TinkerTailor

Here is a couple of pics of a baseball stitch i did for a commission to design a custom leather mounting solution for a titanium bicycle lock. The thing rattled and chipped paint really bad with the factory mount. This is done with 7 oz chrome tan wax stuffed leather and .06 tiger thread. I had to use the tiger cause the lock model is the TiGr...... It took alot of force to wrap leather that thick around a curve that small. I think it turned out good. I just need to refine the strap ends and hardware and she is done. My bike is dirty.......

This thread has been continued elsewhere. As gottaknow said in his thread about diagnosing the machine, The machine has had oiling issues for a very long time and looks to have had water in the oil causing problems. Northern Alberta is a sparse place, there are not to many people who do this kind of work and they are all expensive (and some are shady. The ones that were contacted could not even fix the problem, or wouldn't even touch it for less than a boatload of cash. The one who did look at it did not mention the long term lack of oil to the top end, and was probably in over his head. The user then came on here to see if a diagnosis was possible, as no locals seemed to know what was up, or were shady. Gottaknow has diagnosed, and will have the machine fixed and back to the user soon, at a reasonable price. Sometimes you have to talk about the issue to a group of people to find the RIGHT resource. Also remember than frustration can do strange things to the brain and emotions, which can show through in the tone of a post. Jumping in now with your 2 cents is a week or 3 past when the user chose a course of action and moved on to finding the solution. As for not contacting the original seller about repairs, Shipping accross the border isn't always easy. Also I think it is much easier to now go back to the seller and say wtf, than it would have been if the user just phoned and said my machine is no good....There is now a detailed diagnosis from a professional. Likely the original seller would have wanted a professional opinion before paying to ship the machine both ways anyways as users are notoriously bad at diagnosing problems with these machines. If i have a problem with a product, or suspect a crooked deal, I ALWAYS get an opinion from someone who is not financially vested in the sale. If the seller screwed you the first time, he/she may do it again. (not saying that is what happened here, i'll leave that diagnosis to Gottaknow and Venator to discuss privately.

They are attached to your face with jb weld and staples is my guess......lol These masks are great. What part of Canada you in?/

When you get to a hard spot, the tendancy is to wiggle the awl a bit and push again. I obviously cant see down in the hole, but it seems to me that when the awl is pointy, it stays in the divet when you wiggle it. The rounded end will move around a little, helping cut the fibers at the hard spot and let the awl pass. I also find i can re-aim better with a rounded tip, due to the same reason. If i re aim with a pointed tip, the needle always wants to go into the dead end hole, not the one aimed correctly out the other side.

I have my eyes open all the time, and troll thrift stores. I have a couple close by so i do a quick route while walking my dog once a week or so. Couple months ago I found a cast iron treadle scrollsaw for a dollar. Cleaned off all the caked on oil and sawdust. Now i can put it up on ant treadle table, connect a belt and go to town cutting slots or scroll work in thin wood or sheetmetal. Its very similar to this one: This week i was looking inside (what looked like)an empty tool box and found a handful of tool steel drill rods of various short lengths and diameters. 50 cents for the lot. They are hard......and hold an edge. There are hardening marked on one so it is hardenable, whatever kind of steel it is it is good for tools.

Wood gouges work for rounding corners off.The student wood carving sets have a surprising number of uses. I have a pretty good supply close by of old bicycles, and i use the tubing to make punches. I squash it in a vise to make slot punches.

The citronella in the proofide is both a solvent for the tallow and an anti microbial

I took a slot screwdriver, bent it, ground it with a dremel chainsaw sharpening stone, polished it with emery and wrapped the ugly handle. Now I have a tool I use for edge beveling, stitch line creasing and wet modelling including a pretty cool edge treatment I get when I heat the tool. I also use it as a thread cutter when sewing. It also works to score orange peels to make then easy to peal. The citris removes gunk. one wipe and its clean........

Yup. The old compliment through insult trick. you are on to me.....

