Faster Way To Make Stitching Holes?

[NewYorkerInSydney]

Hello good people,

I hand sew everything and really like the look of it vs machine sewing. However, the volume of my work is increasing and my hands are getting REALLY really tired of making every single hole by hand with an awl. I often punch through two glued layers of leather and thats even tougher to do. I have tried using a large number of diamond hole punches, chisel punches, you name it. Almost every kind of multiple hole punch tools and find that some of those holes too big for my liking especially when I sew through things like fine narrow watch straps. I know machine sewing would be the answer but I dont want to go there. Does anyone know of any other way to make the holes faster than one by one with an awl? I wondered a few times if using a sewing machine WITHOUT thread for the purpose of making holes, would work, but I dont have an industrial machine. Any ideas anyone? Id really appreciate it.

Regards,

NYIS

[TexasJack]

I do recall seeing a guy using a Tippman Boss to make the holes, then sewing a saddle stitch on a sheath.

[Jax]

Hi NYIS, if my memory serves me correctly when you hand stitch into machine made holes the stitches lie the opposite way to normal, we tryed all ways of making our stitching quicker neater etc when at college but I think many went back to the old way of making the holes with an awl as they go along, if you ever saw any of the factory stitchers in Walsall they stitch at a phenomenal speed, but they have to they are paid by how many items they stitch.

[NewYorkerInSydney]

Hi guys,

Thanks so much for your responses. I'm pretty fast at making holes with the awl it's just that I'm getting tired. My volume of work is increasing and when you've poked thousands of holes one by one in a day wth an awl my arms and hands want to fall off. I just don't like the idea of machine sewing but I have no idea what else to do. But I'm hurting these days. I hope someone will chime in here with a solution that will solve this problem. ))

Nyis

Hi guys,

Thanks so much for your responses. I'm pretty fast at making holes with the awl it's just that I'm getting tired. My volume of work is increasing and when you've poked thousands of holes one by one in a day wth an awl my arms and hands want to fall off. I just don't like the idea of machine sewing but I have no idea what else to do. But I'm hurting these days. I hope someone will chime in here with a solution that will solve this problem. ))

Nyis

[Jax]

I know just what you mean, I made a set of driving harness for my dad some years ago & hand stitched it all 10 stitches per inch, some straps are 6' long with 4 rows of stitching....it wasn't just my arms that were aching, me bum was too from sitting for so long

[katsass]

Well, I have seen the stitching of an (other) old guy that uses a small bench-top drill press to punch his stitching holes. He uses an overstitch to mark spacing, then uses a small diameter nail (about the size of a #0 harness needle) as the bit. He runs the drill press at it's lowest speed, and as I watched him work, it showed very little (if any) leather being removed from the hole. He has a few boxes of different sizes of nails, and uses a smooth slab of plywood to back his work when drilling/punching the holes. His stitching looked pretty damned good - - to this grumpy old man's eye. He is primarily a knife maker, and doesn't like to spend much time working leather for sheaths. Mike

[Dwight]

Most of my work is sewn by a Tippmann Boss, . . . or I would probably be doing concrete work, or roofing, . . .

That said, . . . every now and then, . . . a project comes up that "needs" to be hand sewn. I have two options: 1) take the thread out of the Boss, . . . make the holes, . . . and stitch the rascal, . . . OR, . . . like Mike said above, . . . use a drill press. When I use a press (in the states we get Chinese cheapies for $50 or so), . . . it is never even plugged in. I mount my regular sewing needle in the chuck, . . . punch the hole.

I also make sure my needle is oriented correctly at all times. If I can see the eye, . . . it's wrong, . . . and I re-orient it so I cannot.

The drill press is not as fast as the Boss, . . . but it is really good for small stuff, . . . and you can have as much control over where everything is done as you could possibly want.

You can creatively also use the drill press as a sewing machine if you punch through, . . . pull up a little bit to produce a loop in the thread under the leather, . . . use a second needle, . . . throw it through the loop (thread attached of course), . . . and pull it all tight.

May God bless,

Dwight

[Rawhide]

put a diamond awl blade in a sewing machine, and use it to punch the stitch holes..

[WinterBear]

Well, you say you don't have an industrial machine, right? Do you have a non-industrial machine? It may or may not be able to pierce the leather with an awl or a needle, it depends on the machine.

What about taking the ideas in here, and chucking the awl into a stationary drill press or a small arbor press? Small presses are generally pretty affordable, and you wouldn't need something with a lot of power or a ratchet. I've been thinking of something similar myself for making these thick welts on some axe covers I'm making, but wasn't sure if it would work. I'm reading through these posts, and beginning to think it should. The leather I'm trying to sew is thick and hard enough that as even as sharp as my awl is, I'm having a hard time punching through. I just can't hold my hands steady enough. If I find and outfit a press with an awl, I think I'll plan on backing the leather I'm punching with a thick piece of cork topped with a piece of skirting to give the awl something to "bite" into that won't damage the awl once it punches through the leather.

