RockyAussie

I guess there is one or 2 things here to consider.Did they get the idea from looking on LW ? I hope they did as that may mean they are reading this now and along with their deceptive advertising regarding the " Cow leather/Italian veg tant cow hides " the construction change with the spring clips means they have elected to use will unclip at a very annoying rate. Aesthetically I think it looks better but in service it will lose appeal very quickly. I would promote the original as REAL + ORIGINAL along with all of the better points. Shame on Tantat Piece company for not offering some credit to @andrewsejlv

Hi Gary, Thank you for sharing your test results with us all. I wonder if before the clear sealer coat were applied if it were sanded back would the adhesion have worked better. Sort of reminds me of how PVA glue behaves when wet for too long. I might try the base coat now having seen your results. Normally I just apply straight to the rough sanded leather 2 or 3 coats then sand back with an 80 grit? (Medium foam sanding block)to get smooth then finish of with another 2 coats. That separation line up the middle can drive me mad at times if I get too much on but its not to bad if I do as above. Again thank you for sharing so well this information.

Hey jimi, yes that is correct. One side has the gussets and the other not. Thanks @garypl turning inside out is not that hard but I should have pointed out that doing that with glazed crocodile would be very difficult with out getting wrinkles in the glaze. I should also point out that if doing this in most leathers the leather lining would not be necessary. Thickness wise between 1 to 1.4mm (about 3oz) would work fine. Thank you all for the kind comments..... It helps to know if it is of any help to anyone

Quite likely the post is not long enough for the leather you'r using. Check that they work on some thinner weight leather first. If they work alright then you can get some speedy rivets (7mm) i think that you should be able to substitute for the post male part to give you some more length.

This should be the last round now-- Both the gussets get stitched down Next is the other side stitched on Little straps for the key ring attached Now the final stitching gets completed. Note: they get carefully backstitched into the same holes- The case now gets turned inside out and pressed into shape That's it all and thanks for looking. Comments are welcome Brian

Thanks, I was hoping somebody might notice it. For the croc skin given your location I would give Valerie Douglas (in Broome) a call and tell her it was at my suggestion if you like. She is a very nice lady and I have a great respect for her. If she would prefer I could do it from here for her if you only want a small piece to try out. Here's a couple of pictures of croc knife pouches I've made from skins like she has. The last one, I had to get that knife as it was an anniversary one and shared my birth year.

The next step from here is to second cut all of the now attached pieces down to their finished sizes. Here the cardboard pattern is attached to the gusset piece- This one shows one of the top pieces ready to second cut. Below are all the pieces now second cut. As we are not now folding the croc edge along the zips we have to use some edging to improve the finished appearance. The 4 zip line edges now completed with 2 coats of edge coat each. Next with a prepared pattern the zips are glued and lined up in place - This picture shows the zips attached and ready to start the stitching- My trusty old Pfaff cylinder machine does a beautiful job. This is what we now have left to assemble- The middle lining is now glued to attach to one of the outer pieces- showing the piece now attached Here I start to stitch the gusset side pieces into place More to come later.

Thanks Gary, I will post more tomorrow as dinner is ready now and its hot

Ok now the leather bits cut above are all bits for lining on the crocodile and must be split down to about .5 mm so this next picture shows what we started with is about 1.4mm- After splitting .5mm A little bit more skived of around the edges Now the design change- The customer wants the prototype in black matte croc and this skin I though would be nice to use is a bit small so I wont be doing the folded edge on the zips. This is the skin- Cardboard attached to skin for cutting next All the croc now cut out shown The croc is a bit thick at 1.1mm A run through the splitter and is now .7mm. The 2 pieces on the left are the bottom splits. Next its time to start putting it together so I've decided to spray glue them all in this case. Here they are now with the linings all attached. More a little later

This is a method I use to help make my prototypes quickly and neatly. The example product is a double zippered key purse which unfortunately had a design change halfway through. The first 3 pictures show the key purse when finished. This one is the side that holds the most bulky key bunch. This is the other side This one shows what it all looks like when closed up. The following picture shows the patterns I've drawn for this model and they are the patterns for first cutting the pieces. They are 2mm all around over the size they will be cut down to in later steps. This picture shows how before cutting out I give the thin cardboard a spray with some contact adhesive and left to dry for 1/2 hour or more. Brushing on is alright as well but do it light and quick so as to not change the cardboard shape. The patterns now hold down well for cutting out if placed onto a poly cutting surface. The poly cutting boards for kitchens work well as well. Here I show the 1st cut patterns neatly cut and no movement. Next I use the same procedure for the second cut patterns shown below All the patterns cut out and shown below Next a sharp knife is used to cut out the leather pieces. Note that the glue holds down well still but not enough to damage the leather when removed. Shows cardboard being removed. All the leather parts needed are now cut out. The crocodile parts will come later. I think that is the limit of pictures I can load in one go so more a bit later.

