stelmackr

I see some of the same problems I have when cutting thicker leather, especially curved sections. The only solution I've found, other than sharper tools and a steadier hand, is to use a one-inch belt sander from Harbor Freight and smooth out the curve before using the edge beveler. http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/disp...Itemnumber=2485 Bob Stelmack

When I make covers for books or portfolios, I sometimes have the same issue I noticed on your project. It's that "off-center" decoration (the eagle) that looks fine when the project is unfolded and open, but either too close to the fold or edge when folded. For me it's an aesthetic issue. I've tried many ways to get it aligned, but often the final trimming and sewing or lacing make it look "off-center" and it drives me crazy. Bob Stelmack

Johanna, The settings are already set as you suggest, but still too soft. Thanks for the tip. Bob Stelmack

Dave, I have not watched the entire video, but it looks good so far. I've tried to adjust the sound both via the sound icon on the video page and on my sound volume on my computer. No luck. If others have the same problem, I would suggest an increase in the volume of the recorded sound in the following videos. Bob stelmack

December RawHide Gazette Issue Posted Just a short note to say that the newest issue of the RawHide Gazette has been posted at: http://pslac.org/ ..and look in the PUBLIC index. This months issue contains: RawHide Gazette -- o--Carving Christmas Cards Demonstration by John Wickstrom o--Norm Lynds’ Custom Tools o--November PSLAC Meeting Pictures o--Emerald Valley Leather Crafters Guild news o--Mystery Braid Belt o--Free Leathercraft Classes in the Tri-Cities of Washington o--Leather ClassPictures o--FERDCO 8th Annual Leather Show at Pendleton, OR o--Knives by Graycloud o--Paula’s Knife Photos by Graycloud o--PSLAC East Happenings o--Workshop Co-ordinator’s Report o--Sea Leather Wear o--Upcoming Events...and... o--PSLAC Current Schedule ( Note: There is now a quick link to view the upcoming workshops and meeting demos at: http://www.pslac.org/schedule.pdf ) Since these PDF files are quite large (0.5 to 2.5 mega bytes), may we suggest that you right click on the link and save to your hard drive for viewing when off-line. This way you can continue to browse while the file downloads AND to can start your own collection of RawHide Gazette newsletters! Bob Stelmack Editor, RawHide Gazette www.pslac.org

Although the cutters say they are for photos, the C-1500P will cut 3/4 and even 5/6 leathers with a little practice and a firm hand to hold the center and a sacrificial cutting surface underneath. http://www.lion-office.com/nt/circle.html I use the C-1500P unit above. below are some others: http://www.seihin-world.com/s/2002/03/29_1302.php http://olfablades.stores.yahoo.net/olcmcicu.html Bob Stelmack

The 12 Steps of Leatherholics Anonymous 1.) We admitted we were powerless over leather--that our wives had become unmanageable. 2.) Came to believe that Tandy Leather Factory could restore us to sanity. 3.) Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of the Leatherworker.net as we understood it. 4.) Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of our tools. 5.) Admitted to Johanna, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our tool collection. 6.) Were entirely ready to have Johanna remove all these excess tools. 7.) Humbly asked Johanna to remove our tool obsession. 8.) Made a list of all the tools we have collect, and became willing to give them up. 9.) Made direct gifts of the tools wherever possible, except when to do so would cause another leatherholic to be created. 10.) Continued to take a tool inventory and when we acquired one, promptly admitted it. 11.) Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with Johanna as we understood her, praying only for knowledge of her will for us and the power to carry that out. 12.) Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to other leatherholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

The problem with individual leather stamps in not only the vertical alignment, but the kerning (horizontal positioning) of certain letters next to each other. If you use those Tandy Leather Factory stamps and position one stamp to the next, then it is just like typing a Microsoft letter in courier font, a non-proportional type. See this example: RawHide Gazette Whereas, using a proportional font, like Times New Roman you get a result like this: RawHide Gazette You can see that certain letters are "kerned", or moved closer to other letters. This kerning taken care of with the individual letters relative width and a kerning pairing indicated indicated in the font software. So, for me, I have chosen to experiment with letterpress lead type and perform the kerning with the letters. For example the lowercase "i" is extremely narrow, whereas the "m" is the largest with. Please see http://www.pslac.org/public/02_feb03.pdf for an example of letterpress type pressed (embossed) into leather. I use a bookpress, but a plain old wood vice would do the job. By using letterpress type I get professionally spaced text on leather. When I don't have the size or font I want, then I trace the letters printed out from a computer on the project and tool them. Bob Stelmack

