spy bot searcha nd destroy and they work pretty darn good. I also use windows firewall. I also use this program called ccleaner http://www.ccleaner.com/help/?v=2.10.618&l=1033 Run it and have it clean out all the cookies and such on your computer everyonce in a while. Now be advised if you have webpages with autologon setup like this forum if you have it clicked to remember your computer you will have to retype your name and password because it cleans up all the cookies. Another thing when you turn on your computer hit F8 repeatedly and this should give you a option to boot into safe mode. Boot into safe mode which will allow only the programs necessary to run your computer (it will look odd because you wont have any video drivers running), now in safe mode do all your scans, do the avg scan, SB, and Ccleaner, then reboot and log in normally.

Another thing, you guys that have websites, who did you go thru to get your domain name and setup your website?-

Well I finally applied for my state business license (doing a LLC), mainly to get my tax id number and then to eventually setup a website to maybe make a little money on the side. Ofcourse now Im all worried about the taxes and stuff lol, gotta do some more research as I didnt research enough recently. I helped with my parents shop for 15 years but didnt do most of the paperwork. ? for you guys, did you incorporate your old inventory into your new business when you started it or just start fresh and have youe old inventory for a buffer per say. Whats the best record keeping program that you guys have found that works good for small personal business? Any pointers or big no no's for the type of thing that I am going to be doing? I know there are about 1.2million different ones but anyways.... Oh and one last thing, so if you still sell some stuff on ebay do you use your business name and such or would that be against ebay polisy if so would all the ebay sales be totally seperate from the business adventure.

All kinds of things lol You can mix it with reson, some oil, and make little balls that you use to wax linen thread with if you want to wax your own thread. I rub the wax on my edges to aid me in burnishing the edges. Most seals like snowseal and severl others use a mix of bees wax but Im not sure of the recipes of the wax for these applications.

I had heard of a place up here in the bremerton area that packaged meat and tanned hides from your hunting kills but I think they went under. I dont know of any places other then that in my area.

Nice belt Marlon, good job on the stitching, I still cant seem to get the hold everything and stitch thing. I am gonna wait till I get a real stitching horse for that. I think you would like that pattern on the inside better if the outside wasnt black. I think the pattern and dye job is fine its just with the black outside I think is what doesnt jive (IMHO). It still looks good though.

Esantoro would be the person to talk to about that one. He also has many pics of the ones he makes, may help ya out a bit.