Martyn

I cant help with your other questions as I'm a novice and have no experience, but I've just bought my first BK basket stamp and can give you a size reference... It's a number 2 Celtic basket stamp, according to my verniers it's 12mm x 5mm... Leatherman Charge for scale... Please forgive my poor stamping, but here's a closeup of the impressions...

Absolutely stunning! When you are at the top of your game like that, it must be very difficult to give it up. Can I ask, how many hours in these guns and how do you figure out a price for something like that? Do you charge by the inch or for the project as a whole?

Just looked at Equus, their basic 'West End' belts are £75BP and their Damascus belts look the same except for the buckle and are £240BP. Looks like you are buying a £75 belt with a £165 ($235 US) buckle on it. Equus probably aren't paying that much for them, but there wont be much of a mark-up in the buckles for them. You probably have to buy 20 buckles to get em for $100 each or something. Probably the cheapest way to do it, is to buy an annealed blank billet of stainless Damascus and make your own buckle. You could do it with some files, a blow torch and a Dremel.

Honestly, I think you'll be lucky to find anything under $200/buckle outside of India.

There's probably quite a few who could do it, but I'd be sitting down when you get the quote, it's likely to be into the $100's per buckle. Something to consider is that the majority of Damascus is carbon steel - it'll rust. You can get stainless Damascus, but welding stainless steel is tricky and those who can do it, will charge more for it. You might get something more affordable by looking at Damascus made in India. It tends to be a mixture of carbon steel and mild steel and is generally much cheaper than Damascus made in the west.

Hi Floyd, it's a number 2. I still cant get over how crisp it is.

I agree with most of what you say Charlie, but this is not student saddlers dot net. Unless I'm mistaken, it's a forum for all, from someone who just wants to make a bit of something for their own use, to professionals and everything in between. To suggest that someone who just wants to know a good way of sticking 2 bits of leather together, needs to spend hundreds of hours learning to freehand with an awl, is just absurd. On the subject of rudeness, I wasn't referring to you, but I would add that being rude isn't a right or a privilege, no matter who you are or what you've accomplished.

Charlie, I would expect nothing less. I've never suggested that saddlers should adopt chisels as the new gold standard. I agree, they are not good enough for that. However, there are very many professional leatherworkers who do not hand sew, or if they do hand sew, they use all sorts of interesting techniques for punching, like putting an awl blade in a drill press - or even using a drill. While a chisel might not be the gold standard, they produce a superior hole and product to a sewing machine and just about everything else. Are they as good as a hand awl? No. But they are better than everything else. If you can live with those horrible sewing machines being part of the industry, then you should be able to live with chisels. To chastise someone for suggesting the appropriate use of a good tool just because the tunnel vision of their professional pedantry doesn't like the idea of them, is not only wrong, it's rude.

Your assumption is that everyone here is going to put 20 years into a trade. I would suggest that most, are like me, either part timers or hobby leatherworker. I dont sell anything, I make things for my own use and my own pleasure. Although I've been playing at it for several years, sometimes I go six months or even a year without touching a piece of leather. Realistically, I doubt I will ever posses the skill you suggest with a freehand awl. For me and many like me, a stitching chisel is a superb alternative. I can produce work that is a far higher standard. The above is a test piece and I wasn't trying to show off my skills, I was trying to show off the holes. Your criticism of my alignment skills was neither asked for, warranted, nor relevant. See my stitching on the previous page - with respect, it's straighter than yours! I doubt I'll ever be able to produce stitching that straight with an awl and there are many like me. Chisels have a place, You may not like the idea of them, but your way isn't the only way. Something I suggest you consider before you next reprimand someone, your next victim may not be so gracious.

