MtlBiker

Welcome to the forum! Are you new to sewing or to the machine? Have you tried sewing leather with it? I'm not familiar with that machine but since it seems to be a compound feed machine, it should do well with leather. You many not need to change the presser foot, unless maybe you find it leaves marks on the leather. And of course it also depends on what kind of leather (veg tan or chrome tan) and the thickness and how many layers. You should use leather needles though instead of the general purpose needles that seem to come with the machine. Good luck!

Hi Blanka, and welcome to the forum! Welcome from a fellow Montrealer! I'm curious about the leather course you took. Are you looking for a new or used machine? I'd suggest that whatever machine you get, you make sure it has a servo motor (most new machines do) and it would be really helpful to also have a speed reducer. And the other thing that's really nice is a NP (needle positioner) motor. That can be turned off, but it lets you set the machine to always stop sewing with the needle down in the fabric or up. I have all that on my Techsew 2750Pro and I am very happy with it. If you're looking for new, I've bought two new machines (Consew 206RB-5 and Consew skiver) from Equipment Delisle on blvd. St. Laurent. Stephen Delisle has been very helpful. I think they sometimes have used machines also and from time to time they sell a demo at a really good price. Worth checking them out. Good luck!

That's interesting about Mop & Glo... I just searched for it online here in Canada, and many retailers list it (Walmart.ca, HomeDepot.ca, Canadian Tire) but all say "not available in stores" and also "out of stock" online. I don't know if this is a supply issue (many products seem to be out of stock since Covid) or if the product is no longer available in Canada, but the only place I found it was on Amazon Canada, but the price was insane! $50 for a 32oz bottle!!!!! The price from the other out of stock retailers is only $7-8 for the same bottle. But not in stock. I do have some Resolene though, and I also got a bottle of Fiebing's Pro Resist. I'll be experimenting soon.

That's a pretty nice looking bag. You're talking about using 2mm leather (5oz) for it? Depending on the leather that might be plenty stiff even without using any additional stiffener. Best way would be for you to make a small test piece and judge for yourself. I'm a relative beginner so take what I say with a grain of salt, but I've actually used Decovil Light on the base of a couple of bags. The leather had been chrome tan slightly less than 5oz and the Decovil Light (only used it on the base) worked perfectly. Just have to be a little careful with the heat when you fuse it on. I hope this helps.

Why would you go through the trouble of re-forging a cheap hammer? Did you see what @dans79 said above? He took a $10.49 hammer and made it into a work of art, without re-forging. I think his result is really gorgeous. Can you get a "cheap" hammer for less cost than that one?

That's terrific! I wish I'd seen that before spending money on yet another Osborne product that is inferior quality. I've already polished out the little scratches and smoothed the sharp transition, and then with a buffing attachment on my dremel, and some polishing paste, I ALMOST got a mirror finish. It's certainly very usable now, but when I have time I'm going to continue and try to get the mirror finish. I know it's not needed, but for some crazy reason it's something I feel is very cool. And I'll continue making my Osborne better... it's almost at the mirror finish stage already.

That sounds really expensive ($750US) for something so old and rusty. But good luck to you.

Sounds like you're a very patient man! I too have had bad experiences with China Post and Chinese vendors, most recently I ordered a bunch of double cap rivets through AliExpress. One of the only places I could find 12mm caps with 12mm long shaft. Anyway, a pack of 100 sets was something like $8, and the shipping was listed as about $6 (I can't remember the exact prices but pretty close to this). I added 10 different sets to my order (black, gunmetal, silver, gold etc) in two different sizes and then was surprised that the same shipping cost was added to EACH set!!! I sent an email to the vendor (these were all from the same vendor) and he replied that he'd adjust the shipping for my total order. The order came in surprisingly fast (only one week) with everything in one package, and I was charged for the shipping on EACH set in spite of him having said he'd take care of it. I emailed again and now after two tries, I'm not getting a reply. SIGH In the case of the Sinabroks chisels, the frustration was that through his selling website, there is NO way to leave a message or contact the seller. And my credit card was charged for for the order on the 5th. No acknowledgement of the order, and no shipping notification. So thanks to @GatoGordo having posted the owner's email, I sent him a message asking about it. He did reply, saying that he'd ship my order about the 20th. SIGH Pretty annoying considering the items I ordered were all marked as "in stock".

Gee, you linked to an antique video... aren't there any more recent or new ones? Seriously, thanks very much! When I started sewing and particularly working with leather, I had no idea there were so many facets to it, and oh so much to learn. But it sure is fun!

Thanks very much! I'm just a dinosaur I guess, as I've never been on Facebook and probably never will. But there really should be a contact link on their business website.

Thanks very much for the tips, Fred. Much clearer to me now. But if you're coating "everything" with your resist, how does the shoe polish stick to the stamped part? Or do you gently apply the resist over the stamped area, trying to only hit the high parts? So that then the polish would go in the depressed areas? I'm just going to experiment I guess, but your tips are very helpful and will get me headed in the right direction. Thanks!

That looks more like the top of a salt shaker than a cobbler's hammer! But with my hammer, it wasn't the small scratches and pitting on the face of the hammer that marked the leather but rather the sharp transition from the face to the sides. I've rounded that off and will finish with polishing (POLISHing) it tonight but I'm sure it won't be leaving any more marks.

