Red,white,& Blue Stitching

[jim hamer]

good evening everyone,

i have just made my son a a damascus knife with his firemans cross schrimshawed on the scale (he is an emt, fireman). it has ivory scales with red, white, & blue spacers. i want to stitch the sheath in red,white,&blue. any help would be appreciated. also what color stain would make the blue stand out.

thanks all,

jim hamer

[DoubleC]

Wow, a Picture would sure help on this one Jim. Cheryl

[electrathon]

You use 3 threads and move forwards one one the front and two on the rear, stagering forwards. The back will not look as good as the front.

[jim hamer]

thanks for the reply, cheryl,

i'm a 69 year old knife maker and will have to get my grandson or granddaughter to show me how to to download the pictures to this site (after christmas, unless we can be sneaky). it will be ambidextrous, non pouch. left for dress, right for work, as cross is on one side only. i was thinking of red 1/3 white 1/3 blue 1/3. three stitch lines could make it rather bulky. the blue is tandy thread. all i could find. a good looking knife if i can toot my own wistle. will post pictures when i learn how. can't figure how much welt three parallel lines will take.

thanks for your advice,

jim hamer

hamer knives

[electrathon]

like this

[jim hamer]

electrathon,

sorry but i don't quite understand. used to single color stitching. have done some double stitched. fun keeping them lined up!

jim hamer

hamer knives

[electrathon]

There are three threads, Each thread does every third stitch. You are sewing one thread at a time. Move over and do it again, next thread does every third stitch. the final thread fills in the final space. the back does not look as good as the front.

It is easier to demonstrate than to explain.

Aaron

[WinterBear]

If you're using a welt, you can run the extra thread between the welt, so you only show one thread front and back, albeit each stitch on both sides will show in different colors.

[jim hamer]

thanks,

i will practice tomorrow. time for this old man to go to bed.

jim

[immiketoo]

MAn you guys lost me on that one. I have no idea how that works, regardless of how the back side looks. Is it each an individual saddle stitch?

[TwinOaks]

http://leatherworker.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=15122

Here is a short tutorial on how to load the pictures to Leatherworker.net.

As we have members that don't have high speed internet, large picture files sometimes take a long time to load/view. You can solve that minor issue by resizing the picture. If you don't have a program that can do it, you can download "IRFANVIEW", which is a very basic photo editing program and is free.

To use it, simply open the program, then open a picture file (you can work directly from a camera, or from a saved image on the computer).

Once you have the file open, click on the drop down menu under 'image'. With the open pic file, you will see an option for "resize/resample"...click that. That will open a window that asks what size you want to use. The 800x600 size (on the right hand side of the window) is one of the standard sizes for emails. Click on that size, click okay, and give it a moment. When the dialogue boxes closed, you'll be left with a resized picture. You still need to save it, so click on the button that looks like one of the old floppy disks, type in the name you want to use for the file - something that's easy to identify, like 'sheath1'. I typically save the resized image directly to the desk top instead of a file, as it's easier to find. Then, open LW and follow the directions in the tutorial above.

If you want to view a large picture on a slow speed internet line, instead of waiting for it to load in the current tab ( sometimes the picture is larger than the screen and requires scrolling to see it) simply click and drag the image to the "new tab" button. This will open the pic in the new tab and it will be a viewable size.

[DoubleC]

I can see what Aaron means on his example, and I'm wondering if there is a way to make it look ok like WinterBear said. I don't understand exactly how that would work, can't 'see' it in my head but sound like it would work with what Aaron did. A picture would help me so much, I'm sorry Jim. Cheryl

[WinterBear]

Ok, maybe this will help. Excuse my stitches, I wasn't exactly 100% awake, so I wasn't terribly careful about which thread was on top of the next, so they're a little wonky.

This is where you can hide the threads in the welt, so you show three-colored stitch on the front, and a three-colored stitch on the back. It's not exactly a saddle stitch, more like a backstitch crossed with a saddle stitch, and likely a weaker join overall than a saddle stitch.

I have three layers of leather in this example. The top (T), the middle or welt (W), and the bottom ( . For this, I stacked the pieces all grain side up, but you could certainly have the outside layers both grain side out. The three threads are called White, Brown, and Dk. Brown in the directions below. Now, the hidden threads in this example lie between the welt layer and the top layer, but could just as easily lie between the bottom and the welt. You can cut a groove to hold the bulk of the hidden stitch in the welt, or if you are using two layers to the welt, you could cut a groove into the sides of the welt that face each other, making a hidden channel to hold the threads.

To start, I ran White from the backside through the first hole in the bottom layer (so hole B1), the first hole in the welt layer (W1), and the second hole in the top layer (T2), then down through all three layers at hole three (T3, W3, B3).

The Brown cord starts in the welt, and goes up through T1, then down through T2, W2, B2.

The Dk Brown cord starts at the top and goes down through all three layers in the first hole (T1, W1, B1), then up B2, W2, T3, down T4, W4, B4.

The White cord goes up through B4, W4, T5, then down through T6, W6, B6.

The Brown cord goes up B3, W3, T4, then down T5, W5, B5.

Dk Brown goes up B5, W5, T6, then down T7, W7,B7.

White goes up B7, W7, T8, then down T9, W9, B9.

Brown goes up B6, W6, T7, then down T8, W8, B8.

Dk. Brown goes up B8, W8, T9, then down T10, W10, B10. And etc.

Front or top view.

Back or rear view.

View of hidden stitches between the welt and top layer. The top layer is to the left.

Edited November 18, 2012 by WinterBear

[DoubleC]

OK that makes perfect sense to me EXCEPT what is the welt piece for anyway? I hear that term used all the time on different projects but I am not sure what you do with it. I have always confused it with piping on upholstery. Cheryl

[David8386]

It is the piece you put in between the front and back to allow for the thickness of the knife, gun, etc... And to keep the blade from cutting your stitching.

David

[DoubleC]

Thanks David. Then I understand perfectly what WinterBear means. guess I should have asked a long time ago what it meant. Cheryl

[jim hamer]

Thanks all for the replies. The welt is allready glued. I was thinking stitching the top right 1/3 red, the bottom 1/3 white, the top left 1/3 blue. Any opinions?

Jim