fredk

Actually thats easy to do. We were given a large canvas bag and that was it. The bag had been designed in the 1890s, and was still made by guests of Her Majesty in the 1970s. We filled it and then emptied it. Never any interest in its design

yeah, right, and spiders, roos, frogs, crocs. . . . The most dangerous thing here (other than terrorists) is the wasp Mind you, I could have done with anti-wasp anklet gaiters when I was a postie. The wasps like to sting ankles

afair a kilt doesn't need a hem cos its the width of the loom so both edges have a selvage - a self-edge

Excellent. Thank you. I've just started to wet mould a mask. I'm using a polystyrene head to shape it on. I'll be using elastic to hold in on me

That looks grand I'd like to see more photos. Maybe some of it on a face? a polystyrene head maybe?

Aye, and a little known fact is that tens of thousands, from the Highland Clearance mainly, went as slaves. My town was a major port then and the slave ships called in for provisions before heading to the Atlantic. But this be a deviation. I'm just keeping up with following this thread and the construction of this sporran edit to add, btw do you know there are various superstitions related to bags, purses and sporrans? mmmm, thought not. With sporrans you are supposed to give it to the new owner and indeed keep it yourself with a small leather drawstring bag containing a handful of dried oats. This is to ensure you or the other person will never go hungry. Superstition is that if you don't have or give that wee bag you'll starve to death within 6 months

Search out 'Irish Arms' ~~ I don't have any contact details for them. Its been many years since I dealt with them. Last I knew they were based on Co. Louth, but may have moved from there They've made leather items as well as swords, soft clothing and more for many of the top films. Owner is (was? RIP?) Boyd Rankin, a top guy in the way of making things, especially pedantic about it being historically accurate

Most definitely YES, it can be to some people

Try searching for 'airbrush spray booth' for plastic modellers. They are small, sometimes portable. One of these would do your job example; https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Hobby-Airbrush-Spray-Booth-Kit-Craft-Spray-Booth-Extractor-Filter-100-240V/193475341465?hash=item2d0c076c99:g:DN0AAOSwARpdOBpc

Use MDF. Laminate it to the thickness you want if its not available. Sand the cut edges smooth. Coat all with two thinned coats of waterproof PVA glue, then three coats of a gloss varnish, sanding smooth between coats.

yes, but for small items an arbor press will do the job. I use my Tandy press and metal dies to punch out the bases for game playing pieces from thin suede pig skin neither would I

About 6 years ago we had a very heavy snowfall. About 5ft in rural areas, 3 ft in cities. Local airport spent £150,000 on a snow plough/blower for the runways. By the time they got it the snow was gone. The airport has not needed it since. This past winter we had 1 inch of snow for all of 36 hours. That picture of a 'traffic jam'; if that was here, the double line would be white and all those drivers would get a fine for crossing them Here is my letter aligning frame; I posted up about this some time ago, here https://leatherworker.net/forum/topic/88027-some-ideas-for-your-letter-stamping/?tab=comments#comment-601367 Here, there was a man who did that. No longer. Don't know what happened to him. But through him a lot of less-well off people could buy bikes for themselves and children. Now you can't touch a basic bike for less than £300

a. Those come in a variety, with different messages b. I saw a live one in Belfast, about New Year time afair. By the feel of the lettering and the smell it certainly felt and smelt like it was burnt in using a laser

Try Le Prevo in Newcastle. England. Their tool prices are very easy on the wallet and I think the tools are made by Ivan. Scroll down to 'Embossing Stamps' http://www.leprevo.co.uk/carving-tools.htm I got about 90% of my stamping tools from Le Prevo.

ach, just a glitch of a deviation. Another deviation. A while back I was reading on shipping out of Ulster. From the late 1600s to pre-WW1 just one port in Ulster was sending between 7 and 10 ships a day, 6 days of the week, each with around 100 tons of leather hides. At the time Ireland was forbidden to export live animals to Britain, so they sent dead ones in bits. Ulster still exports a vast amount of beef to Britain. But I've not found a tannery in Ulster at all. Every time I go asking about buying hides I get directed to 'leather' furniture shops. Nor can I find out what happens to all the hides. A friend who was once a butcher asked an abattoir for me. He got a non-answer that the 'skins' were mulched and went to a dog food factory and the bones were crushed and went to a plant (garden type) food factory. From once having a very big leather industry Ulster - Northern Ireland, appears to have zilch now. How does this meet the o/p remark/question? If there is no local leather industry its hard to get any new people interested in leather at any stage of its life (well, other than beeves on the hoof)

On the handles of the tools there should be a number. List that number here and if you can, a photo of the working end of each tool. When we know what you have we can advise better on what else you may need. But be aware; getting these tools is habit forming. I started with a 7 tool starter set and I've now got over 130 of these tools!

I do not know the Tandy Carnauba cream. I have some made by Le Prevo. I do not know what else is in it The cream might work alright. I started making my mix before I ever bought the carnauba cream. Without knowing what else is in it I would not use it. oh, more that that, start with about 1/2 to 2/3 the amount of wax, by volume edit. you can probably get yellow bees wax in a local hardware store. If you can find some local bee keepers, and I know there are a great many in Croatia, ask them for the white 'cappings' wax. You'll pay a little more for it but its the purest, cleanest wax out of a hive.