Thanks for the detailed response. I want to respond to a few points, but cant work out how to split quotes on this sdoftware, so I'm going to borrow your trick of highlighting your comments in red. OK. So lets try some circumstantial evidence. I would agree with the circumstantial part, but whether it constitutes evidence is debatable I think. I'm going to try and respond to some of your points with actual evidence, that I hope you will take under consideration. Particularly post the Industrial Revolution, I do not believe that the use of a Stitching Chisel would not have been tried. It is after all a very small step from giving a pricking iron a gentle tap with a rawhide mallet to whacking it through the hide with a hammer! I would suggest that it was tried for reasons of economy (time costs money in a competitive industry), and found to be lacking with long term use, and subsequently lost customers. Pricking irons are not stitching chisels. Lacing chisels have been around for a while, but stitching chisels are fairly recent. I doubt your master would have ever seen or heard of them, certainly not the industrial revolution. I agree that whacking a pricking iron produces unacceptable results - I think this is what you thought I was advising initially - but I agree, not good as you'll see below. I really do think that your lack of hands on experience with stitching chisels is colouring your opinion, because what I read in your assumptions of them, is a million miles from my experience and I'll try and show that below too. I suggest that there is little difference between the effect of a machine needle and a stitching chisel? I disagree. There are two issues here, firstly a chisel does not produce a lock stitch like a machine. This is a major part of your criticism of machine stitch failure. Chisels make holes for saddle stitching, exactly the same stitch you make when using an awl. Using a chisel doesn't turn a saddle (double running) stitch into a lock stitch. There is no debate on this point. The next issue was one of the nuances of tensioning by hand, versus by machine. Even if you could empirically prove that hand tensioning provides stronger stitching than machine stitching, you'd still be a million miles away from showing that holes made by a chisel over an awl, affect the tensioning of a hand stitch in any meaningful way. it is another cost cutter and the actions of the machine needle have a similar result on the leather ie it punches a hole as opposed the the awls slicing action. Again, you are drawing a similarity between the hole made by a chisel and a machine that doesn't exist and refusing to accept the similarities which are many. I think if you actually had hands on time with a chisel, you may not change a lifelong held opinion, but the strength of it might be moderated a little. I did a little experiment just to illustrate the point. Close up pictures of the holes made by iron and awl, versus chisel and I think they are quite illustrative. In the left corner, we have a George Barnsley #5 pricking iron, it's been around the block but it's still serviceable. next to it, a CS Osborne awl haft loaded with an Osborne #43 awl blade. Now the blade is brand new, it's not as sharp as I'd like and that does cause issues. I've just given it a quick strop, but it does need a proper work over on a stone. That does affect the results, no question. In the right corner, is a Seiwa Japanese 5mm/5SPI stitching chisel. It's relatively new and comes sharp out of the box. The victim is 2 layers of 7/8 oz veg tan, glued flesh to flesh. The top row of holes have been made with the iron & awl, the bottom row with the chisel... Front... Back... As you can see, the holes made by the iron & awl are pretty bad. I promise you, I havent butchered it just for effect, it's a combination of my poor awl skill, an awl that is less than ideally sharp, stabbing through 16 oz of veg and inherent difficulty with using a hand awl. But rather than looking at the poor holes made by the awl, look at the very clean and absolutely awesome holes made by the chisel! :D It's hardly butchered is it? They are slits, just like an awl, they close up, just like an awl (you'll have to take my word for that until such a time that you get to try one yourself) and look at the exit wounds? The chisel does less damage to the leather because you are punching through into a surface, rather than into thin air as you do with an awl. Chisels are precision tools. They are designed to be used like this, they are profiled to mimick an awl and are made from heat treated and hardened too steel, as appropriate for a tool designed to be driven though something and into a hard surface. You dont have to bludgeon them through the leather, a couple of light taps with a 13 oz maul will suffice. Now I'm not suggesting the chisel is superior (though at my skill level, it clearly is), what I am saying is they are nothing like the abhorrent nightmare that the strength of your opinion would suggest. Here is a picture of what happens when you try and drive an iron through by whacking it - this is what I think you thought I was advocating on the previous page... Now that IS butchered. There is no 'back' picture, because the prongs of the iron were not long enough to go all the way through. This is bad, no argument from me. This is what they would have objected to in the industrial revolution, this is what your master would have objected to and therefore by proxy, this is what you are objecting to. But this is NOT a chisel and it's NOT what a chisel does. That is evidence. I rest my case.

