Bree

Splitters need a large heavy knife which is very sharp. They do a lot of cutting work so they need to be heavy duty with good quality steel that holds an edge well. The biggest limitation is pulling the leather through on manual splitters. It takes a good bit of force and you can damage the piece if you don't do it right. Best thing is to have the leather moved by power rollers (expensive machines) versus tugging on your piece. The mechanics are pretty simple... a roller pushes the leather up into the blade of the knife against a tensioner and the leather is moved through the knife splitting the piece. How big are the pieces and what shape are they? I have a Heritage 8" Skiver/Splitter which is an Osborne 84 clone (very common).

It is a thread lubricating cup. You could put liquid wax or silicone thread lubricant in there. I often put some Silicone Thread Lube from Weaver in mine. You don't need a lot. Just enough to add a little lube to the thread. To be honest you probably don't even need it with the high quality threads and needles we have today. Serial Number Dates http://www.ismacs.net/singer/singerdates.html

They are both good machines the Pfaff 1245 is probably the better of the two. Have a sewing machine tech check them out.

Get yourself a standard XD-40 blue gun and you can use it for 9mm, 40 S&W and .45 ACP models from Springfield Armory. I don't think they will work for the new XD-M series.

I bought the burnisher and motor from Ivan. He convinced me that this thing is the greatest deal since sliced bread! I have a nice MDF base cut to afix the motor too and clamp to my surface plate. So as soon as it comes in I will let you know how it performs!!

I was over at Lowes this weekend and I spotted something that I liked which I think might work very well for edge finishing. Here it is: http://www.amazon.com/Shur-Line-57930-Rubb...y/dp/B000A2JTNW It has a nice small sponge based roller and you can store your acrylic edge paint in there and clean it very easily. It was worth the $8 I paid just to try it out! If it doesn't work well for leather, it will be useful around the house.

You haven't shown the most important part... the machine heads. Can they sew leather?? Yes. They need to be in good condition with the right needles but they can sew leather. I have a VS2 which has a similar treadle unit to what you have shown and she will sew light leather. So will my 2 White Rotaries and my Singer 19-51. Remember that on these old Singers and Whites, all the components are metal. There are no plastic gears. It's all tough sturdy metal... mostly cast iron and steel. They are very tough and capable. That's why they are still around!!

Thanks for sharing the construction info!!

LOL!! No alarm pages last night!! The time change routines that I wrote for my software applications worked!! Hot Dayum I love it when a plan comes together!! I go through this torture EVERY time change because I am always terrified that some crazy condition will be realized in my applications that I missed and the time change will break the app triggering a flood of alarms. I am so happy that leather doesn't care about the time change!! Just another reason why leatherwork is superior to IT work!! Too bad it doesn't pay as well!!

HP... Outstanding. Just outstanding. Now how about the nitty gritty production details? What did you use and how did you do it... the leather... the construction... the edging... the pattern... the carving... the dye and finish... the hardware... the stitching etc.? Also how much did you charge the customer for these belts? Your fans want to know!! And we are your fans now!!

I was over at Rockler yesterday and picked up a 20 pack of some extremely fine grit sponges for both my wood and leatherwork. I also spotted a couple of items that I thought I might test out. They had a 1" thick block of very firm felt maybe 5" long by 1 1/2" wide. I grabbed that and then I spotted a similar block of cork and grabbed that. I used two 25% off coupons that I had to treim the pretty ridiculous price on each of these. Anyhoo... I took a piece of veg tan strap, wet the edge, and corked it with a firm unidirectional, moderate pressure rub. I got a very nice burnish out of it! The cork block was surprisingly unaffected by the burnishing pressure. It felt good in the hand because that block is pretty easy to grip and use. I didn't have time to test out the felt yet. I don't see either of these as a replacement for a powered rotary burnisher. I am getting ready to test out Ivan's burnisher and I am hoping that it is all that he says it is. I will let you know my impressions once I try it out. I can't run it on my buffer because he says that the speed is too high. So I have to fabricate an adapter to run it on my drill press. I bought a long 1/2" hex bolt yesterday with a long section of non-theaded round stock. I will cut off the head and the threads with my Dremel tool and a diamond cutting wheel (hopefully!). And then use the drill press to test out the burnisher. I have to wait for a replacement burnisher because there was a problem with the initial one I received. Ivan is taking care of the problem with a smile! Good man! If his burnisher works out, I will buy the special motor and use that rig for production. The package looks like a great deal and I am impressed with what I have seen so far. But it never hurts to have many ways of doing the same thing!!

