TinkerTailor

have had the same issue recently, so I just tested some newer tandy rivets and i could pull the burr off by hand easily after setting and then slide it right back on. It appears the hole stretched too much, perhaps because the copper is too soft. A new burr is still tight. I tried again, only this time i used my nippers to make a few shallow grooves in the shaft of the rivet around where the burr sets and it worked much better. I tried to make tiny notches like you find on a shingle nail. It really helped lock the burr in place until the peening was far enough along to hold it. As a rule, i tend to leave a stub as long as the rivet shaft is thick. Works for me.

That is how i do it as well, however i would like to go faster at times and have someting to push against when turning curves. A roller guide is in the way. And eyeballing a stitch while holding up a couple pound worth of brass and leather can be hard. Too much to pay attention to. A guide foot would help in places like here:

On an aside, do you know who makes/sells an edge guide foot like this for a 441? I do alot of close to the edge sewing and it would be useful. Sometimes i can't use a standard or dropdown edge guide due to shape of project or stitch position. Like yesterday....

Yeah, you need to send them in the templates already drawn in a computer graphics program that saves the info as lines such as illustrator or CAD, unlike photoshop applications which save the info as dots. CAD and alot of programs for web/print graphics are vector based, or based on lines. The lines are used as the paths the tool cuts on. ANY design is possible. Blackriverlaser has pre made templates available for leather workers which are very well regarded. Ebay store goes offline from time to time, but comes back. I have never used them, I cut all my own patterns the old way, out of frozen pizza and beer boxes. If I want to use them alot, I then glue to masonite and cut out on the scroll/table/whatever saw.

I am seriously considering painting my 5100 black. It would fit into my shop much better. I have a buddy who pinstripes.......

How are these oil pumps commonly driven? like could they be overdriven to bump the psi at low stitch rates with a pulley change or something?

The other option is to fill up the grooves in your existing foot (or a second factory foot) with jb weld, or some other epoxy putty........Only tool needed is a popsicle stick, and who doesn't like popsicles? edit: Hot glue might even work for a short time to test it. Crazy glue mixed with sawdust or something would also work as well and is removable with acetone, unlike epoxy.

I got alot out of this book: The recipes in it obviously take ph into account based on application. Get out your bucket of spermaceti, your rape oil, and that stash of caoutchouc, Its time to make some leather dressing! Did you remember the brown sugar? I give you: "The manufacture of lubricants, shoe polishes and leather dressings" https://ia600404.us.archive.org/1/items/manufacturelubr00brungoog/manufacturelubr00brungoog.pdf All page numbers i list are pdf page numbers, not the original page numbers. Page 29 of the pdf, they talk about the ph of oils and how it changes as it rancidifys due to the presence of free fatty acids forming. It also clarifys what are called neutral oils, which are oils that do not have the free fatty acids in a fresh state which change the ph, such as rapeseed(canola) oil as well as olive oil. They imply that some oils have the free fatty acids when fresh and are unsuitable for use with metal due to corrosion issuesdue to Ph. I would imagine the same thing applys to leather. They also get into drying vs non-drying oils, linseed oil, for eg, is a drying oil and is not very suitable for a lubricant and presumably a leather dressing, while it is used in recipes for leather varnish. Page 102 is a writeup on neetsfoot oil and a comment about how many sewing machine and clock oils are bleached neetsfoot repackaged in tiny bottles and marked up. pg 119 is the recipes for the fine machine oils. They also talk about freezing neetsfoot and straining out the oil that is still liquid to purify it. Also bleaching it in the sun using violet glass.....Had they discovered uv treatment? They did notice purple glass bleached it better for some reason. Page 114 is an interesting recipe for leather belt dressing to prevent slip made from ~90% castor oil and 10% tallow. Page 142 is where the good stuff starts. The stuff relating to leather. You will notice that many of the recipes for shoe polishes etc contain sulfuric acid or soda, Presumably to make them strong enough for a man but Ph balanced for a woman.........Or is that deodorant?....rabbit holes are fun.........squirrel Page 148 talks about ant-acid boot leather varnish .....acid free....The effects of ph on leather were DEFINITELY known at this time. I have from my reading determined that as a leather treatment, tallows are the best treatment for lubricating the fibers and preserving the leather for a long time, however they are hardest to apply due to being mostly solid at room temp. Tannerys hot stuff tallows and waxes to make that expensive horween stuff. Temperature and exposure time are needed for the leather to take up the fats fully. These processes are out of the reach of the average user as they require special equipment and machinery and is better done in bigger batches of hides. The tallow lubricates, and the wax protects. Both are very long lasting before breakdown, if it even happens. We as leatherworkers try to approach this on raw leather but without the prolonged heating and tumbling. Oils are the best solution to make leather treatments that are easy to apply. In order to apply the harder waxes and tallow, we often mix then with thinner oils to make easily appliable pastes and cremes. In my opinion,Neetsfoot oil has won over many as the oil of choice for a few reasons: 1: The general availability and cheapness of neetsfoot oil as well as its suitability for leather in that it is non-drying, long lasting, and has a long shelf life 2: It is easy to apply. It can be used to make waxes and tallows thinner and possible to apply at room temp 3: The US army chose it. 4: It works in most of the situations leather is used as an adequate dressing. 5: Grampa used it, and so did his grampa......so did stohlman and some other saddler guy...

Bellys stretch but also tend to squish more as well. Because the belly when used as a lining will squish and conform to the item better than the backside of stiff veg, it may help with retention as an added bonus.

