JayInOz

We were dirt poor when I was a kid, but we were clean, polite, well fed and much loved. We had no 'phone, no electricity and no running water. Dad heated buckets on the stove and Mum heated water in the wood fired copper on bath nights. My Mum had first bath, my sisters next, then my Dad, then me. The water was then taken back to the laundry to wash the clothes, and it was then used to water the vege garden. I got up at first light and ran my trap line, then along the creek to check my fish traps. Then on the bus and off to school. Weekends were mine- headed to the hills with bow or gun or axe, or panned for gold in the creek. Life was tough for my parents but for me it couldn't have been any better. Now I'm an old fart and seem to spend my time trying to recreate that warm feeling. And I think half the reason I try to learn so many craft things now is so that future generations of my family will have something to show that I was here:) JayInOz

We certainly need the luxury market and I'm glad it exists too, but even if I was filthy rich I don't think my conscience would ever let me spend several hundred thousand dollars on a whim, when there are so many better ways to spend the money. If you want to see decadence, check out the Dubai gold market on Youtube- see what craftsmen can do with ten tons of gold at any one time:) I've lived on the land for almost my entire life. Down side currently- this drought that's dragged on for years (spending more than half my income on feed to keep things alive). First lamb born this season and taken by a fox the same night. Sow gave birth to ten piglets two days go and squashed six. Almost our entire fruit crop destroyed by flying foxes. The upside- being surrounded by trees and gardens and countless birds. Producing most of our own food. Privacy. No neighbors. Supposed to be a cold change arriving this afternoon so I'll fire up the wood stove and bake bread. Tomorrow the wife and I will pack a picnic lunch and spend the day detecting and panning for gold in a nearby creek. Mike compulsoryness sounds like it should be a word. "I like to use big words because they make me sound more photosynthesis" JayInOz

I was just reading on another forum that Kamala Harris would be ideal as the next US president, as women are far less likely to act on impulse and do stupid things. And then I read $377,000 for a handbag:) By the way that's $479,000 Australian dollars. Wow. Couple of Seegers where I live, and I saw Bob Seeger at the Boston Garden in about 1981. Just thought iI'd throw that in:) JayInOz

Some day, some how, you'll be rewarded for the effort you put in:) One of you grand kids will say- with a tear in her eye- my grand dad made this for my grand ma with his own hands! They must have been really poor back then.... Or something like that:) I was shopping with my wife in a town about seventy miles away last week. We were about to leave the main shopping centre and I asked if there was anything else she really needed, as we wouldn't be back there for weeks. She replied that she needed a new bag. I said Well there's a bag shop right there! Walked in and I was genuinely impressed by some of the bags for sale. Leather in various colours, fancy panels, fringes, braided handles, some lovely hardware etc., etc. My wife picked up a big synthetic bag- black, copper coloured snaps and name tag, no other decoration of any kind, and said Perfect! Sixty dollars. I give up. I've been married for a very long time, and I still have no idea what they're gonna want JayInOz

Those flowers are fantastic! And "Still not thrilled with scrolls" is going to be my new test to see if I can have one more beer JayInOz

I'd be interested to know why your wallets didn't sell. The art and workmanship are obviously top notch. Any guesses? JayInOz

If I can ever make stuff to that standard I'll die with a smile on my dial Beautiful work YinTx. JayInOz

Wow! Really cool. Did you lace them straight over the factory grips? Any glue or anything to stop them slipping off in the middle of a bit of wild cornering? Although on a Road King there probably isn't too much of that. Now on my Iron 883 on the other hand.... JayInOz Edited to add- my Iron was mostly black straight from the dealer, but I darkened more of it since- black derby cover and fuel cap, smoked indicator lenses etc. But I also black leather wrapped the upper fork tubes which were chromed. Just plain leather- but you've got me thinking now:) JayInOz

Nice work! And nice gun. I really like that little butt. Sorry I meant grip- really like that little grip:) JayInOz