As good as a commercial option might be, they can be expensive for a small tin and they have other additives which I do not want. I have two grades of beeswax/carnauba/nfo mix which I use all the time. A soft grade, like soft butter for applying after dyeing which feeds nfo into the leather to replace oils lost and a hard grade, which I use for edge burnishing and end finish polishing. After dyeing the leather should be given a feed of nfo. Getting the amount just right is a problem, too much can ruin a project. But with my soft mix I can get just about the correct amount of nfo into the leather. A precise recipe? ha, ha, I make it by - umm, 'I think that will do' or 'that is about right' Metal bowl. Heat some beeswax in the bowl until the wax is totally melted, add about a spoon full or two of white carnauba wax flakes, then add nfo. Stir well. Let the mix cool and see how soft or hard it is. Too soft - remelt and add more beeswax. Too Hard - remelt and add more nfo. If you use about 100g of besswax add about 5 or 10ml (a teaspoon or two) of Carnauba wax flakes, use white flakes and not the brown. Then just add nfo until you get the mix as you want it. This 100g/10ml/? mix will last you a lot of projects.

Get bees wax. The best is from a local to you bee keeper. Melt some bees wax with some carnauba wac and add in neetsfoot oil to make a paste. You can use this mix to feed your leather and as a finish polish.

I chose these two as you can just make out the reflection of the semi-shiney surface. The Klear/etc makes the small valet tray water resistant enough for it to work as a drinks coaster

A thought. Punch one oval hole in thick leather. Glue two narrow strips onto that piece, one either side of that one hole and carefully aligned with it and the width apart of the belt strap. Place this 'template' over the belt strap and punch through the hole in it, move it along for each hole, or just press the punch into the belt strap to mark it, and then punch all the holes after the template is removed

I originally did as you did, then my paid-up host blocked putting photos anywhere and demanded an increased fee. But before that I had already started to put photos on here as requested by Northmount / aka Tom I use a simple photo processing programme. I edit my original photo slightly and save it to a file on my computer dedicated to 'Share' on leatherworker.net. I take that original photo and down size it to between about 300 to 450 pixels across in the photo programme, save it in that 'Share' file and from there post it on here using the 'Drag files here to attach or choose files . . . ' at the bottom of the reply box

Another tale from me. For many years I made and repaired leather items for the members of my historical presentation group. Amongst the items frequently needing repairs were their shoes and boots. I reckon I did a pretty good job on those even though 'I don't do shoes!' One time I came across an elderly cobbler in a town near me. In short, we arranged that he would teach me some rudiments of cobbling. We set a date for when to start. Come start date the shop was closed up. I was told the cobbler had died about a week previous. Try as I could I could not find the cobbler's family as I wanted to purchase as much of the old equipment from the shop as I could afford. This shop went back to the 1860s or so and had all sorts of very old, but still working, sewing machines etc as well as loads of hand tools as the cobbler repaired horse tack as well. Over the next couple of months I kept an eye on the shop for signs of life. Then one day there was a builders skip outside it. It had building rubble. I asked one of the builders about the shop contents. They had smashed everything up with sledge hammers and sent it to landfill. I left them with the idea that the contents of that shop, which they had destroyed, was worth about £10,000 ( a conservative estimate, I had counted 12 large sewing machines and other machines, most from the 1880s to 1930s) There's more When I was in a plastic model shop some months later I mentioned this to the owner. She told me there was an old cobbler's shop just across the street, which was all blocked up. She gave me some contact details. I went to the contact who was an agent for the owners. He got me a list of what was still in the shop. Again sewing machines and tools by the score. Mostly from the 1910s to 1930s. I offered to buy the lot. I offered a low price as the machines had been sitting rusting for 20 years, unlike the other shop where they had still been in daily use. Word came back, the owners didn't want to sell to me. That was OK. What happened next wasn't OK. A few months later the owners decided to 'redevelop' the shop and the all the old shop contents were either sent to land fill or sold to a metal reclaiming company for a pittance.This I found out, eg, a 1910s treadle Singer they got for 25p, being the scrap metal price. This I'm not 100% sure of as these tales are passed on to me. We have, as you readers no doubt have, those shoe repair places in shopping malls, the 'Heel Bars'. These are operated as paid-up franchises, ie the shop person buys their equipment. I've been told, from time to time, that this one or that one has closed. What about the equipment I ask. Enquiries I've been bothered to make of the mall has informed me that if the Heel Bar unit closed with the equipment still in it either the mall or the new unit renter has dumped the nearly new sewing machines. These machines could have been given to schools or colleges or voluntary groups. I do know that a certain place called a 'Mens Shed' got 3 leather sewing machines, source unknown but they look like 'Heel Bar' ones. They asked me to come along to teach some of the men of the 'Shed' how to use them, but 'Shed' rules disallowed that plus, I had to admit to them, I don't how to use them myself. So there they sit.

But not everything is back in it, eg the Al Stohlman books on making cases, 3 volumes, appear to be missing. Least wise I can't find them

Not really. It can depend on how good the glue joint is. I've separated well stuck leather pieces by finding a spot not perfectly stuck and using a fresh scalpel blade, starting at that point carefully slicing at the joint whilst peeling away one piece of the leather. I had to go with the flow, peeling back side A a bit, then maybe side B, turning the item round, sometimes just using the the point of the scalpel blade. It took absolutely ages but I eventually won over it