It could be something stupid like one side of the spool sat with one side exposed to a window and every second foot of thread is brittle from UV exposure. Or the whole roll got dropped at some time and one end or corner has cracked fibers. It is glass.....Every time the thread gets to that corner it breaks. When you tested it you got the good part.

Cash on tools=cash gone. Cash on leather=more finished product, thus more cash..... Tools and supplies cost money. Smart buying can ensure that it costs as little as possible. Maintenence of existing tools and making/modifying tools to do the job are other ways to save some money. Due to marketing, at times certain items are re-labeled and marked up significantly because the new 'product' is for a specialized market. While industry specific suppliers are the lifeblood of every industry, and sell the things you can't get anywhere else, do your research. Here are some examples of obvious remarketing: Leather website "T" sells blue nitrile gloves in a six pack for $5.00 cad. Walmart sells 100 for $11.00 cad. "T" has the gloves marked up 650% over regular retail Beeswax is sold for $6.30/oz block at "T". At the craft store, it is $12/lb or $0.75/oz........750% markup over regular retail. Tool sharpening skills are a huge cash saver. Osbourne arch punched are awesome, allow you to see down inside, and will last forever, and generally are a good investment if you can afford it. They are not the only option however. In Canada, hollow punch sets at discount automotive parts stores are 15-30 dollars for a 12 punch set, 1/8 to 3/4. They are carbon steel, hardened but poorly machined, and dull. A set of diamond needle files is about the same price, and I managed to sharpen all of the punches in 3 episodes of the simpsons...For 40 bux and a little time, I have a set of large hole punches sharp enough to push through most garment and thin veg tan by hand, that is just pushing it and twisting. No hammer. I have also used the 3/4 to do a series of holes in 16+ ounce hot wet-formed veg tan (hard as nails...) with a 3lb maul, it will do it in 1 hit. If you take an old 1 inch spade woodworking bit, cut off the point and use a hack saw to cut slots, a stitching chisel is pretty easy to make. Fine tune it with those diamond files and hone the edge with some emery paper on a piece of glass. In this thread I would love to see a discussion about ways you have found to save a little here and there on tools and supplies. I am going to post a few updates here and there of other tips and tricks for the thrifty tinker. If you do want to post, please keep it on topic and try to refer to existing tutorials with links. This both helps to make them easy to find, as well as prevents this thread from having unnecessarily long posts reciting existing tutorials. Also, no trashing companies. Its ok to post their prices, please avoid the rants on your opinion of their pricing practices. Lets be civil. OK GO.....

Look at how your punch meets the anvil. If there is a space under the cutting edge, the punch frame is crooked. I have adjusted cheap ones by putting the anvil in a vise and slightly twisting the whole punch to get the anvil flat with the cutting surface of the punch tube. Giving the punch a quarter turn before you open it can help with cutting the stray fibers in the hole. If you use a hammered punch, it tends to go all the way through, cutting the fibers instead of squishing the last few against the anvil like rotarys are prone to. Sharp tools=success. Learning how to sharpen tools is one of the most important skills to save money. It allows you to refurbish free/cheap old tools and make crappy new tools usable.

Not a bad idea to stick to one unit of measure or the other. Working in 2 unit systems simultaneously will cause mistakes. 3/32 " is 2.38mm. Are you asking if a round 2.5mm hole is correct for 2 strands of this lace? How thick is it? The weight of the lace will also affect the hole size. make a couple short samples and try out a few things. Its way better to waste a little lace on a piece of scrap than to ruin a project you have time into.

Stitching is a little uneven.....

Look at the ingredients for Brooks Proofide, the traditional conditionioning treatment for Brooks bicycle saddles which are wet formed veg tan. Tallow is a major ingredient. They use it because it treats the leather without making it stretchier, which oil can do. That stuff is amazing. I have over 15000 kms on a brooks saddle in the vancouver rain, and it is still awesome. Proofide is the key.The ingredients are Tallow, Cod Oil, Veg oil, paraffin, beeswax, citronella.