There's a young couple here who make body armor for pig dogs. Collars several inches wide and heavy duty chest protectors. All synthetic. I'd love to see what you could do with that in heavy leather:) Some of the dogs are heavier than me. Battle scarred, beat up, mean looking monsters. With the right gear on they'd look like something out of a horror movie:) JayInOz

Looking forward to pictures of the armguard! I had one made in Holland for my wife as part of her birthday present last month. How slack is that when I have full hides looking at me in the corner:) I was going to post a picture of the one I bought but it isn't showing on their website for some reason. Anyway, this is them. https://fairbowshop.nl/ They make a lot of nice stuff. And if it loads in Dutch just click on the little British flag top right. Do you have a first name? Dwdwannabe hurts my finger:) JayInOz

Looking good! Excuse me for being a bit slow, but how do you intend to wear it? On a belt, facing back as a field quiver I'm guessing. Forward as a hip quiver would hide too much of your nice tooling. And eleven posts in six years? I hope you have a good reason for that:) I went to school briefly with an American kid named Douglas Jensen from Salt Lake City Utah. His Dad was out here for a year or so building Mormon churches. Haven't seen him in fifty five years and still remember his exact address. How weird is that? JayInOz

Thinking about that feller with the clamps. About forty years ago he and his brother in law moved up from the city and bought a farm that adjoined our place. They inherited a couple of head of mean, nasty, wild cattle and decided to shoot one for meat. Set up a block and tackle in a big old yellow box tree which stood at the top of a steep hill overlooking the creek. They put some hay directly under the hook, then went and sat in the truck about fifty yards away and waited with the rifle. Eventually the cattle came in and the wrong one ate the hay, so they had to put more out and wait some more. The one they were after finally put it's head down to take a bite and one of these fellers took the shot. Just like in the movies they shot it between the eyes- so the bullet went about three inches below the brain. The beast staggered backwards about five yards and then cartwheeled down the steep side into the trees in the creek. Took them all day to get it out of there. But the story doesn't end there. These fellers were living about fifty yards apart in temporary digs while they built their houses. In between their camps they built a double ended long drop toilet- door at each end and a partition in the middle- out of second hand timber siding. They decided that the timber wall of the outhouse was the perfect place to peg out the hide of this rangy beast they'd killed, and do "something" with the leather they were going to make. I rode over on my old Harley a few days later to see them about something and stopped in my tracks when I looked towards the outhouse. The hide had dried and shrunk and rolled up, taking a heap of boards with it. The whole lot ended up being burnt in the rubbish pile. Actually those blokes provided us with quite a bit of entertainment over the years. And as you can see- I'm a man of few words:) JayInOz

Nice! Might be your first belt, but it's definitely not the first tooling you've done:) JayInOz

I know a feller who has a drum full of clamps that came from a tannery where a mate of his used to work. He has hundreds of them- never used them once and won't sell any. People like that annoy the beejeebus out of me:) JayInOz

Thanks fellers. I've been looking at photos. I'll just take a stab at dimensions and see how I go. One more question though- how far back from the roller is the cutting edge of the blade? Quarter inch? More? Does it matter? JayInOz

Brian the best way would be to skin it using a tree, a chain and my truck. I'll talk to him about it next time I see him- he buys quite a few Wessex Saddleback piglets from me. Squirrelly I see a lot of pictures of fellers stretching hides using ropes on a frame. Total pain in the bum. If you want a quick and dirty method that takes about a tenth the time, peg the hide out with hardwood pegs flat on dry ground. When you're happy with how it looks, go around the outside and slip the hide an inch or so up each peg so there's air flow underneath. Works a treat. The hide will usually dry hard around the pegs, but you can just trim off the entire outer edge, pegs and all, and job done. JayInOz

I have an old plough gauge that belonged to my Dad. It's missing the blade, so I bought a stupidly expensive piece of D2 tool steel and will make one. Does anyone in internet land have one and could they give me the dimensions of the blade please? Position of the slot- distance from rear of blade etc.? I don't suppose it really matters what my blade looks like as long as it has a good cutting edge at the business end, but I would like to make it somewhat resemble the original. Any help appreciated. JayInOz