In the past I made a lot of knife sheaths for a fellow in Norway and I think it was called a Puukko from memory. He used to supply me with a shaped plastic liner to be installed in the pouches. That gave me the following idea for the following. The sheaths for the Puukko's were all made out of porosus crocodile skin so the cost was not such a problem. What I have done a couple of times since is made something similar by first making a wooden blade copy then heating up some thin poly pipe tubing until it started to flatten then gently pushing the wooden blade down into it. If you make the tube longer you just need to sqeeze it together at the end and leave clamped until it cools off then trim to shape after. Hope that helps some. Brian

Just to let you know the Cowboy CB 4500 according to the page on http://www.tolindsewmach.com/cb4500.html states this below Needle: 7x3 or 794: #18-#27 Thread Sizes: #69 - #415 I haven't tried taking the thread that thin myself as I have a few other machines that can handle that size fine such as Pfaff 335, an Adler 69 and a stack of others, but I would think maybe have a talk with Bob there first myself. I would still think a cylinder machine would be a better starting off machine myself.

If you do please let me know.

Congratulations....That is amazing. The base is so ornate I would almost be tempted to drive down and get it. I really hope it comes through intact. Brian

This may be a stretch but many years ago when I was doing shoe repairs and selling leather craft tools and such I had one customer come in with a pair of old boots that were nearly solid. It did not matter what I did he said as they were not wearable now anyway. I knew that any normal leather conditioner was not going to go anywhere near close to working so I thought I would give this tanning solution kit a try out. The part I used was Leidreiters Leather Lube. I am not certain but I think the same stuff may be named Leder leather lube these days. The results were completely amazing. I got a brush and just painted over the leather and kept going on and off untill they stopped taking in any more. That was a mistake. The leather went that supple that it took another 3 months for them not be all sloppy when he wore them. I tried it on some tooling veg here to see how it would go and to my surprise it went soft but left no residue marks either. I found this page online and it may be of help. As I said I do not know if the formula is the same any more but if you give it a try please let me know the results her as I am sure a lot of others would like to know as well. http://www.archeryessentials.com.au/LederLeatherLube.htm I just checked and that site is in Australia but a bit of a google should show up some a bit closer.

It may be your wording perhaps, but normally the stud stem does press into the hole and not the slit, contrary to what you have said above. In the picture of the bag you have shown if you were to pull on the strap it would be stopped by the hole and not the slit and is therefore correct. Have any pictures that show it the other way?

I spent near to an hour trying to work out how to say something along that line. Given the range of products you mentioned like dog collars and so on I would spend my money on a 441 Class machine first. Although I would not use it for doing wallets normally, I have done so and the results turned out well. The below wallet was done with 20m thread (138). If you track down where to get this needle plate and dog foot combination you can get down to upholstery weight and without any other changes other than thread tension and a little foot pressure go up to some very heavy weight leather as in this linesman's pouch which is about 3/4" thick. It also allows you to get up very close to the edge. The extra foot lift and capacity over the 3200 is worth spending the bit extra on. Lastly ....I do have some flat beds but they are there for the ladies to use.

Very tidy looking work there.

For many years I have found Wmc Jackson ( Peter Jackson) to be very helpful. O3-94173131. http://www.wmcjackson.com.au/www/home/

Funny that....I said that to me missus ....I'm learnin bout cooking tonight.

I have a similar edging machine and use it nearly every day. I find I get better results and more consistent application by getting rid of the brush and making up a aluminium strip to replace it with as in below pics. This also makes the cleaning up a breeze as you need only wipe it of with a damp paper and it does not need to be taken off then either.

Its actually pretty easy except the edges often work better with a leather covering such as in the top edge here. Ignore the missus....she'll expect you to shave and all next if your not careful. You'll even be expected to know how to make your own coffee

Hi @Dun That is the first time I have done that and being machine stitched I didn't think of the fold showing the bobbin side thread until I had it done. Had to unpick back to where it gets hidden about the fold and restitch. Live and learn. Re the feet ... I think I might make up some more interesting shapes like arc's and stuff. What do you reckon? Thanks for the compliment but as I normally do crocodile that has to be made to very high standards, these are really more practice pieces. The last 3 croc ones we made for a retail customer sold in only 2 weeks at $3000+au each. As you would expect heaps more orders. The hardest part is working out how to make the leather ones at an affordable cost, example here would have to sell for near $700au and that does seem to slow the average buyer down a bit. Unless they know our product quality already that is. Ha Ha ...I been wondering bout that.. but.......... Thankfully LW helps make that come closer a whole lot quicker. Thank you, we try.... a hundred pictures to start with help too.

I have to agree. I still have some of the Landis rough rounder and skiving machinery and never use them these days.They are very good if you want to cut hard sole leather but pretty rough for most leatherwork IMHO. For cutting knife sheaths I usually cut to shape one side first then attach the top side oversize and then trim it to size. A follow up sand and its done. Here a tube video I did awhile back and theres a couple more might pay to check out as well-

Hi Bugstruck. Thanks for the compliment. The leather I used on the straps and binding is called Jungle and is an oil tan retan from East Coast Leather in Brisbane Australia. It comes in about 2.5mm and I split it to suit. The feet or the pads on the bottom you could see more of in an earlier post I did on this tote done into a patchwork style. Here is the link- I'm told there may be a short Video in the instagram pics so here a link to it as well. https://www.instagram.com/wildharryaustralia/ Please ignore the bums in there....my daughter in law has been busy looking after the postings on that . Lookin for a broader audience I am told.....