battlemunky

Yep. https://www.dotfasteners.com/shop-by-brand/lift-the-dot/

I hang them on a hook as well. I've been air brushing more and more lately though, it is a whole lot more consistent.

@fredk beat me to it. You could maybe soften it some by a light oiling as suggested and then working it in your hands, essentially milling it, to soften it some. I think your hands will wear out on 5mm leather before it reaches chrome soft though.

That piece on the inside loop looks like chrome and by its nature will be softer. Its all in the tannage differences. I guess its time now to ask why you need it soft? If you're looking to make a vest or garment with thick vegtan, you're gonna have a hard time with it being wearable without having a bunch of smaller pieces like scaled armor or something. If you're looking to make a sheath or holster type item, you want it stiffer.

I'd go to a one-stop shop like Weaver and load up your cart and print that off for your bill of materials. Weaver has good tools, not top tier in all cases but good, reliable stuff. By the time you wear that out it'll be time for replacing it with the top tier items onesy-twosy as needed. I'd do one cart with tools and one for supplies. If I found myself in your position, this is what I'd do.

Nice looking collar on a pretty pooch!

Beautiful work sir!

I use the blue painters tape. It sticks pretty good and you have to slick the flesh side down with some gum trag/glycerine saddle soap bar/slicking agent of your choosing when you remove it, depending on the leather.

I use the .8 mm and 1.0 mm as well.

I have a ton of the "hand sewing thread" from Amazon and it works really well but I've been converting over to Ritza Tiger thread. Its just better thread IMO. There are quite a few options though and several depend on individual taste.

Good to know. I keep my stuff on a roll generally but now I'll definitely not roll any on some flat card stuff. Its few and far between that I get knots/tangles/pierced thread anymore but its always a pain in the butt when you have to stop and untangle or unhook your thread from something while sewing.

Welcome @Woodshed! I'm from right up the road in Huntsvegas. There are so many good pieces of info and instruction on here you could probably stay busy applying what you learn here for a thousand years or so too.

Another excellent example of how to be excellent!

Looks like a regular ol' sheath until there's a snake hiding inside! That's pretty cool man. You did pretty good matching it all up, the geometric stamping plays well with the snake skin and the scales on the knife.

Pretty cool and ultra-utilitarian. That'll last forever.

Beautiful work!

Another fine piece of work!

Lovely work Ryan! What are your bargrounders?

Even the bargrounding isn't all that bad. I was curious about where a 4" belt is used myself.

Looks good!

Looks really nice. Several of y'all are killing it with the Eco-Flo waterstain...making me rethink my position on the stuff. I have a little, I may try running it through my airbrush and see if I have as much luck getting as nice of a finish as you have.

Beautiful!

Thanks @IdahoB!

*slow whistle* That is some ridiculously nice work @Danne. Thanks for taking us along. If you get around to it one day, please show us how to skive like that.

How would you use it? Pick it up and drop it down each time? I'm trying to think of how it'd work for beveling. I could see it for a one hit stamp perhaps but I've gotten good with just repetition on those. Springload it like a center punch. (R) <---my turn :-P