Punch one more slot so the bullet is over the error when the leather is woven in. Bob Stelmack

Try this http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=1uMUSZlgyjg and the edge gets a burnished color without dye. Bob Stelmack

See it in action here: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=1uMUSZlgyjg Bob Stelmack

No relation, just something my daughter sent me and told me that when I told the kids not to run with scissors, that there might consequences and here was proof for her. Bob Stelmack

No description necessary: Bob Stelmack

November RawHide Gazette Issue Posted Just a short note to say that the newest issue of the RawHide Gazette has been posted at: http://pslac.org/ ..and look in the PUBLIC index. This months issue contains: RawHide Gazette -- o--leatherworker.net by Johanna Schroer o--Motorized Fantastic Leather Edge Burnisher o--John Wickstrom and Paula Marquis' Latest Projects o--Ken Bush's Knife Sheath o--Home Leather Dyeing Instructions Using Rit Dye o--Bookbinding Ideas o--Andy Stasiak's Christmas Leather Ornament Demo o--PSLAC East’s NEW 5 Week Class o--Workshop Co-ordinator's Report o--8th Annual Pendleton Leatherworkers Trade Show o--Donated Leather o--October Meeting at the Desert Leathercrafters Group (DLG) o--A Braiding Day with Herb Rockey ...and... o--Upcoming Events o--PSLAC Current Schedule ( Note: There is now a quick link to view the upcoming workshops and meeting demos at: http://www.pslac.org/schedule.pdf ) Since these PDF files are quite large (0.5 to 2.5 mega bytes), may we suggest that you right click on the link and save to your hard drive for viewing when off-line. This way you can continue to browse while the file downloads AND to can start your own collection of RawHide Gazette newsletters! Bob Stelmack Editor, RawHide Gazette www.pslac.org

How about not dyeing the inside? Bob Stelmack

To ALL above, regarding motors other than the 1750 RPM. I have one of Ivan's fantastic burnishers and running the uncased leather against the burnisher along with Ivan's prepared wax mixture requires some force and friction. The idea is that the wool felt wheel mechanically lays the leather fibers over while the speed heats up the leather melting the wax mixture into the fibers that are being laid down. Use of a motor that would start to stall when you push the leather against the burnisher would slow the burnisher down and the wax mixture would not work as effectively. I suspect that the mini bench grinder would fall into that category (I do think that mini bench grinder* would be a nice addition to a leather shop for many other reasons). I think Ivan will be selling a perfectly matched motor, at a reasonable price, with or without the burnisher in the near future. Also, a motor that spins faster will overheat the leather and sort of burns the edges. You can slow a motor down with a pair of with a ratio of 1:2, but that requires an extra spindle to hold the burnisher. I know Ivan. He make belts. LOTS of belts and LOTS of other items. His experience and his burnisher came out of an evolution of trying other ways. I think this burnisher and a 1750 RPM motor along with the wax mixture is fantastic. Hope this helps. Bob Stelmack (*note: As with any tool that grinds metal, be sure to keep it well away from cased leather because the small ground particles cause black spots on the leather that cannot be removed.)

Please page 14 of the August 2008 RawHide Gazette for some additional information. I've clipped out that page and here it is: burnisher.pdf If you want to see the entire issue then here is a direct link: http://www.pslac.org/public/08_aug08.pdf If you want to see an index to all the public issues, here is a link: http://www.pslac.org/table_index_rawhide.htm Hope this helps. Bob Stelmack burnisher.pdf

Here is a good way to use up some leather scraps: Christmas_Ball_from_scrap.pdf Bob Stelmack Christmas_Ball_from_scrap.pdf

Wonderful observations! Karen and I were lucky enough to spend 2 years in Japan and 7 years in the UK. Both island countries. The similarities between Japan and the UK were amazing. 30 to 50 million people on land smaller than California. Countries with written histories going back many centuries. Two counties that absolutely hate their neighbors, but adopted much of the neighbors language. Great warriors that gained much land and gave it back. Two countries with accents that are unintelligible when attempting to speak English to an American. Both fishing countries. Both have remembrances of a royal leadership. Both have a parliamentary form of government. One country has Sumo, the other Cricket -- both boring in large doses. But all-in-all, a wonderful experience that we loved every minute of. Bob Stelmack

