Air Powered Leather Too;ing Machine

[BillB]

Oscillating tools (air powered or electrical powered) have been around for some time. Some of them good and some of them not so good. When I received my Uncle's leather tools they included a Burgess Vibro Tool. It dates from the 1940s or 1950s and still works. It does make noise, but that is primarily due to its age. With todays electrical components one could be made that would be very quite. I have also seen an engraver using a pneumatic vibrator about 1 inch in size to do fine engraving on gun barrels, etc. His was powered by a small modelers air compressor that would fit in my hand and did not make a lot of noise. Of course its size did not require a lot of air volume either. Some times we forget that tools are developed to help make "work" easier. We don't use rocks for hammers, flint knives for cutting (though the bones knives are rather nice), and we don' fashion our bevels and other "tools" out of wood or soft metals. Some folks have gone as far as using lasers to create the patterns. I use both needle and thread and an electric sewing machine. I really don't know what the term "Hand" crafted means anymore so I tend not to use it. Nor do I want to start another long discussion on that term. Just presenting food for thought. As for me I will continue to design and craft products for my customers, one at a time.

BillB

Sorry about not having the picture of the Burgess Vibro Tool on my last post. Here it is.

Bill B

[TwinOaks]

Another factor for consideration is the eventual nerve damage caused by LOTS of vibration. It tends to desensitize one's hands.....which is why there's always a market for "better" tools. For the tool in question, I could see it useful for a lot of beveling in straight runs, or perhaps a really large amount of backgrounding.....and that's about it. So much of what we do is in the details that speed is only acquired through practice. Now, something like a spring punch would, I think, be useful for single handed stamping.

[whinewine]

It just looks very cumbersome, and being cumbersome, it would over time become heavy & hard to use, especially with the vibration factor.

[Suze]

looks like it would be hard to control

and really his work doesn't have a "craftsman" finish (looks sort of "wal-mart quality" to me) you know get it done and get it done fast - costomers will never notice kind of thing.

If I am Paying BIG bucks for something -- I want it to look really GOOD not slapdash

[Vikti]

I watched a couple of his videos showing this tool. While I know that there are times when we use a beveler on an area where we didn't cut the leather to get certain effects but there is very little carving that I saw on his videos. On some of his work he shows images that really needed to be carved before beveling and some of that looks real bad.

Good intentions but, I think, bad implementation.

[jeffroberts]

I got into the craft to explore what I can create with my brain and two hands, part of the joy is creating certain hands tools as I need them, learning the swivel knife and the never ending practice of hand stitching ! Bottom line is my shop is quiet and peaceful with a little background of soft classic rock which seems to foster the creative process after watching you guys / gals here foe inspiration. Peace / jeff