Arturomex

Just to follow up a bit. I had the good fortune to buy one of these knives from Terry and I'm very happy with it. Great knife at a great price! Probably one of the best hundred bucks I've spent in a long time and I feel I got a damn good bargain. Happy about dealing with Terry, too. No muss, no fuss, straight ahead and the product I received was exactly as advertised. Make no mistake about it, this is a stout knife. My "go to" is an older Osborne Head Knife with a bit of the handle lopped off that weighs in at about 71g (2.7 oz). Terry's knife weighs in at just over 200g (7.1 oz). This is a pretty substantial chunk of steel. I don't expect any knife to be as sharp as I want and while this one came with a good basic edge on it (it cut leather without a problem), a little time on the hone and strop turned it into a formidable cutting tool that takes and holds a beautiful edge. Also noted that the honing and stropping process didn't just fine tune this blade, it also gave me some time with the knife in hand to get used to the weight and ergonomics of it and I consider it time well spent. Although I prefer a slightly shorter handle the ergonomics of this knife work well for me. Especially those nice, subtle thumb depressions. The handle is a little longer and bigger than I'm used to using but that's me and it didn't take long to adapt to this tool. What I would really like to see Terry produce next is something using the same grade of steel at about half the thickness used in this knife, a handle about half to three quarters inches shorter and with a head knife configuration on the blade. I'd be on that like a fat kid on a Smartie. I don't have any connection with Terry aside from buying this knife but I recommend keeping an eye out for whatever (if ever) might be offered in the future. I will be. Regards, Arturo

Just received a new pair of boots made of what appears to be pretty oily, waxy leather with a definite pull up quality to it. In an effort to stop the kilties from curling, I'm thinking about gluing some Tandy Bag Stiffener to the underside of the kilties. The leather feels a little oily and I'm considering contact cement as a bond. While I'd like to do a trial run on another piece of leather, I don't have anything with this particular leather's qualities on hand. Never used contact cement on an oiled leather. Hoping someone here has and can share their experience and the results. Thanks, Arturo

Looks great! How is it working for you? Regards, Arturo

Look forward to your report on this. My big criteria when I'm making a strop is the firmness of the leather. I think that softer tempered leathers tend to "curl" around the blade and I don't think they deliver optimum performance. I use 3 X 3/4 inch milled oak for my blanks. I buy four or six foot boards at a box store and have them cut it into 12 inch lengths on their saw. I use contact cement to glue a slightly oversize piece of leather onto the blank leaving 3 1/2 inches bare on one end. After I have the leather affixed I roll it with my kitchen rolling pin making sure the edges and two corners are on tight and then trim at the edges of the blank. I usually go grain side up with the hardest, firmest 2 to 3 or 3 to 4 ounce veg tan I can find. Depending on what I'm doing, I will put olive oil on a strop before applying a compound like white rouge. I find that after a while the oil has a tendency to soften the leather a bit and I watch closely for sponginess. (Again, the curl around the blade.) Regards, Arturo

I couldn't agree more. And it seems to me that any time I've imported something worthwhile from the US, customs brokers have been quite gleeful as well.

On the same track as Tom, there. Not to hi-jack this thread but I wonder, Tom, if you you've ever dealt with Buckskin in Calgary? I was actually in the Nanaimo store this afternoon. Regrds, Arturo

I have to believe there's more than one leather store in Vancouver but are you referring to Lonsdale Leather when your say, "the shop in town?" I don't really see them as a big latigo supplier but I've used several veg tan double shoulders that were OK. Not great but OK. You have Tandy in Surrey. As Sheiliajeanne notes, there's a lot to be said for being able to pick your own leather or, depending on the quality on any given day, picking not to pick any leather. It's disappointing to walk out of a shop without the leather you went in for but not nearly as disappointing as opening a package of second grade leather you paid a premium price for on the 'net.. It's worth checking the Tandy Canada website periodically to see what's on sale. I imagine there are a lot of opinions about the quality of leather from Tandy. I find that sometimes the quality is there, sometimes it's not. This, of course, makes it very difficult to plan any kind of production. Another source you might want to check out is Buckskin Leather. They have B&M stores in Calgary, Edmonton and Nanaimo. If you're talking a fair size order, it's definitely worth while talking price with these folks. Web site here: https://www.buckskinleather.com/ I see that they are now also a Weaver Leathercraft distributor.

