Dwight

Those are not cracks . . . they are wrinkles . . . they are produced by the bending of the leather. Getting it fairly wet with water that first time you bend it will alleviate some of it . . . but also using a thinner leather will also make a big difference. The thinner leather will not wrinkle as bad. You may skive the area that bends . . . do that on some practice pieces . . . it may be your ticket. Also you can bend it around a dowel . . . slowly and incrementally making the dowel smaller each time . . . pulling it around by the loose end . . . rather than just bending it over the piece. BUT . . . wrinkles are part and parcel to leather and leather work. It proves your work was not done in wool, cotton, or plastic . . . May God bless, Dwight

Instead of carving it . . . do a control C of the pic . . . paste it into a MS Word page . . . and print the page. Use waxed paper and a ink jet printer . . . and if I remember the process correctly . . . you then just transfer the wet ink to the leather . . . rub it with a rag . . . till you see there is no more ink left on the wax paper . . . you are done. NOW . . . I'm going from memory . . . did it 10 or so years ago . . . check out the internet for better directions. You WILL GET a really nice image if you take your time. I did my son's face on a piece of leather . . . was really good. OR . . . if you don't want to do that . . . print it on white paper . . . use school latex glue to glue the paper to the leather . . . then use a wood burning tool to trace and add the lines to the leather by lightly burning it. Make sure the burner is turned low . . . and take your time. It also produces a beautiful image if you are patient as you do it. May God bless, Dwight

A. Make sure your two edges are exactly 90 degree cuts . . . and as near perfectly straight as you can make them. B. Contact cement the edges together C. I would (for a simple quiver) use a much simpler stitch pattern than Garypl used .. . . just a simple XXXXXXXXX stitch straight down the seam. D. To help insure it stays together . . . I'd put my shoulder strap attachments at the top and bottom of the seam . . . with a 3/4 inch or so wide strip running down the outside . . . with the ends of it becoming the anchor points for said shoulder strap. For garden variety pratice arrows . . . nothing needed . . . but for my broadhead arrows . . . each one goes into a separate plastic tube liner. May God bless, Dwight

Chris . . . the easy way to do this . . . forget about the 7/8 oz leather you would have used. Get some really good 3/4 that is closer to the 4 side. You make two sheath blanks . . . mirror cut from each other. The piece with the hair side out . . . inlay your snake . . . sew him in place . . . . then contact cement both together and from that "one piece" continue making your sheath just as you usually would. I regularly make 6 shooter holsters this way . . . and when done. . .the nice thing is they are really sturdy. AND . . . you don't have to skive anything here . . . May God bless, Dwight

Rivets are usually put in cheap stuff . . . so it won't come apart. They don't put in a welt . . . so the knife cuts the stitches . . . voila . . . it comes apart. SOooooo they put a rivet in there to keep it together . . . and your knife drags across the rivet . . . dulling it faster than skinning two democrats. Nahhhh . . . no rivets . . . put in a good welt to protect the blade . . . that is the American way. May God bless, Dwight

Looks good from here. Revolvers . . . especially in western rigs are really OK with home grown models . . . semi-autos in CCW rigs are a different story . . . but it CAN BE done. Hang onto that model . . . word gets out . . . you may be Mr. Chiappa . . . May God bless, Dwight

I use a concoction of 50 % by weight . . . pure bees wax and 50% by weight . . . neats foot oil. Not the compound . . . the real OIL. I put it in a jar . . . suspend the jar in a pan of hot water . . . it melts the beeswax . . . they get melded together . . . Rub it on the leather . . . polish . . . you'll like it. It's a 100+ yr old recipe . . . add more oil if you want it a bit softer. I've made and use both. May God bless, Dwight

I only make and use . . . two pieces of 7/8 veg tan . . . cemented together so hair side is out on both sides . . . and sewed . . . Or a folded 7/8 piece sewn at the top . . . it becomes a money belt. Don't do anything else. May God bless, Dwight

Let double down on hating to put work into something that won't be appreciated. I built a very pretty bag for a young lady once as a wedding present. Spent many hours on it . . . getting it right . . . picking the colors, the leather, the accouterments, etc. Several months after the wedding . . . I got a strange email from someone I'd never met . . . asking me about the bag. She had picked it up in a flea market. Yeah . . . it still aggravates me. If someone had done that for me . . . if nothing else . . . I'd a put it away in the attic . . . just so I could honestly tell them I still have it . . . May God bless, Dwight

This is an easy one . . . take a look at the drawing . . . it pretty much explains it all. The only difference I make . . . instead of 5 holes for adjustment . . . I give them 7 holes . . . gives room to lose more weight . . . or have another slice or two of pizza. Oh . . . and the distance from point B to the end of the belt is 9 inches for my belts. Some make it a bit longer . . . some cut it down. I think it makes a better looking belt that way . . . May God bless, Dwight

In truth . . . we do live in a very small world . . . Europeans have lots of relatives here . . . we have lots of relatives there . . . most of which do not know one another . . . I read one time that if you knew all of the friends of all your friends . . . to go out 26 generations of friends knowing friends . . . you would know everyone in the world. Sobering thought . . . But like you . . . I think it would do a lot of good if we all could see better the roots that make us who we are . . . physically, mentally, and emotionally. Racism and bigotry would take a serious nose dive if a lot of people actually knew ALL of their ancestry. The perfect example is one of the most racist bigots ever . . . Oprah . . . who claims she is super glad that two DNA tests proved there is no white people in her ancestry . . . but I've got news for her . . . she did not get that lighter skin tone by not going out in the sun. There's a white boy or two back there somewhere in her makeup . . . May God bless, Dwight