G'day again Mike. We Aussies are gifted swearers I'll admit- comes with years of everything going wrong I think:) I also like the local expressions that I hear when travelling about. I recently heard someone I know describe his father as "deaf as a beetle" and a mate of mine the other day describe himself as "blind as a welders dog" Don't know anything about carving kangaroo hide. I've only ever done rawhide and chrome tan. I do know it will not brain tan which I find really sad- I love brain tan, even though my hands ache just thinking about it. The last hide I brain tanned was a big red deer that I killed with a bow in Queensland. You have to work brain tan until it's completely dry in order for it to be really soft. I did this particular hide on a cold, damp day and it took six hours. My knuckles were bleeding and I literally couldn't undo a button when I finished. One of my sisters was just given a permit to shoot five hundred kangaroos on her place, but she's not allowed to use them for anything, which seems a bit ridiculous Aussie music- here's a local girl like a lot- Apologies YinTx for the thread drift. JayInOz

Mike I have a lighted binocular magnifier that I bought to use when knapping small arrowheads ( I was visiting my doctor one day and he was wearing one without a light. When I told him about the light option he got excited and ordered one for himself) These days however I use an eight inch magnifier- a circular lens surrounded by a circular fluorescent light tube. It's on a long arm like a work light and is really good to work with, as long as you don't clamp it directly to the table you're working on, as it will jiggle a bit. JayInOz

YinTx get your least favourite swivel knife and grind it narrower- should take about thirty seconds:) I've seen stuff carved on a grain of rice- you know you can go smaller if you have to:) JayInOz

Hearing you Brian. People seem to think that some animals have more right to life than others. I used to make an important chunk of my meagre income shooting foxes and selling the skins every winter. The anti fur mob completely destroyed the industry. An estimated 7.2 million foxes here and practically no market, so now we shoot them and leave them lay. The numbers go up and the sarcoptic mange kills a heap then repeat. I lose lambs to foxes every year. We shouldn't kill deer either because they have lovely brown eyes:) The feller I get the horse tails from doesn't really want to give me hides simply because it would slow him down to skin them carefully. He shoots the horses in the paddock and has the chainsaw warmed up by the time they stop kicking. It's pretty brutal. I just like rawhide because it's so simple and quick to make- builders lime and water to dehair then vinegar and water to neutralize and you're good to go. I'm sure there are other ways but that's how I do it:) JayInOz

Interesting story oltoot. A local feller here kills quite a few horses for dog meat- greyhound industry- and he drops the tails here for me to make stuff out of- mostly fly whisks with fancy turned handles. He's always promising to drop me off a couple of hides but hasn't gotten around to it yet- I'm a patient old fart- I can wait:) Here in Australia there are no native animals with hard hooves. The country is shallow and easily damaged. So the environmentalists are screaming for the wild horses in the snow country in the Southern Highlands to be culled. There are presently around seven thousand of them and they want the number reduced to around seven hundred. That's a lot of meat and hides for someone in the know. JayInOz

":He who laughs last wins" . Squirrelly66 it's been my experience that he who laughs last gets hit first:) You folks ever made rawhide from horse hide? Someone told me once that the hide from a yearling colt made the best rawhide you could get but I haven't had a chance to test it yet. JayInOz

Just wondering if anyone here makes leather flowers. There are some wonderful examples on line and I wouldn't mind having a go at it- though where I'd use them I have no idea. https://www.google.com.au/search?q=leather+flowers&tbm=isch&source=hp&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi52uyht9LiAhUQbisKHeSzBnIQsAR6BAgEEAE&biw=1340&bih=612#imgrc=-Wx7_O4uD3tixM:&spf=1559740804938 That link doesn't look good- but I'm new here- I can probably get away with it JayInOz