Good job on the tutorial Bruce. The technique is simple to learn and produces a very nice result!!

Great set! Really nice work on the inlay and lacing.

I like it!

My deepest sympathy on the passing of your dad. It is a testament to your love for him to craft such a moving poem.

OK Ivan... The ball's in your court. I have the burnisher and two pieces of the special wax. I am NOT going to mount it on my 3500 rpm motor. I will wait to see what you come up with in an inexpensive 1750 rpm motor. I'm not in a great hurry as I have a huge amount of work to do for my IBM job right now. I want to do this right. BTW... Thanks for the FAST service!!

I wanted to update the discussion about my Artisan T-4000 LA-25. Because they made a special stand for this machine and mine was the first of this type, there were some problems and not all of the items that should have shipped with the machine did ship with the machine. When Steve became aware of this, he jumped! He has been a busy beaver sending me things and helping me get the machine working at spec. I have to tell you that he has earned his pay. Anybody that is thinking about an Artisan machine... get on the phone with Steve Tayrien at 888-838-1408. Tell him Bree sent you! Steve will not only give you great technical advice, he will make sure that you are happy!! I like Artisan's competition... that's no secret... I was intending on buying one of their competitor's machines right from the very start. But neither company showed up at the IFoLG to demonstrate their equipment and sell me on why they are best. Artisan showed up and they spent a lot of time with me. They gave me good sound advice and they are sure working hard to become #1 in my mind... even after the sale has been completed. They are impressing me more and more each day. We had a rocky start but they are doing all the right things and earning their wings every day. Great job Steve and Artisan team!! You all are rapidly improving my total cost of ownership which includes service and satisfaction after the sale. You are earning my recommendation. Buy from Artisan without fear. They will do right by you.

Great idea Tim! I have a bunch of scrap sheepskin. This would be a nice way to use some up.

Yes Ed... You will enjoy the 55 pounder. It is one of my trusted companions... and I didn't even have to Escape From New York to get it! Over here in Upstate NY we have TWO Harbor Freights in the Buffalo burbs. I almost went over there tonight just to wander around. Heck I own 1/2 of the store already!!

You can't go wrong with a belt like that. 5-Star+! Edit: The darn belt is too nice to wear!!

Very nice. Great leathercrafting. My display is set to 1024 x 768 which is very common... 50-60% of all monitors in current use. At this resolution the text for individual items scrolls off the screen creating a horizontal scroll. That is a defect. Try to keep your descriptive text within the screen boundary. Format it in a compact form so the reader's eyes don't have to traverse so much space. That text is part of your selling presentation... an important part. Make it very easy to read. Don't allow the form of your presentation to be a reason not to buy. It's an easy fix to correct this. You are off to a good start!

Welcome! I love your stuff. The belt is KILLER!

Far be it from me to violate the manufacturer's suggested configuration! Send me the info on the new motor at breeliz AT verizon DOT net Ed... My Delta does not require belt change. It handles everything itself. It sometimes gets mixed reviews but I have never had a problem with it. Works like a champ in everything I ask it to do. http://www.deltaportercable.com/Products/P...ProductID=11420

Thanks Ivan! The buffer does indeed run at 3600 rpm. However, I think that by using lighter pressure I can get the same effect. If I can't, I can run it on my Delta Drill Press which has variable speed between 500 and 3100 rpm. One way another I will get it to work especially if I use some very fine sandpaper (400-600 grit) prior to burnishing to prep the surface for burnishing.

I would like to get some dies for my Heritage Spot Setter. I have dies for round spots but I would like to get a set of 1/4", 3/16", and 1/2" for PYRAMID spots. Weaver hasn't got them and Standard Rivet will make them but at a cost of $200 apiece. That is way more than I want to pay considering that the round spot dies are about $46 a set. Do any of you guys know of a source for these dies? Or am I condemned to a $600 charge which I definitely want to avoid. BTW I have a few thousand of these spots so it would be really nice to be able to use the big spot setter rather than punching holes for the prongs one spot at a time.