October RawHide Gazette Issue Posted Just a short note to say that the newest issue of the RawHide Gazette has been posted at: http://pslac.org/ ..and look in the PUBLIC index. This months issue contains: RawHide Gazette -- o--My FERDCO TK-801 Skiver o--Ivan’s Latest Chinks o--Jeff Mosby’s “Pig Boys” Embossing Plate o--Workshop Report o--Desert Leathercrafters Group Meeting o--PSLAC East Tandy Leather Factory Classes o--PSLAC East 2nd Saturday of the Month Class o--Sooke Fall Fair o--PSLAC September Meeting o--Puyallup Fair o--Sample of Puyallup Fair Entries o--Puyallup Fair Leathercraft Results o--Chan Geer’s Workshop ...and... o--Upcoming Events o--PSLAC Current Schedule ( Note: There is now a quick link to view the upcoming workshops and meeting demos at: http://www.pslac.org/schedule.pdf ) Since these PDF files are quite large (0.5 to 2.5 mega bytes), may we suggest that you right click on the link and save to your hard drive for viewing when off-line. This way you can continue to browse while the file downloads AND to can start your own collection of RawHide Gazette newsletters! Bob Stelmack Editor, RawHide Gazette www.pslac.org

I have found that bookmarks on a home computer doesn't work for me. For instance, if I find something of interest at someone else's home or at work the bookmark stays with the machine. And if said machine crashes and you don't backup the computer daily, then the bookmarks are lost. Here is what I did. I read in a Linux magazine about a nice Perl script that I modified and put on my web site. Here is the text: #!/usr/bin/perl use warnings; ##use strict; my $BOOKFILE = "../data/bm.dbf"; use CGI qw(:all *table); use CGI::Carp qw(fatalsToBrowser); open(BKM,">>$BOOKFILE") || print "Can't open $BOOKFILE for appending data, reason: $!<P>\n"; if(param('a') ) { my $URL = param('a'); ##my $TITLE = "TITLE"; my $TITLE = param('t'); print BKM "<a href=$URL target=\"new\">$URL</a>\t$TITLE\t\n"; close BKM; } print header(), start_html(-title => "Bookmarks"); print "<body>\n"; open(BKM,"<$BOOKFILE") || print "Can't open $BOOKFILE for reading data, reason: $!<P>\n"; while (<BKM>){ print "<li>$_";} print "</body></html>\n"; Now this little jewel is activated by installing one bookmark on every computer I use with this text: java script:void(win=window.open('http://website_hostname.com/cgi-bin/bm?a='+location.href+'&t='+document.title)) ...and I name the bookmark "BM>" to indicate bookmark storage While the page of interest is displayed the "BM>" bookmark is clicked and the URL and title of the page is appended in a file on the web server. To confirm the storage I have it read back the entire stored file (you could eliminate this function). I also have another bookmark called "<BM" that activates a little database program I wrote that will search the file and display the entries that contain the keyword used to search. This book mark looks like this: java script:void(win=window.open('http://website_hostname.com/cgi-bin/db.cgi?path=/path_to_data_file/data/&filename=bm&pass=password')) Now a little improvement would be to "tag the entry with a third field", like the Firefox browser, when the entry is written. If anyone is interested, contact me and we could exchange some ideas. Bob Stelmack

Here is a leather carving where the scales were formed with a "v" shaped (two sizes) wood carving gouge: Bob Stelmack

Call FERDCO, they have be helpful with all makes of machines over the phone: Contact Information / Mailing: Ferdco Corp.- PO Box 65 - Harrison Id 83833 Contact Information / Shipping: Ferdco Corp. - 128 N Fredrick - Harrison Id 83833 In the US - Call Toll Free -1-800-645-0197 Outside of US - 208-689-3006 Fax - 208-689-3008 e-mail ferdco@smgazette.com Cheers, Bob Stelmack

PSLAC (Puget Sound Leather Artisans Co-Op) monthly newsletter is The RawHide Gazette found at http://www.pslac.org or just go to the bottom of this page and click on the graphic "RawHide Gazette". Bob Stelmack Editor, RawHide Gazette www.pslac.org

Try http://www.abbeysaddlery.co.uk/ Bob Stelmack