Do you have some pictures of your crew punchers? I'd like to compare. "And I'm uncertain about the plough. It might as well be George Barnsley or H Brindley. Or again some other company that had the tool making capabilities." I think certainty is impossible with an unbranded tool, just balance of probabilities. If it's one of thiose others, they would have to be making 'exact' replicas of the Dixon tool. Did they do that? Wouldn't they make to their own patterns rather than make 'fake' Dixons? Here's another view of the plough for you to compare - it's a 5" BTW. This is from the Dixons catalogue... If my plough isn't a Dixons, it's a perfectly exact replica isn't it?

" My point is merely that people shouldn't assume that they're buying Dixon if they're buying that punch." Oh I completely agree with that. If brand names are important to you, then dont buy an unbranded tool. But it is a forged steel tool, it is in excellent condition and the only branded tool I can find which looks like it - and it does look exactly like it - is a Dixons. I'm not sure why you dont think it's a Dixons when it looks exactly like the Dixons branded tools I've linked to? But it is all speculative at the end of the day. people should do their own research and satisfy themselves. Do you also think my plough gauge is not a Dixons?

" I'm saying, that your crew punch might be Dixon and it might as well be from some other company. Just like your plough might as well be from Brindley or Barnsley. " I totally agree. I think they are Dixon's though, dont you? " And if I'm looking at my own Dixon crew punches they look nothing like that crew punch. They're much more curved, refined, and rounded off, but they could be of an older date than said crew punch. " I know they did change the style and the more modern ones are different. It might be that older ones are different too. But the only crew punches I could find like mine - with the groove at the throat and bevelled corners on the handle - are Dixons. There are quite a few examples of crew punches (like the ones I posted) which are branded Dixons and look exactly like mine. If you can find a vintage forged English crew punch that looks like mine that is not made by Dixon, I'd love to see it? At the end of the day, who made it isn't really important other than an indicator of quality. But I am pretty certain they are Dixon. Aside from the obvious - that they are unbranded - I'm not really sure what point you are making?

I'm not sure I follow you. You dont think the crew punch is a Dixon's? The only manufacturer that I could find that made crew punches that look anything like mine, is Dixons. They are quite distinctive, look here.. http://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/saddlery-leatherworking-tool-dixon-475564412 http://www.oldtools.co.uk/leatherworking/155--5-crew-punches.html Can I ask, with your non-Dixons tools that are marked with a broad arrow, are they also marked with the letters SFT?

I'd trust my kids on a swing stitched using pricking irons to make the holes, without a second thought. I'm utterly unconvinced that it makes a blind bit of difference. While I'm not that great at traditional awl method, I can do it and as others have said, I can not discern any difference whatsoever. The stitching chisels shown are made from heat treated and hardened tool steel (unlike traditional irons) and are designed and made to be used exactly as described. I'm not convinced even under mission critical applications, that it makes a jot of difference. For example, many western saddles and tack are made up on a machine with a lock stitch. The lock stitch is mechanically a weaker stitch than a saddle stitch, but you don't hear of cowboys having issues with their saddles falling off because of it. Sorry to those who disagree, no offence intended, but I think the suggestion that chisels somehow weaken the stitch, is absolute nonsense. Anecdotal opinion isn't enough, I'm afraid I'd need some evidence to convince me otherwise.

One question, if you've never used one, how do you know? Is the difference you suggest real or imagined? If it's real, how significant is it? OK, that's more than one question. I don't know how you can adopt such a strong position on this, having never used them though? Dont you think that's a fair point?