I have successfully cut wet leather . . . just make sure the edge will somehow not make any super difference. That would be if that edge were sewn over another . . . or braided . . . or sanded . . . But the best idea is to make a template . . . get your size and dimensions that way . . . it's good and good for you. May God bless, Dwight

Me too even . . . on the DNA from Ancestry.com . . . my wife's was basically England with a tad from Irelend tossed into the mix. Mine hit the Heinz 57 . . . but the funny part was I was always told German, Dutch, English, Irish, and Native American. Ancestry nixed the German and Dutch . . . added East Med (Israeli or close by) . . . French . . . Scottish . . . Nordic and way over in Eastern Europe . . . I'm planning on getting some good stories once i'm walking the streets of gold . . . find them all and get the fact line on what went down . . . But thanks again . . . on the book . . . Ebay had a paperback for 6 bucks delivered . . . it'll be one of my "lavatory library" tomes . . . May God bless, Dwight

Not sure which one . . . but if my cousin was here . . . she could probably look in one of her books and tell ua how Walter Prescott Webb is related to us. . . . and which cousin he is . . . lol. One of the great things in my "Webb" family is the two threads that seem to run rampant thru the family . . . wanting to know how something WAS done . . . or wanting to know how to DO something for the first time. This one was a past tense chaser. But, thanks . . . I'll have to check that book out . . . I'll probably like it even if it didn't have the Webb moniker on it. May God bless, Dwight

What works for one . . . may not for another . . . but if you mess with it long enough though . . . you will find the one that works for you. I mark one end of mine . . . the spot on the "other side" away from me . . . and put the heel of the punch over there. I give it a couple light taps . . . watching it go down into the leather . . . and using the aforementioned eye/hand coordination I slowly start working the punch down into the leather as I work the cutting part towards me. If there is any doubt as to how straight or crooked it is . . . lift the punch and check it out. You can move the punch a bit and get away with it most of the time. Slow medium punches work best for me . . . a firm tapping motion. BUT . . . another key to making sure it works . . . the surface under the leather cannot be a bouncy surface. On those punches . . . I am directly over a leg of my work table . . . and it goes a lot, lot, lot smoother. ALSO . . . if you have any beeswax . . . rub your punch all the way around on the beeswax . . . it makes things go so much easier. May God bless, Dwight

Looking good . . . I've had a knife kit for umpteen years that one day I need to finish up and make a sheath for it . . . thanks for the reminder . . . May God bless, Dwight

Holster is beautiful . . . Wouldn't give a dime for the Glock that goes in it . . . but that's a personal thing . . . May God bless, Dwight

You don't need the castle doctrine . . . you just need a couple acres and a back hoe. May God bless, Dwight

Ouch . . . but glad you can at least have them . . . what the heck happens when you shoot the bad guy on your property . . . doing bad things???? May God bless, Dwight

Good looking..........did you put a sweat shield behind it?? May God bless, Dwight

Aussie has it correct . . . would love to put two hands on that ol' pistol . . . not smart enough to know if it is a Schofield . . . .always wanted to try one out . . . never have had the chance yet. But if it is it's good . . . and if it's not . . . the leather is still good. Thanks for sharing, may God bless, Dwight

I assume you want to fold the edges over the white portion of the face of the Samsung case . . . or at least enough to hold it in the case. If it were me . . . I'd find a piece of PVC or similar plastic . . . slightly thinner than the tablet . . . say may 30 or 40 thousandths thinner . . . and I'd cut it a half inch short of the length of the tablet . . . and only 2/3 or 3/4 as wide. I'd then take a router and round the edges to match that of the Samsung. THEN . . . very carefully cut the leather so it lays a good 1/4 inch over the tablet . . . and cut the corners so they match up in a nice 45 deg angle at each corner. THEN . . . very carefully wet the leather (that 1/4 inch plus a tad) . . . with 135 deg water . . . working one edge at a time . . . then the top . . . the other side . . . last the bottom . . . I'd work it over with a flat plastic rod . . . until it went over and stayed over. I'd work it until I got all 4 sides done . . . then put it under a lamp with a thermometer . . . don't let it get over 140 degrees . . . but heat dry it . . . Then all you do is carefully dye and finish . . . and you will have a pretty case. Use a light dab of glue or contact cement to pull and keep the corners together . . . and then be very careful with it. You'll have a case like no other. I started to do that with my Samsung Note 8 . . . but I am Mr. Fumblefingers . . . and I bit the bullet and bought a bouncy rubber case for it so I didn't have to pop for a new glass face for it. Post pics when you get it done . . . May God bless, Dwight

You are a definite credit to the leather working industry . . . May God bless, Dwight

I have some fairly rigid white foam . . . cut a round hole in it . . . stuck it down in there. Took all of 15 seconds . . . the solution will outlast me . . . by decades . . . unless someone comes in after I'm worm food and tosses it. Or cut the bottom off a long skinny pill jar . . . screw the lid to a board . . . put the bottle down into the lid . . . drop the skiver into the bottle. . . done. May God bless, Dwight

As always . . . you do beautiful work Bruce . . . I still crack up at your tag line about squatting with spurs on . . . May God bless, Dwight