TinkerTailor

I am thinking that if i were to build a shop for off grid use, I would line shaft it and power it by an engine that i can also use to keep the grass down, fertilize the garden and then eat after. A standard clutch with no motor will work with a line shaft. As a matter of fact they have motors with a stub out the other end for a line shaft pulley so the machine can either be used line shafted or electric. Now for my power unit i give you the age old idea of the goat treadmill (this one powers a washer): Also can be powered an additional way. If i'm gonna feed the bastard anyways he may as well work for it:

Nerd stuff ahead: Friction is a funny beast. I was watching a video where an engineer placed a square bar across a gap between two blocks, and placed a given load in the middle, measuring the deflection. He then took another pair of bars, both too short to span the gap, and placed them overlapped held together with a couple of rubber bands. This assembly was such that neither bar was supported by the bricks, He then placed the same load on the top and the deflection was half as much........The only thing holding the bars together was a couple rubber bands........The friction between the two bars, provided by the rubber band tension, was sufficient to prevent sliding and allow the bars to reinforce each other. What i take from this is if a strap is designed and used properly so the load is lengthwise, the seam should not fail until the pieces slide which would require overloading or abrasion. I look at the thread in a seam as operating similarly to the rubber bands here. If the seam is not tight enough ie. thread tension too low, the friction co-efficient will drop and so will the seam strength. Basically the max tension within the limits of the thread will give the highest co-efficient of friction and thus the maximum strength. As well, the minimum stitch length within the materials limits will give the most strength. If you apply force in the wrong direction, and pull the seam apart in use, all bets are off

Then skip the boss and get an electric if you can. There are plenty of situations where having both hands free to start a stitch is advantageous and after a while with the boss, you may end up feeling like leatherwork is like training for the world series of slot machines. You have a bit of an issue and that is that the machines that are nice for doing shoe uppers are generally not tough enough to sew a welted sole on. The big heavy machines are just too cumbersome for delicate topstitching. Price wise, for your 3000 upper budget, you may be able to get 2 machines to each do a particular job. For instance, a techsew 810 roller foot post bed machine will do the upper work and is 1500 US new with table and servo. Then get a used tougher machine to sew the uppers to the soles. These types of machines that do heavy work are known for marking the leather unless you open your wallet and get the desirable and more expensive compound feed ones with non marking feet. When sewing on the soles, marking is not nearly the issue as when topstitching an upper. Shoe makers have all sorts of fudge wheels and things to hide the marks on the shoes from heavy stitchers. A used heavier duty stitcher can be had with a table for under 1500 easily with some looking. Even less than a grand if you are lucky, which leaves 500 bucks for thread, servo if needed, needles and beer (or mead if it is more viking..)

I would imagine that the rule about never stitching across a harness strap mostly applies to leather because the holes are actually punched through and weaken the strap considerably, as well as letting in gunk that will rot it. With webbing the whole goal is to sew it without any fiber damage. If the fibres are not damaged, it should not matter which direction the stitching goes provided the pull direction on the strap is as designed. In reality once you get that much stitching the textile to textile friction due to surface area is what holds it. Of course higher spi has more hold in this respect but also more damage to material due to more holes. Not that one shouldn't sew parallel to the strap as wiz suggested, as this probably makes a difference in the straps ability to handle the shear loads on it due to wind and such going down the road. I also imagine that re-sewing a dirty old strap will cause more damage to the fibers than when sewing fresh clean stuff. Basically i am saying that the leather to webbing comparison isn't the best one due to major differences in materials and their stitchability.

At least he has good scissors......I looked through my stitch sample garbage bin, where i chuck the stuff i have used when i change thread/needles or if i am testing a certain stitch combo. Some of those pieces have been tested on half dozen-dozen different times and none of them is even close to looking as bad as that guys finished project......I mean, what is with all the threadless holes that have differing angles to the holes. Was he trying to figure out which way the needle goes by trial and error??. I feel like this is the kind of user that needs to be told that the pointy end goes down....Thing is, that sailrite will build a what he wants if he even came remotely close to knowing what he is doing. It would track it up some for sure, but if he patterned, glued and stitched before forming while the leather was dry, he could have got a passable sheath, albeit with some minor marking outa that sailrite. Apparently he bought a cobra as well..

Website is down due to a data cap at your webhost. Just a heads up.

I mostly included the info so you could have some semi informed questions to ask the potential person who does the work. There are quite a few european users on here more than set up and capable of doing this work. I am not a big fan of putting any more money in the pockets of the shipping companies if I can, and I prefer to work local for a few reasons. I already use imported leathers from italy...So you would be shipping the stuff half way around the world twice to buy leather through me that I bought from your neighbour and already paid shipping on. That is alot of oceans to cross and fuel to burn for something that shouldn't be too hard to get done locally. I would add your location to the title (or ask the mods too) to attract some of the people on here from germany.. I am in Vancouver Canada which is 3900km from new york and 8000km from Berlin......

Too slow for the tempo. When you do the ghetto backstitch, you gotta get crazy. Like 1 drop of crazy glue in the last hole.

Textured feet? I once had the idea to cut one foot off my double toe and braze on a replacement using the head of a very small basket/border stamp, then adjust the stitch length till it matches up. If it is going to mark, why not make it pretty....I may still do this with the blanket set that came with my 5100 machine. Not ever gonna use those, and if i need them for something later, some other user on here will have a new set they will never use too.

