celticleather

The fog's beginning to clear! I guess population density must play a large part in this. I heard on the news tonight that in some states, the number of people wanting to vote exceeded the number of polling slips available . . . whoops! The Kilroy/Chad debate seems to depend upon which side of the pond you live!

I have four or five plough gauges in my tool collection, but I just daren't use them! The sight of that blade standing proud with no guarding scares me to death! I still use the simple little wooden strap-cutter (it's over thirty years old) for all my belt and strap cutting. Perhaps one day I'll pluck up courage to use a plough!

You're dead right, Ray! Voting here in the UK (in my family, at least) is an after-tea in the evening event, and certainly not an all-day chore! I'm beginning to understand that there are several methods of voting in the US polling booths . . . electronic, pen and paper, and pulling some sort of lever. Perhaps having to make the decision of which method to use contributes to the long wait? And I still don't understand what part Chads play in the process. The only Chads I've encountered were little cartoon drawings that appeared on walls in Britain after WW2. So much to learn, and so little time!

Okay - here's some more equally useless and arcane information. There are some schools of thought that say the term 'mad as a hatter' is a corruption of 'mad (furious) as an adder (a venomous snake)' The word 'adder' is itself a corruption of the Old Saxon word 'atter', meaning poisonous. There is some evidence that the phrase 'mad as a hatter' was in use before hat-making became recognised as a trade. I was born in Luton in the UK, which was a centre of the hat-making industry until forty or fifty years ago, and I don't have any childhood memories of the place being populated by madmen (or women)! However, if I'm being honest, I prefer the explanation that involves the use of mercury nitrate in felt hat-making. That's my two-penn'orth!

I'm not sure I should have started this . . . it's making me cringe already!

I'm still a bit baffled by the fact that some people in the US have to wait for hours to cast their votes. In the UK, each of our constituencies (there are 646 constituencies) is divided into smaller 'wards', and each of these has its own polling station, or sometimes more than one. People drift in throughout the day, collect their polling slips, mark their 'X' in pencil, place the slip in the voting box, and off they trot. Is the US system too technological, or do they not have enough polling stations? I understand that many people in the US vote in advance, and we have a similar system which uses postal voting, but this has been proved to be vulnerable to abuse. One thing's for sure . . . if the UK ever tried computerised or online voting, it would collapse at the first fence! We manage to spend waste millions of pounds on new systems - everything from passport issuing to air traffic control and the health service - and nothing ever comes up to expectations. We're better off with pencils and paper!

I just suffered the eyewatering indignity of shoving a saddler's needle right up under my thumbnail! It was a bit messy, inconvenient and a tad painful, but not exactly life-threatening (my tetanus jabs are up-to-date!). As a community of people who are constantly using sharp and spiky tools, I'll bet there have been some far more spectacular disasters in some of your workshops. So what's your worst leather-related, self-inflicted (or otherwise?) injury? Show us your scars . . !

I hadn't realised that Weaver sold these, so I just checked. At $41.25 + p&p, I'll stick to my free one!

A couple of years ago I landed a contract to make 100 belts for the Nicole Miller fashion house in the US. I couldn't face the thought of edging them all with a dauber or brush, so I made the little gadget pictured below. The reservoir is the cap from an aerosol can, and the central spindle is the plastic core from a thread spool. I hunted around for a not-too-soft foam to cover the spindle, and used a 3mm thick foam innersole, which is glued to the spindle. It's really easy to just draw the edge of the belt along the roller, which is constantly replenished from the reservoir. I use it all the time now, but it's only suitable for non-spirit based dyes, such as Fiebings Edge Dye or Edge-Kote. Spirit-based dyes make the foam expand and disintegrate. It's saved me hours of fiddly work with a brush, and cost me nothing! Just to show off, there's also a pic of Nicole Miller wearing one of the belts (not sure who the other girl is . . . maybe someone called Gershon?).