My understanding is that you're applying dye, then paint, then sealer. Is that correct? If you apply dye, then seal it with an acrylic based product (think Resolene) and then paint you shouldn't have any problems. Acrylic paint on an acrylic substrate should give you a good result as long as everything has dried properly.. I don't think you should need to apply another sealer after the paint but I think I would probably put some Resolene on anyway but that's just me. It's important to remember that you can't put acrylic paint on anything that has oil or wax on it. As for dyes, Fiebings sells 32 oz bottles of dye and gallon jugs of Resolene. Regards, Arturo

Very interesting, indeed! Thanks for putting that up. Regards, Arturo

Yeah, I know he's more about the grading thing but I thought you might find the reference to the producer of the video you referenced interesting. There's an interesting little nugget on chrome tanned leather here: https://leatherworker.net/forum/topic/71045-how-to-identify-chrome-or-veg-tan/ in the fourth post. Regards, Arturo

This is an interesting article that addresses some of that marketing hype: https://nstarleather.wordpress.com/2018/05/31/the-grades-of-leather-hierarchy-youve-probably-read-about-is-a-myth/ Regards, Arturo

Just a reminder that acrylic paint doesn't work well over any kind of oil. Regards, Arturo

So, why don't you just say you measure 7 1/2 inches from the center hole?

This. Because it works. This. Because it's correct.

Look forward to hearing about this. Regards, Arturo

The last time I looked you could download the Lucky 8 Belt Book from the Tandy Library for free. Page three shows the "Proper Way To Measure A Belt." If measuring from an old belt it suggests measuring from the buckle tongue (where it would rest in the billet) to the most used hole on the old belt. That hole would determine the center hole on the new belt. Measuring from waist size, it shows measuring from the buckle tongue on the buckle and then making the center hole to the size of the measured waist. The illustrations show 5 holes in the billet with the billet extending 4 3/4 inches from the center hole for a single keeper and 5 3/4 inches from the center hole for two keeper loops. Page nine, however, shows the holes being punched 3/4 of an inch apart and the billet extending 5 inches past the center hole as does the section on tapered billets. I just measured the belt I'm wearing. It's five holes at 1 inch spacing. The center hole is 6 inches from the end of the billet with the hole closest to the end 4 inches from the end of the billet. Regards, Arturo

I'm very curious to see how this works out for you. Please let us know what you think of it. Regards, Arturo

I'd really like to know how this works for you. I like the way it works on veg tan in the first video and the leather in the book binding video seems to be a little softer. If it works reasonably well on softer tempered leathers it will be ideal for what I want to do. Please, let us know what you think. Regards, Arturo

This looks interesting but I wonder how well it would work on soft temper leather. I checked out some of the Chinese made machines and it looks like they can use the old double edge safety razor blades. I wonder if that's possible with the German made machine. Regards, Arturo

Wondering if anyone has any experience with Sunstar machines. Korean made, I believe. I see they also offer a skiver. Perhaps I'm not Googling correctly but I don't see much in the way of reviews on the 'net. I have read the thread here on forum. Just checking to see if anyone has anything more to add. A couple of links to machines I'm looking at: https://www.sunstar.co.kr/en/product/sm/1289/listProdSmModel.do https://www.sunstar.co.kr/en/product/sm/1294/listProdSmModel.do Thanks for your input. Arturo

Yeah, I agree. Lots of uninformed opinion in this thread that's easily tempered by reading the experiences of the people who've actually gone through the process. I've imported a few items from China. It's no day at the beach and what you thought you bought isn't always what you get. When I buy from a dealer I get what I pay for. Your mileage, however...

I like the Osborne No. 145 sewing awl haft. Not jazzy but I like the way it fits my hand and it works for me. I'm on the same page as zuludog; it takes me about an hour to sharpen and polish an Orborne blade to my liking. I paid $24.00 CDN for the haft and $10.00 CDN per for blades. I suspect I could probably get the blades for less if I shopped harder. Leather Wranglers has a little video here showing what a well sharpened and polished Osborne blade can/should do for you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ARvDZoOZGLs&feature=youtu.be Regards, Arturo

LOL " when you offer it for free, folks will walk on by." True, that. A while ago I had a little cow/calf operation and we backgrounded calves over the winter. Had a nice big pile of well rotted manure in the yard and I needed to lose some of it. We were about 30 miles from a fair sized city so I put an ad in the classifieds offering to load for free. No response. Was having coffee with an older neighbor and mentioned it to him. "Well," he said, "your problem is that you're giving it away, son. Run another ad offering it at $25.00 a load." So, I did. The next Saturday there was a line of pickups a quarter of a mile long on the section road waiting for me to swing the gate. Couldn't give s**t away but they lined up to pay for it. Cleaned up in more ways than one. LOL

LOL You're pretty sharp for this time of morning, Chuck.

Hi Chris, Have you tried contacting Leather Machine Company? I don't know if they deal in used machines but they're fairly close to you in Ontario CA. and it might be worthwhile to get in touch with them. Regards, Arturo