Is that a machine with the prickers under the foot to pre-prick stitch holes? Is that why there are different feet for different spi? Or do they have "overstitch" pressers that push the stitches down after?? Perhaps they are referring to shorter feet that have less rows of prickers/pressers to prevent the tracking problem on curves.

I do this alot too. Especially when the backside is visible. My 5100 does not have the best backside backstitch. I probably could fiddle it a little better, but the rest of the machine is running so good, why bother. Besides, doing it by hand allows me to ditch the thread. I have a couple long needles and some long forceps that i use to grab the needle deep inside things to pull it out and leave the thread hidden inside.

So basically they are saying the machine sews curves. Incidentally, that is some very nice work.

The answer is Yes, Totally can be made out of leather. PU leather is marketing garbage used to sell fake, reconstituted, "leather" that looks nice in the store and has just enough leather to qualify being called such. Real leather is way too expensive for the average person and the average companies profit margin. If you make it out of a nice proper full grain 8-10 oz+, it should last another 100 years if you treat it well. Plus it would look WAY better. There are people riding on 100 year old saddles and that leather can hold there fat rears on a bouncing, moving horse. Those saddle straps are 3-4 inches wide, your seat is 18 or more. Should be fine. I would use veg tan leather myself, however there are some beautiful chrome tans from horween (and lots in italy) that would also work. Key here is choosing a leather with very little stretch. Sometimes by adjusting the design to use smaller pieces it is possible to reduce the waste. Large areas of blemish free leather big enough for a chair usually are more money than hides that may have a mark or two to work around. For instance, if the design was adjusted to have 2 strips of leather across each the back and the seat, it would be much easier to get out of a side. My office chair is 20 inches wide(~50cm), and you can frequently get straps 70-80(~180-200cm) inches long out of a side of leather. By my math it would just fit This is one project where staying away from the belly and paying attention to leather grain direction will be crucial, as a section of belly right where one of your cheeks goes will stretch more than elsewhere leaving a pothole. For instance, if you have the leather running top to bottom with the back at the right and the belly on the left, the left will stretch more and eventually be the chair will be a little crooked. Double butts(bends) are a cut from the cow with the spine right up the middle and includes the back leather on both sides for 12-24 inches depending on the cutter, no belly. This would leave a strip at least 24 inches wide, enough to run right up the seat, just. 32 inches wide would be better. These are probably the best bet for minimal waste and even stretch, with the spine of the animal going up the middle of the seat. Second best would be horizontal bands (18-24" wide) of leather cut so the spine runs horizontally....Nice belly sections are probably fine for the armrests though. I would give you a price quote but i think the shipping would be a little high........

In this they talk about different presser feet for different spi allowing the user to do flat, raised and waved work.....What is waved work??/

In unseen spots, i have been known to do the ghetto backstitch, Where you pick up the foot, pull the material back 3-5 stitches, drop it, and sew over the end of your seam again. Not as pretty but will work in hidden areas.

thats pretty cool.

Its like an aerostitch, only its an aeroeverything. It sews with invisible thread and needles. The feet are as light as air. All some kinda super-secret wonder-woman jet plane technology stuff, made to darn her invisible parachute.....

All of a sudden, guys are buying tanning beds for their cough cough, "holster hobby"

One of the main functions of wax besides lubricating the thread is to lock the stitches after you are done. Hammering your seams after also closes the hole around the thread helping lock things down. On that note, what are you using to make the holes? if you are using an awl/chisel that is too big for the thread, it will be loose in the holes and prone to slipping. In order to get a good backstitch the holes must be small enough that you have troubles putting the needle through for the backstitch, and may need to use pliers to get it done. If it is not this tight, the stitches don't have a chance. Also, ensure you are putting adequate tension on the thread. I backstitch 3 full and then bury the threads between layers on the fourth(looks like 4 backstitches) every time without a problem, I do however do a double cast (the first half of tieing your shoes, inside the hole) on my backstitches.

When they are new, yes they are very well regarded machines, and very expensive. You would be paying 10 times those prices for a new one today. Often people on here own clones of them and dream of the real thing. Of course, the machines near you, If they are worn out they may be much worse than a new clone. It really depends on how many metric miles of thread they have run and whether the guy running it oiled it right. Depending on model and wear, those prices could be high end or a screaming deal. A nice 205-370 can get double or triple that. For an old worn well used lighter duty flatbed, price is on the high side, and i'd want the table and motor setup to be nice and right.

I used to use butchers paper to protect the bench, but it is only kinda waterproof. Parchment isn't that much more, and works way better. One problem though: I had a particular situation where i needed to overlap the parchment and attach to the table. Tape will not stick.......

I use silicone parchment paper from the baking section of the grocery store. I fold it in half and stick the glue to itself, and it tends to peel back off of one of the sides. Do it a couple of ways and the piece is clean, that is if i am feeling too cheap to just rip a strip off the roll. Handy also to lay on things or slip into seams to stop stray glue spots.

http://www.meah.com.hk/Uploads/Product/201103/201103171505130468_DY-253-00.pdf It says in here to remove a cover screw on the arm, loosen the locknut and then change the stitch length. Doesn't sound like something you want to do often...

Looks just about right then.