Talk to your neighbours before they are pissed off, let them know what you are doing, and ask if there is a prefered time to do hammering. Bring beer or cookies, whichever is appropriate. I save all my hammering until 10 am, since my neighbours are at work and my days off are midweek. No complaints yet.

Will it also be the best oil if the machine is run too slow on an occasional basis, with less scheduled and thourough lube schedules than you may have? You have said yourself that the factory machines are a different ball of wax when it comes to how close to the duty cycle they are run, perhaps the conditions on the home users machine could benefit from lube with different parameters. And, holy smokes that thing throws thread......

Perhaps he has a whole bunch to use up and can't bring himself to throw it out. Or the people who made it are long gone. Where else are we supposed to ask questions about how to do what we are not supposed to be able to do with Mr. Leather and his tools and machines? .......That was a mouthful.....phew

A stitch or two in the corners of a leather washer is quick and easy and makes the washer look like a part of the design as opposed to an add-on. I also have used rectangles and punched a second hole for a rivet so it looks like the washer is also a reinforcement for the snap.

Tooling and stamping, sure, use yer rawhide..... Punching a 1+ inch arch punch through some 15oz vegtan, stamping large makers marks, etc you need some jam behind your swing. I have a special hammer for when i really need a heavy blow. Its a 3lb rock drilling hammer with a total length of 10 inches. It will drive a shader stamp right through the leather AND the marble table if you hit it enough. I also choke up on it and hold the head like a rock for finesse. I have epoxyed a layer of veg tan on one of the faces to protect tools, however i frankly do not care if the striking surfaces of a tool mushroom. I have a set of files and the ability to use them. I do not baby tools. I use them for what i need to do, how i need to do it. I maintain them frequently and if a tool breaks, I either repair it, or make a better one. I buy new tools only as a last resort.

I have seen vintage snaps that had those slots which are to receive barbs that are on the inside of the socket or stud. It appeared to be designed to give a little better hold in canvas. Saw those barbed pieces in a bin at an old saddle shop 20+ years ago. Never seen them since. Those snap caps may be a re-used design.

Yeah, I found it in the bike world as well. I meantioned in another thread that is is alot more reasonable in the gallon jugs if you use it frequently. I know a gallon is a whole lot, but its good stuff and then you wont run out. Plus you can sell refills of the little bottles to your buddies for half price and still not lose money..... In your position, i wouldn't experiment either, however alot of "industry specific" products are really just re-labeled generic product with a jacked up price. In the bike world, they sell these little tubes of spoke prep for building wheels. Its like 30 bucks for an ounce or two. Active ingredient? Linseed oil.... Lava flow bike chain oil? Straight up chainsaw chain oil. Tandy blue nitrile gloves for leatherwork - 6 for 5 bux, at the drug/hardware store 100 for 10 bux.... Most rusty bolt removers are mostly kerosene. Also, bearings are bearings. Auto engines are pretty similar inside mechanically to sewing machines, bunch of cranks and rods and cam followers, and big v8s generally run in the same rpm ranges a sewing machine. Car engines and motorcycle engines use pump, splash and rarely wicking oil systems as well. I am willing to bet that there has been waaaayyyy more money put into developing better engine lubricants than better sewing machine oils in the last century. The new synthetic lubes may be the cats ass for sewing machines, who knows? I would actually be interested to know if the automotve synthetic oils can be removed from fabric easier than dino oil with your dry cleaning methods.

Yeah, you have alot more privacy settings on dropbox. You can make youtube videos private and things, but it is a pain. Youtube is a public site that added some privacy settings and drop box is a private storage site with public access options, if that helps.

According to this page is may have been from santiago chile in 1967+. The 2 letter codes are near the bottom: http://www.sewalot.com/dating_singer_sewing_machine_by_serial_number.htm