Funny, i found this video this morning in my youtube feed and i thought it was the perfect video to post here, then i watched it and saw that you created it just for this thread.... Btw, I really appreciate your videos. I love all the shortcuts you have from years of experience. Alot of these techniques are going to be lost to time very soon. Particularly the pearl glue edging, and the english point round knife trick, both are great. I also like that you do not mess around. The 4 foot long strop is awesome. Why make it small when your arm stroke is close to 4 feet. Maximizing efficiency. Keep sharing and i will keep learning.. Thanx., TT

I found starrett knife edge band saw blades for 15 bux starting. Here: http://www.bandsawbladesking.com/bandsaw-blade-deals/band-knives/starrett-band-knives-razor-edge-band-knife/

Do a search on archive.org and restrict it to pre 1930 and look for tanning and leather books. There are a ton from the heyday of leather and quite a few do get into chemistry. I have seen manuals and textbooks on there from the 40s and 50s with more modern chemistry, however i found searching later stuff isnt as fruitful. All are free to download. Lots of recipes for leather treatments as well. Some with nasty ingredients though.

Thanks for the tip..

If you are going to continue working with leather there will come a time when you will regret selling these high quality, desirable, hard to find tools. I would stitch by hand until you sell a few things. Then get a machine with the proceeds. Seriously consider keeping the tools, amassing a collection like that again could costs many thousands and take months or years if you could even do it.

Hadn't seen the pic, thought you had an issue with buckle end of belt. You should wet the leather before you fold it for the buckle. Those wrinkles on the edge are from rubbing the buckle. A larger roundover on the edge and a slightly narrower belt or larger buckle could solve this. It could also be a rough surface on the buckle catching the leather. However, if the blanks are cut too close to the belly, these wrinkles sometimes show up in the belt blank. Is the leather hairier on the back in the wrinkled areas?

Are you wet forming the bent in the leather? This will help. Also, alot of belt makers skive the leather thinner in the foldover overlap section to keep the bulk down and to allow easier bending. Also make sure the leather is not too wide for the buckle, and your holes and slot are the right size for the hardware. Do some searches around this site, it may also be that you need to adjust you finishing procedure to incorporate steps to soften the leather with oils and creams. Opinions on finishing methodology are like earlobes, most of us have 2 and both are useless.

These guys have similar, as well as lots of other interesting things: http://www.hudson4supplies.com/metal-hardware/metal-defense/itw-double-bar-1-black.html

Edit: The text below is meant to be more of a general guide and less a comment on your situation. Your situation sounds like it may have additional aspects to consider regarding your machines oem setup and service provided. If you are planning on keeping this machine and using it for a long time, learning its internal subtleties is a great idea. Machines should come timed right, but sometimes shipping can cause issues. Its always faster if you can fix things yourself. My machine had an small issue when i used the hand lift but not when i used the pedal lift. A mechanically inept person would have been totally perplexed by it. Even in photos and over the phone, it was difficult to covey to the place i got it from. I figured it out with a single washer as a spacer. Could have cost them alot to get the issue taken care of if the machine needed a house call from a local mechanic or if it needed to be shipped back across the continent.....Both of which would probably take a week or more to resolve..... Instead because I can sew as well as fix things, I was sewing in 2 hours, and it cost everybody 25 cents for a washer. Sometimes I wonder if industrial sewing places are standoffish because of 2 reasons, First is that they charge for service and training. Yes you bought the machine, but every man hour that goes in takes away from the bottom line. Second, which relates to the first: Most all places that buy these machines have sewers that just jam material under feet all day long and a mechanic who sets up the machine. They also buy more than 1 at a time. The mechanic should know how to set it up and generally would not need instruction. Service/training costs get spread over all the machines the factory bought, not just one. As a home user, you should be both mechanic and sewer, or know someone who is, and works for apple pie..... Supporting the mechanical blunders and learning curve of every home user can get really costly really fast, as opposed to supporting a professional mechanic with training that bought 6 machines. This is the difference between retail and wholesale in most markets. Everything is cheaper wholesale, but you don't get to ask questions, just send in the list of part numbers and we will get it to you. Industrial sewing machines are only purchased wholesale really as there is an almost non-existant retail market.. The leather machine guys are playing in this game and marking up their accessories to cover the service they provide to the retail user in the wholesale market essentially. Some of these companies are small. If you take up their time with an issue due to your mistakes or inexperience, and they help you, finish the phone call with an order for a spool of thread or a couple of packs of needles or something. The token sale says alot and helps them give you the service. Plus you need needles and thread anyways. Never forget that the right hand washes the left. Pretty hard to wash your hand if you only have 1.

The bobbin and hook are gone on former prison machines????? I wonder how many prison weapons those made.

Should I mix the rubber dust and the barge in the blender? Will it change the taste of my smoothies?.....

The effect you are looking for is called jacked leather. There were also special boot jack polishes used to maintain this effect. I believe jack boots were flesh side out as well. Somewhere in the past i read all about this stuff, but it is gone now...

I can help though not in person. I have made a bag very similar to that, and am in the process of photo documenting the process on a second. What issues are you having?

When i was thinking about this, i contemplated veneering something like this ply myself, I do have connections in the canoe and kayak building world for materials. Perhaps i should just get some scraps and cut-offs and lay up an ultralight kevlar/carbon/ flattop for myself.... Machine weighs 200 lbs,.... flat top, 200g........It would be an excuse to build the vacuum press i have had in the back of my head. Oh my, how projects breed projects.........such is life.

Does it have that phenolic smell when you machine it? Never seen that stuff, like to find a bit locally to check it out.

It seems after some use all of my harness needles develop a curve from me flexing them away on gussets to prevent just this....Also caused by how i grip it for push/pull strength. I am sure CS osbourne makes curved needles, just call one of their resellers and ask. A couple advertise on this site. I have never bought them so i don't know who has what , though my local guy has them. No mail order though.