fredk

Legs are known as 'Barley Twist' - popular in mid to late three-quarters of 19th century Europe although the style goes back to the mid 17th century or so. It looks like a Spanish made, or American-Spanish item for the Spanish in the South West of USA. The scroll work is reminiscent of the Spanish Moors school of art. I'd date this to about 1890 - 1910, Spanish American Any good wood worker will be able to turn you up a replacement spreader bar. You have to decide if you want the colour and finish is to be an exact match or slightly off so its only noticeable on close inspection

Get a piece of right-angled aluminium or steel, i.e. this shape: L, get a piece about 25mm on each arm of the L and about 600mm long. Use this as your straight edge; placing it with the open V on the leather [like this : A]. You now have a raised part to grip and push down with. Use a rotary blade cutter like Floyd suggests. With thin leather I do not start the cut at the edge, I start it in some, maybe a few cms, then I do that uncut bit after the rest.

Very hard to say what it is/was without either a photo or more description. My first thoughts are; your piece was the bottom one on a rack, the rack had an open wire frame work so air could circulate, the weight of the other leather on top of yours made the wire rack leave impressions in the rear side of yours. Could have happened at the tannery or main Tandy warehouse or even at their store

Never heard of this but stand it in a bowl of hot water, or micro-wave it [top off] for a short time to get it really very warm and it should mix together again with shaking

Aye, but in my groups we all used traditional hand made arrows; all using grey and white goose feathers. If I marked my arrows blue and shot in comp against someone from another group who also used blue it was easy for me to take the blue sticky plaster off and replace it with red, or green or...

A; I never loan out or share tools, B. to mark my arrows during a competition I used to wrap a bit of coloured band-aid [aka sticking plaster in the UK] round part of the shaft. Band-aid can be bought in a few colours, will take colour from a sharpie and if you wrap it around the stamp stem it will act as a grip as well. Whatever colour you choose use the same on 3D stamps in paint, put it into the bottom of the central hole maybe

Have you considered France? France and Vietnam once had and now have again a good friendly relationship. France sometimes welcomes people from the countries where they once administered government

Lift-a-dot; used on the tonneau hoods on classic and vintage cars. Easily come by. Good quality brass ones can be expensive, common steel ones are cheap enough

Thats looking just grand

Could you not do the job yourself with a planer-thicknesser? They only cost a couple hundred $$ or less. At $100 each board, after you've planed the second or third you're winning

most excellent

Sounds like its too dry & hard. Try feeding it with neets foot oil. A little bit at a time and see if that softens it

Dunno how this would work for your problem; to stop someone tapping a card, eg a thief, through a wallet I sandwich an aluminium tape between the outer and the liner. Perhaps if you had a leather/alu/leather sandwich divider between the cards?

Good pictures charon. Better than trying to describe them. Thanks

Know anybody wot can weld? Weld a 3/8 bolt to a piece of 3mm or 6mm steel plate. I bought a bit of 3mm steel plate recently for my press, cost me all of £1.60 [about $2] Buy a piece of 6mm to 12mm thick acetal. Use two-part epoxy glue to stick it to another piece of steel plate. Acetal, about $5, steel plate, another $2. At most about $15 for it all

You need sail eyelets which have a 'washer' for one side. You need to have the matching setting tools for them. Two tools; a bar which widens and flattens part of the eyelet over the washer and an anvil with a centre hole and a circular groove; the groove prevents the eyelet from deforming and the hole allows the setting bar to do its job. The commonly bought eyelets are just basic types which are crimped using a special pair of pliers; these types are basically rubbish and useless

I just took a bit of 2 x 2 inch timber and drilled holes into one side through to the other. Different sizes for the different tools, but the smallest hole will still take most of the other tools as well. It wasn't wall mounted as such but mounted on a board that got shifted about out of the way, but close to hand when needed. For mounting to the board I just put screws thru the board into the 2x2. I suppose a couple of small steel right-angle bracket could mount it to a wall. I'm redoing my working place and I'll be using of those magnetic bar tool holders now I reckon

Centre punch. Standard drill with HSS drill. Use a very slow speed and a cooling/cutting fliud. There are special fliuds but in the past I've used 3-in-1 oil, brake fluid and engine oil - both new and very used. You can drill once to size or start small and work up the size in a few size steps. Best to use a drill stand for accuracy, but if you're very careful it can be done without

This is a good idea On straight runs I put lolly [aka popsicle (?)] sticks between the jaws and the leather. This also helps to spread the loading further than the jaws themselves. On short runs or curves I just break the sticks to suit

The only short cut to cutting these out without grief is to get a clicker cutter made for cutting them out. But I reckon you'd need to be doing a lot to make it worth while. I reckon you might be just a bit too self critical. Unless two shields are mounted directly next to each other no-one will notice any small differences, and unless they are cut really askew no one will notice any little lopsidedness. I used to make toy shields for children. I made hundreds at a time. I stacked 10 boards together, drew the shield shape on the top one - using a template - then cut the stack on a bandsaw. I used to spend ages evening up to two curves. Then I had a eureka moment. I stopped doing that. The curves were still a bit lopsided to my eyes, but no-one gave a damn, not the children, not the parents.

A. the only way you can achieve this on a fold-over sheath is to have the belt loop as a separate piece. 1. Sew the belt loop near the top of yellow, on the back, with the good sides together with the loop part extending up from the top, 2. then fold it downwards and 3. sew it to the back of yellow further down. Allow about 2 inches between the inside of the curve of the fold and where its sewn further down B. On a two piece sheath you could have the flesh side of the leather on the outside of yellow, and just fold down the extended top of yellow and sew it to the back of yellow I think sewing is better in this case

I found that it was a personal preference to how high the knife was on the belt. I made the knife sheaths in my medieval group. All of the knives were longer than 15 inches and some were 18 to 20 inches long. Some chaps wanted the knife with the top of the hilt level to the top edge of the belt, some others preferred to have their knives lower down. Only one person wanted his with the top of the hilt a couple of inches above the top of the belt; but his fighting style was such that he could cross-draw that blade very swiftly

bikermutt has it; but I fold the card first, then cut the the 1/2 shield shape. When the card is flattened the two curves are the same. I just cut them out with shears as & when I need them

An idea/thought on peening rivets; long forgotten, just remembered. Last used a long time ago when I worked more with wood. Place a disc of thick card board around the rivet head, allow the head and washer room. Use thick compressed card, like the stuff on card envelopes, the ones that say 'do not bend'. When you start tapping with the hammer and you miss, you ding the card and not your wood or leather surface

The 'shadow' or 'ghost' is caused by the tool bouncing. Its all in how you hold the tool. Grip it fairly tight and hold it tight against the leather, pushing it down slightly. A loose grip or not holding it really tight against the leather allows it to bounce, and your reaction is to then increase your grip and push it against the leather, making the ghost