He intimated the answer in his debate with me. When you make a hole with an awl, the leather closes back up fairly quickly. When you make the holes one at a time, the suggestion is that you can adjust the tension as you are going along in response to this, in order to keep the stitching tight. The old saddlers were taught not to use an iron to pre-punch holes. But a traditional iron like this one... makes flat marks on the leather and has tapered prongs. If you hammer this type of iron through the leather, the holes get bigger the deeper you go. It probably will give you tensioning issues. However with chisels like these... ...the prongs are manufactured to replicate the cross-section of a diamond awl. They are much slimmer, longer and have straight sides. The holes dont get bigger as you go through and they close up just like they do with an awl. In fact when you pre-make the holes, you often have to pass a needle (or an awl) through the pre-made holes to open them up enough to sew. These kinds of chisels though, are alien to the methods of a traditional saddler and some balk just at the idea of them. But then they balk at the idea of sewing machines too. ...and just to send the traditional saddlers totally apoplectic, some people even use a drill to make their holes and are happy with the results. I dont like that method, because it removes leather and definitely stops the holes closing and it makes round holes, which has a tendancy to make your stitches lay flat instead of zig-zag. But each to their own. It's all a question of perspective. Your view of the world is coloured by the lens of your experience.

Works for me.

Whether or not you see something as a bad habit, depends on lens of your experience. I dont make saddles so I dont need to see stitching chisels as a bad habit, I have the luxury of viewing them as just another tool.

I havent had any issues, but again, I'm not a saddler. Importantly, I think it's reasonable to assume the chap who made the first post, isn't making a saddle either. There is more to leatherwork than making tack.

Well I'm not a saddler and I dont make tack, so I'll defer to your experience. I can tell you though, I cant see how it's detrimental. There are more ways of doing saddlery than the traditional English method and they are not wrong, they are just different. French stitching horses are different to English stitching horses, but they are not wrong, just different. Look here... Front... back... I sewed that as a test piece a couple of weeks ago and while certainly not perfect, it is pretty uniform and straight, front and back. I made the holes with a chisel and I know I absolutely could not get it that nice with an awl. I'd love to be able to, but I think we both know it takes years. I'm not the only one who thinks they have their place...

I just want to add, I'm a huge fan of traditional saddle stitching, making the hole one at a time as you describe. I think it's the most versatile and elegant stitching method - but chisels are fine too. The end result is still a traditional saddle stitch in every way and particularly for those of us who dont have decades of practice, it's much easier to stitch in straight lines and get the back nearly as straight as the front.

Nevertheless, the pricking chisels shown are designed to be hammered straight through the leather. Many like them. Even some traditional saddlers. " And.... use a pony or clams to hold the work for stitching. Stitching by pushing an awl down through leather onto a wood, leather or any other surface is a very crude and ineffective way of working. " Actually, no it's not. I can pretty much guarantee that if you used a pricking chisel and pre-made your holes, your stitches per minute rate would go up. It is definitely a faster way to sew than making one hole at a time. You should try it - at least before slamming it.

I agree, that's why I said Pricking CHISEL and showed a picture of a pricking CHISEL. Pricking CHISELS are different to pricking irons. Unlike pricking irons, they have long, straight, thin prongs and ARE designed to whack a hole through the leather, which I'm sure you know. You probably just mis-read my comment, right? Regards, Martyn,

There are lots of Heath Robinson tutorials on hand stitching leather, but Nigel shows the right way to do it. It takes a little practice, but it's not rocket science. The alternative (and probably easier) method of making holes is to use a pricking chisel rather than an awl (or sometimes alongside an awl). These are designed to punch straight through the leather. If you want a recommendation that wont break the bank, look on ebay or amazon for stitching chisels and look for these (the black ones in the middle)... I think they are called ProLine but they are Chinese made and often appear under different brand names. I paid £14BP on ebay for the set. Material: tool steel Length: 10.5 cm Color: black Tooth width: 2 mm Tooth pitch: 4 mm (6SPI approx) Quantity: 4 PCs (1 teeth, 2 tooth, 4 tooth & 6 tooth) They make holes at 6 stitches per inch, which is a nice average size suitable for most things from knife sheaths to wallets. here is a picture of the holes they make (the middle row)... FYI, the top row is 5 stitches per inch, the bottom row is 8 stitches per inch. and when sewn - the middle row again. Note the laft half of the row is sewn with 0.8 mm dia thread and the right half is sewn with 1.0 mm dia thread...