Geez, you're RIGHT!! I just used my new poundo board under the leather and really pressed down even harder (my full weight) and yes, the stamp came out perfectly. If anything, I may have even pressed too hard as the edge of the stamp shows in the leather. I'm not completely clear on the advice you gave about dyeing... Do you mean apply the dye to the whole piece first? And I'm not quite sure what "resist" is. And my sample piece is a pre-dyed veg tan which I really like to use. So I wouldn't be applying dye to it. I guess just a "resist"? Is a "resist" another name for some kind of top coat, like maybe Fiebing's Leather Balm with Atom Wax (which I like using) or Tan Kote, or Resolene (which I find too hard and shiny). Or is that a specific product? This is my test piece (still wet).

Does anyone know how to contact Sinabroks? There doesn't appear to be any contact link on their website nor any way to send them an email. I placed an order for chisels on the 5th (and that's the day I was charged for the order) and I haven't received any shipping notice or acknowledgement of any kind. I'd like to check up on my order (everything was marked as being in stock). How can a company not list any way to send them a message?

I just got my first ever stamps... just a simple maple leaf and a wolf from Tandy Leather. I wanted to experiment with them. Is there a technique for somehow coloring or darkening the stamp to make it more visible? I heard something about using shoe polish but how do you do it? How do you keep the polish from the surrounding leather? Here is my first test... using a 1-ton arbor press and I did dampen the leather first. The circled corner points of the maple leaf are for Tandy as that particular stamp is missing part of the outline and I'm sure they will replace it for me.

I'm going to try doing this by hand. I'll first take a fine file to the hard transition edge which does leave a mark, and then I'll sue fine sandpaper and eventually some polishing compound. I'm sure I'll get it into better shape, but I'll keep in mine @chrisash's suggestion to put some soft leather on the face.

Good idea to glue some soft leather on the face of the hammer. I'm first going to try to round off that sharp transition (it does mark the leather) and polish it. And I may end up putting some leather on the face. Thanks.

Turns out that the pit in the face doesn't show/mark the leather if I pound it. BUT... the sharp transition from the face to the sides does mark the leather. So I willhvae to round that edge off and at the same time I'll polish the face and get rid of that pit. It's the pits!

Was it like that when you got it? If not, what did you do? Sandpaper? Like 2-4000 grit?

Thanks Fred. It is indeed rough, but I'm going to first try what @chuck123wapati suggested. Hit some leather and see what it looks like. Have to wait until the end of the day and I go home though. I'm very reluctant to send the hammer back.... do you remember a month or two ago when I posted about an Osborne edge creaser I'd received? That was so sharp it was cutting the leather instead of just creasing it. I eventually received a replacement from my dealer for it (Osborne replaced it for them) and the replacement was virtually just as bad. I've since moved to the knockoffs that are available for dirt cheap through Amazon and they are much MUCH better that the two from Osborne. I don't want to send the hammer back because I'd surely be labelled as a chronic complainer by the dealer. (That might not be wrong, as I think if you're paying for something it should be usable for the task it's designed for.) Anyway, if this marks up my leather, I'm going to find out how to buff out that roughness and polish it. I just didn't have to expect to do have to do that.

I just received my first real leather cobbler's hammer... it's made by Osborne. The head isn't as smooth or blemish free as I'd expected... should I worry about it? Or should I try to polish it up (if so, how)? I've read that these hammers need to be absolutely perfect so as not to mark up the leather and that you should always be careful with them and not use them for anything other than pounding down your stitch line. What would you do?

I'm too inexperienced to be able to tell what kind of leather my piece is, but it's quite soft and the surface feels somewhat uh, sticky. Maybe it's a type of suede? It's 5oz thick and I showed it to a friend of mine who wanted me to make a simple eyeglass slip in case using it. So I made it, and now wanted to put some kind of top finishing coating on the leather. Mainly to cover/hide the overlap of the edge finishing I did at the top of the case before stitching it together. I used tokonole on the edge and I guess I wasn't careful enough or my buffing came onto the front of the case and it shows. I didn't think much of it at the time, thinking that when I finish the top it would be hidden. I just tested a small piece by putting Fiebings Leather Balm with Atom Wax on it, and the leather changed completely. It lost the appeal that my friend had liked. So I'm kinda stuck. Is there anything you might recommend that I could use on the leather mainly to camouflage the overlap of the top edge finishing? But also to better protect the leather? Should I try wiping the case with alcohol? (Or should I just drink the alcohol and call it a night?) Here's a photo... the small piece of leather on top of the case was the SAME as the case before I put that leather balm on it.

I just checked the KS Blade website... I guess I didn't do enough research before ordering the Sinabroks, but I didn't know about them. And while there is a dealer in Canada for Sinabroks (out of stock though on what I wanted) there doesn't seem to be a source for KS Blade other than through the US or direct. But anyway, I saw only one review on the KS Blade site, and it said the the product comes unsharpened and that unless you sharpen and polish the blades, the chisel will have a hard time going through leather and be hard to pull out. Was that your experience? For the price, I would expect these to be ready to go out of the box. I sure hope the Sinabroks come ready to use.

Be sure that the machine you're looking at does zig-zag, if that's what you need. Most of the clones don't. Walking foot alone doesn't mean it does. Even Sailrite's own LS-1 is straight stitch only. I own a Sailrite LSZ-1 machine and I love it. I truly believe the quality of the machine is head and shoulders better than the clones but what really sets Sailrite apart from the others is their outstanding customer support. Plus they've got all the accessories. Their how-to videos are exceptional, and I do not regret for a second having bought it. What do you plan to sew with it? Be aware that for some applications a compound/triple feed machine would be better than just a walking foot.

Sorry, but I just can't resist teasing you a little bit... Some Canadian, eh? Can't even spell HOCKEY!