Vikti

I like the Vigvisir you tooled on it. That way you will never get lost on your travels

I like your set up. The one question I have is on the fence why do you have your contact point against the fence so small? Don't you have an issue of keeping your work square? I bought my arbor press for mainly setting snaps, do you do use yours for snaps also? I'm trying to improve my setup for snaps.

I just had a workshop on holster making yesterday and we were told that for a good holster you need to use 7/8 0z. leather

Can someone tell me where I can find some conchos with a Ster of David on them? Can anyone offer any advice on where to look? Damon

Thank you

Does this stuff have a shelf life? I opened my can up for the first time in a good year or so and it's really dark brown with some black spots in it. I was wondering if it's still any good? I know your not suppose to let the stuff freeze and I don't think that it has but I wanting to know if it's still useable or should I just throw it out. Damon

Can anyone help me out with finding a vendor for buying some Masonic conchos (and appendant bodies as well) wholesale. I have an account set up with TriTex but the tighter the deadline the greater chance that these people are sold out. I really like the people at TriTex, on an order I placed with them last year they bent over backwards for me and because of that I like to deal with them but I was hoping someone could give me some suppliers in case my main people have to backorder me again. Damon Huse

I have a friend who is wanting me to make him a belt out of steer hide but I'm having a hard time tracking some down, The main reason is that he doesn't want his belt to stretch after a couple of years. Is there a way that I can identify what is steer hide or bull hide? I found a couple of threads here that told me where I can get some steer hide but I don't have the money right now to buy an entire belly that I don't know when I'll be able to sell off the rest. Would a thicker leather, 9-10 oz (or thicker)., be good as far as not stretching goes? One response that I saw was that someone got 2 pieces of 7 oz and glued them together, would that cause it's own problems if the leather is mismatched? The biggest thing that my friend wants is something that doesn't stretch. Any ideas will be much appreciated. Damon

I've been told that while mink oil makes your leather soft and water proof I've been told that it makes your leather brittle? Is that true?

If this is for SCA/Ampgard style combat you might try to find a book about the Iron Roses (sorry, I don't remember the title, I just remember it's a red cover with black print with a Tudor rose on the cover), it's a fighting and armor book for women written by women. I've thumbed through a copy of it and it's extremely informative. I found you a link that might also find useful at http://www.scatoday.net/node/4066 Hope this helps you out, Damon

I came across this video a couple of weeks ago and it works pretty good for me except I use 90-100 lb manilla paper or posterboard instead of the bag stiffiner that they recommend in the video. Damon

Evening folks, In the next few days I will be working with rawhide for the first time. I have a knife that has a relatively smooth steel handle that I wish to wrap up and I was wanting to know how much I need to allow for stretching once the rawhide gets wet as well as how much will it shrink as it drys. The handle is also tapered towards the pommel (or lack thereof) and I was also wanting to know if I could tack the rawhide to the handle to keep it from sliding off or will the contact cement cause the rawhide to wrinkle as it dries? Seeing as I've never done this before I may not be asking questions that I need to ask so volunteered information will be most welcomed. Damon

The one thing I would say to do different on your next one would be to make the spacing between the straps on the underside just a little more apart from each other, add maybe 3/8" between straps or so on top of what you currently have. It will help the peices stay lined up more if there is a lot of movement going on as in if this was going to be used for SCA combat. Other than that I say it looks awesome. Damon

What side of Ft. Worth? Just about every Saturday morning there is something going on at the Tandy on Camp Bowie and I must say that Laura is a great teacher. Also the Lone Star Leathercrafters guild meets there I think the first or second Tuesday evening of the month (it's been a while since I have been to a guild meeting). There's quite a few people around who is willing to teach. Damon Grandview

If you want to use your wooden mauls you could get some rawhide and wrap it around your maul so that the rawhide will take the abuse from tooling instead of the wood. If you find any pictures about striking sticks you'll see that they mostly have the heads wrapped in rawhide. After a while the rawhide will start to flake off and crack but you could simply replace it. Just a thought. Damon