NoahL

Elegant, smooth, and I like the two-tone dye job you have on there. How is the retention with it only being stitched to where the handle starts? ~Noah

It looks nice to me--I'm a fan of the minimal molding, especially ~Noah

I did the stitching holes for this with a drill press: ~Noah

I really like that second sheath! I can't say as I've ever seen a knife angled quite like that ~Noah

Hello everyone, This is a belt I just finished for a customer in India (my first international order!) out of 7-9oz horsehide with distressed brass hardware. The buckle is removable (Chicago screws) and the keeper loop is a "spiral" design that I came up with (at least I think I came up with it?) to compliment the angle of the end of the belt, as well as add a little more character, and the edges have been left rough. Thanks for looking! ~Noah

Hello everyone, As you may or may not have seen, I have been making sheaths lately. Well, I would like to add holes for paracord to some of the sheaths I make at some point, and as of right now I can do that, but I don't have any eyelets to reinforce them. I can leave them glued with Barge, or I could even stitch around them, but those things don't really improve wear resistance or prevent stretch. All of the eyelets I have found are too short to go through three or four layers of 7-9oz leather. Does anyone know where to get eyelets long enough for that? Preferably somewhere other than Ohio Travel Bag, because I don't need $75 worth of eyelets Thanks! ~Noah

For wrist cuffs, which are just short bracers, I just take too measurements--one around the wrist, and one around the forearm where I want the cuff to end (or start, depending on how you look at it). Then, I lay those measurements out on a large piece of paper, connect the ends with straight lines, and viola, a pattern. If you are referring to getting the curve for the ends...I just eyeball that, to be perfectly honest ~Noah

Looks good to me! ~Noah

I would imagine that you can screenprint, but I doubt the standard screenprinting ink you use for fabric would work very well on leather, since you have to get it pretty hot to set it. I know that laser etching looks very nice. ~Noah

Hello everyone, This is a sheath I made for member on another forum for a Michigan Trail knife he had made by John of JK Handmade Knives. The sheath is made of 7-9oz horsehide leather and hand stitched with hemp thread. Thanks for looking! ~Noah

I guess that my question would be "Why?" Cross-drawing a sword that is sheathed edge-up has it's benefits--generally in that it is easy to make a fast, smooth cut directly from the draw. What benefit would there be in a strong-side horizontal edge-up sheath? It would be difficult to draw, and probably awkward to get into a comfortable grip once you did. That said, you could do it very simply just by making a right-handed sheath and putting a horizontal loop in place of the standard loop. ~Noah

Very cool kit! I had been thinking of a knife/hatchet combo sheath, but nothing like that! ~Noah

No problem, guys, and thanks for the tip on the magnets, Kings X! ~Noah

Hello everyone, Well, I broke my holster for my Blackberry 8830 last night while jumping out of my car to try and avoid the 8" of water that collected in my parking space (I failed). I now have a replacement holster on the way, so I decided to dismantle my broken one, lay it out, and trace it to make a pattern, so here it is in case anyone wants it: Blackberry 8830 Holster Pattern For your reference, the circles with the M's inside indicate where the magnets were for the closure flap. You will also want to put a groove down the center of the inside to leave room for the rollerball, otherwise it will get smashed and damaged over time. The side flaps are elastic on the original holster, but I don't think that is really necessary. Also, if you want to get really fancy, you can put one of those thin little watch-battery-sized stainless steel magnets (they usually come with cheap magnetic bulletin board strips, like from IKEA) at the very bottom of the back of the holster, and that will tell the Blackberry to go into holster-mode. ~Noah

I haven't ever made anything like that, but it almost sounds as though you would have to make a button-and-slot type of mechanism for that. I'll be very interested to see what you come up with. ~Noah

We can see them in your last three posts--very nice! It looks like something a Samurai-jockey would wear ~Noah

VERY cool welding helmet! ~Noah

Very nicely done--it all looks very well made! I had thought about making bolt holsters, but I ended up not doing it because I don't actually know any competition shooters. These make me want to make some anyway, though ~Noah

Thanks! I definitely am excited to see your apocalyptic style work, Kim! ~Noah

Very clean! I really like the belt loop style, too ~Noah

The Horween Tannery is still up and running in Chicago, and still tanning horsehide. Not sure who told you that all of the US tanneries for horsehide were closed. It just depends what supplier you buy it from whether or not it comes from Horween (you can't get it from there directly yourself unless you buy 100lbs or more) because each supplier will choose where to get the horsehide from. As far as the imperfections, I agree with Dave's comments above--I tend to like the imperfections, myself. Then again, mine usually only have very minor imperfections, so it could be that your supplier IS getting theirs from overseas instead of from Horween like my supplier. ~Noah

It looks like they block dyed it. There is already a great tutorial on here, but it's late and I've forgotten who made it . Just search the forum for "block dye" and you'll probably find it. Basically, you carve and tool, and then you wipe dye on with something like a firm square of cloth so the dye doesn't run, and it only gets on the surface that way. ~Noah

That is all very cool, and very nicely done! ~Noah

Very cool work, Tom! Someday, when I get brave enough to try real tooling, I'd like to try that block dying method. For now, I'll just marvel at your use of it ~Noah

Thanks Tom! I wondered if you would notice this, since it's a Swedish knife--I have to say, you Swedish folk seem to have making quality tools down to a science ~Noah