Speeding Up The Making Process

[anester05]

Well if my business picks up a little I will certainly start buying drum dyed. What about hot stuffed? Does Drum dyed work just like veg tan but just dyed already?

Well it looks like I will be looking into my first machine purchase, which I think will be a splitter. Any suggestions?

Where is the one I am looking at.

http://www.sdtradingco.com/Splitters.htm

The heritage one because I don't have a-lot of starting cash and I think right now, besides a sewing machine, this will save me the most time.

When carving a belt how much time does it take you to do a 38" belt? What things do you do to save time while carving?

Thanks for all the great answers, they are pointing me is a better direction.

[dirtclod]

Get the one on the right !!! Yes it cost more but it is a lot better machine. I have both and know what i'm talking about.

[JustKate]

Most of the time there is a time savings to batching things up but I learned a few things along the way. .

Plan your work so you get at least some items completed in a reasonable amount of time. ... My small business advisor told me to batch things in some kind of numbers that could be completed in 6 days. That way I could have an extra day if something came up, but mentally I could tell myself that I had actually accomplished something that week. I had something tangible to look at. Most of the time that is how I scheduled my work.

...

<agreeing...> It does not take twice as long to make two of something than it takes to make one. I started cranking out a lot more work when I started doing more items that I planned to sell a lot of in batches of 4 or 5 at a time.

[Art]

Drum dyeing is just a finishing process as is hot stuffing, they are done to hides that are tanned already. Hot stuffing drives tallows, liquors, or whatever into the leather under steam heat and centripetal force. The liquors and oils they use in hot stuffing are determined by the finisher at the tannery, which ultimately determines if the hide is bridle, harness, etc. The drum dyeing just determines the color, they can do it a lot easier than you can, so if you are getting them to do a lot of work for you for basically nothing, go for it. Keep an airbrush around (Badger 250 for big jobs and a 150 for detail work) so you can be creative when you want to.

If you are going to carve or stamp, you generally don't want anything hot stuffed, and drum dyeing doesn't allow you to do shading, resisting, antiquing, or other decorative applications where color and or shading is part of the work.

Get a splitter if you want, but what I would recommend is the Osborne 84 or Campbell-Bosworth Keystone. In my opinion, you don't need one if you can learn to skive. Go to one of the shows where Paul Zalesak or Terry Knipschield are selling their knives. Learn to skive from either, they both make excellent product and you can buy a knife to do more than just skive. Get your leather split to the thickness you want by the tannery. Or buy a band splitter for $16,000 and it still won't skive.

What a volume beltmaker needs is a Slitter not a splitter, or you can get Weaver to slit hides for you if you buy from them. If you are doing double and stitched belts you will need a sewing machine, as handstitching those gets old fast.

I do borders and geometrics, ask Bobby Park how long to carve a belt and then figure times 3 or 4.

Art

Well it looks like I will be looking into my first machine purchase, which I think will be a splitter. Any suggestions?

When carving a belt how much time does it take you to do a 38" belt? What things do you do to save time while carving?

[Bluesman]

Lot's of good replys here, from Bruce and build quantities to Sylvia's station setup. I can tell you from my personal experience, manufacturing assembly and now sales it's all the same. Setting up work stations is an absolute must. You waste time in cleaing off a table or an area to do something else. This is known as setup and needs to be removed from your schedule. Bruce has a perfect sense for this. If you get an order for 30. Tell the customer that you will ship 6 a week for 5 consecutive weeks. That way he gets something, you are accoomplishiong a task and everybody is happy. I have been in manufactruing for over 40 years and I can tell you one thing. Making a product is just like making a pizza. Go to your local pizza joint and watch them. Order comes in, order is made, order is baked, order is bagged, order is sold. Next order, one at a time. You can batch, but make them small, unless there is some setup requied as with a slitter, clicker die or sewing machine. Here you want to batch to take advantage of the time spent changing over.

Good Luck

Jon

[anester05]

What is a slitter?

[Art]

Slitter, better known as Strap Cutter.

Art

What is a slitter?

[anester05]

That would be awesome, so I guess I know what I need to save for. How much does the hand crank one cost from weaver?

[dirtclod]

Are you going to double stitch the halters and headstalls ? If you are i would get a sewing machine and a skiver before i spent 2000.00 on a strap cutter or a bell skiver unless you have a ton of business already lined up with cash in hand for your products. Over the years i have made a bunch of headstalls and halters and they both need skiving and a halter needs to have ever piece on it skived. You can get a wooden strap cutter and cut out all of your pieces as long as their are no curves.

[Art]

$1400 or so.

That would be awesome, so I guess I know what I need to save for. How much does the hand crank one cost from weaver?