Ray - I think you need to get hold of a motor rheostat, which will allow you to dial up the speed you want . . . rather like a sewing machine footpedal. There's a company in Royston - http://www.heasell.net/ - who specialise in all things motor-related. May be worth contacting them with the details of your motor, and see what they can offer. Here's another possible source - http://www.quasarelectronics.com/motor-con...ers-drivers.htm

I should think you'll need a diamond tipped wetsaw, or at the very least a diamond tipped angle grinder blade and lots and lots and lots of time!

As near as I can work out, we're paying about $5.73 per US gallon here in the UK. The current price at our pumps is 96.9 pence per litre.

Superb detail, and amazing lacing!

I was very impressed by the way the saddlebags had been cared for after ten years. The leather had softened a bit - as it always does - but showed no signs of having been allowed to dry out. The lacing was a sort of metallic-covered stuff, probably plastic, which I wasn't keen to use, but the customer's always right (sometimes!), so I just gritted my teeth and pretended it was leather! You're right, Ray; these are embossing plates that I make from a photopolymer material, using a process that I've devised. I'm able to draw the designs on computer, and make embossing plates in different sizes for different products. I can get hundreds of impressions from each plate, and I often combine them to make up more complex designs. The plate material is pretty expensive, so I use it very sparingly!

Sunday was pretty awful here in the UK . . . hundreds of runners trapped by floods on the Cumbrian fells (think they're all ok now), and pouring rain just about everywhere. Spent the day in the workshop, making some belt pouches for stock. Also repaired some saddlebags that I made about ten years ago . . . the owner snagged some stitches and brought them in for repair. Don't think they look bad ten years down the line!

Hopefully a future leatherworker! Congratulations!!

Just a couple of little points . . . In the guitar straps section, 'Here is some of my quitar straps' should read 'Here are some of my guitar straps'. In the upcoming design box, 'Im' should be 'I'm'. Sorry to be pedantic . . . forty years as a proof-reader has that effect! Apart from that, a great site!

Clever, but gruesome! I wouldn't want to walk behind the person carrying this on a dark night!

Seems to be true . . . see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turducken but if you think that's a mouthful, try this http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-50...mas-dinner.html Enough there to feed a small army - if you can find an oven big enough!

I don't suppose Health and Safety existed when they started out. There's probably the well-tanned remains of a few missing tanners at the bottom of some of those pits!

I found a couple of pictures that I took of Baker's tannery. The first is the liquor pit, where the oak bark is soaked to release the tannin, and the second picture is the tan-house, where there are about 72 tanning pits. The oak bark is ground up by a water-wheel, powered by the adjacent river, and when it's not grinding oak bark, the water-wheel operates a series of shafts that agitate the content of the tanning pits. There is archaeological evidence that tanning has been carried on at the site since Roman times!

We have a butcher close by who makes the most amazing brawn, haslet, black pudding and faggots (US eyebrows raised!), as well as 22 different varieties of sausages! Rather curiously - for an English butchers - they also make biltong, droëwors and boerewors, and stock a large range of South African foods. Their fame has spread, and sometimes the shop sounds like an Afrikaans convention, when local Afrikaners call in to stock up. I once tried a small piece of biltong, but on the whole, I think I prefer chewing on a piece of veg-tan! This thread has stimulated my appetite, so I'm off now to make some cheese on toast, lightly spread with Marmite - angel food!

Ray - Is the Weaver video a DVD, or is it lurking somewhere as a download on the Internet?

Sedgwick's are still going strong (http://www.je-sedgwick.co.uk/jes/4230/index/) and have an excellent video on their website. If I want one of their leathers, I usually buy it from Abbey Saddlery (www.abbeysaddlery.co.uk/), which is another good source of leather-related stuff!

You're right about Le Prevo, Ray! It was bad of me not to mention them . . . I've had some of the best veg-tan shoulders from them. They also have an excellent online catalogue! You're also right about the service from JTB . . . my last order from them was short of some buckles, but I sent off a fax to Ted (they don't have an Internet presence), and the missing buckles arrived the next day. I'm also a bit nervous about their habit of putting dyes in the same roll as leathers, but so far I've had no disasters!