[Andrew Chee]

I've used a sewing machine without thread to punch the holes. They come out nice and neat, evenly spaced. Then when you hand sew it, you can't even tell that the machine made the holes. The only problem with a machine js that it cant get into some of the tight areas that you can by hand but the you can always use your awl at that point. You should try it.

Andrew

[alwhorley]

Hello good people,

I hand sew everything and really like the look of it vs machine sewing. However, the volume of my work is increasing and my hands are getting REALLY really tired of making every single hole by hand with an awl. I often punch through two glued layers of leather and thats even tougher to do. I have tried using a large number of diamond hole punches, chisel punches, you name it. Almost every kind of multiple hole punch tools and find that some of those holes too big for my liking especially when I sew through things like fine narrow watch straps. I know machine sewing would be the answer but I dont want to go there. Does anyone know of any other way to make the holes faster than one by one with an awl? I wondered a few times if using a sewing machine WITHOUT thread for the purpose of making holes, would work, but I dont have an industrial machine. Any ideas anyone? Id really appreciate it.

Regards,

NYIS

I use diamond stitching chisels mostly:http://www.tandyleatherfactory.com/en-usd/home/department/tools/punches/88043-535.aspx

Also called pricking irons, though, I think they are a bit different in operation. I know I am tons faster with the chisels, noisier, but faster.

Al

[NVLeatherWorx]

I too use diamond chisels for the larger projects. I can get around a perimeter of 62" within a half hour. I leave the leather slightly damp so that the chisel is easier to withdraw and you don't have to punch it so far through (as so many people do with all of their thonging/stitching chisels).

Can't think of any other methods that would make it easier aside from changing up the type of assembly work (if possible).

[DoubleC]

I recently bought a stitching punch to speed things up although I have three old cast iron Singers and any of them would probably have worked without thread. Actually I'm hand sewing a project now and left my punch and good awl at work so I think I'm going to try that on a project I'm currently working on and see if it works. I'll let you know if it does because these old Singers can be had for a song if you don't need anything but the flywheel and needle assembly to work. Cheryl

[terrymac]

I use a drill press and use my diamond awl blade to punch my holes. You don't need to ever turn the machine on, just use the handle on the drill press to punch the holes. You can punch thru fairly thick leather without much effort. I know some people use a tiny drill bit, but you are still removing material from the hole. If you get a Tandy awl handle, you can pull the chuck out of the wooden handle. It may take a little effort, but it will come. The end of the chuck is a round shaft that fits right into the drill press just like a normal bit would. You can angle your blade just the way you want. Mark your holes like you normally would and punch away. If I am doing a belt, I will take and set up and guide along the back to keep the distance from the edge uniform. It doesn't take long to do a belt, and if you have your chuck set chuck set correctly, your holes will match up just right from front to back. Just a suggestion that works for me, Terry

[Chavez]

Do you have to use the glue?

In my case it's glue that's causing most of the awl blade drag, so I try to avoid it when I can and use tacks instead...

[Tree Reaper]

The problem I had with any type of press is having the leather come back up with the awl because there isn't a foot or restraint to hold it down.

[billymac814]

Here's my experience with this subject.

I once said " I'll never use a machine to stitch my work) I felt that hand stitching was superior, and to some degree it is but I got to the point you're at where I could no longer keep up and really didn't want to try so I had to get a machine or quit taking orders(quit making money) . I now have about a dozen machines for all different purposes and about 98% of my work gets stitched on a machine. I've had no stitch failures since switching to a machine and no customers ever mentioned that they were able to tell the difference. I simply stopped mentioning that they were hand stitched, easy peasy.

That all being said I'm a traditionalist and when I do handsew something I do it with two needles and an awl ,after all if I were to take a shortcut if just use a machine and be done with it. I would say a diamond needle in a press of sorts would produce the same outcome as hand stitching and would be ok but I always tried not to be tempted to take shortcuts that's going to look like a shortcut was taken, the chisels and punches always leave too big of a hole IMO and I don't like the looks of drilled holes or any other method that leaves a round hole.

I would seriously consider a machine, if its financial reasons that is understandable but if you're busy enough to need one you should be able to swing something, if not you need to raise your prices! Many people on here produce some very high quality items and many stitch on some type of machine and I wouldn't even think about saying they make an inferior product because it was machine stitched.

Find someone local to you who has a machine and go spend some time with them and see what they can do, they open far more doors than they close. I would not be where I'm at if I didn't buy my first machine.

Good luck.

[Fd3615]

anyone ever consider modifying an arbor press to accept a punch?

[janaka]

i refuse any faster way, i punch my leather pieces a single piece by a single piece, all i need are just patient and calculate the measurements precisely. i want my work to be as close to 100% handmade as possible.

[bunkeru2k]

anyone ever consider modifying an arbor press to accept a punch?

I have modified a press and attached a Jacobs drill chuck to it to use with the diamond awl. It also works very well for punching the holes for belts, chicago screws, and installing snaps. For making the 2 layer belts and holsters, I don't have much of an issue on keeping the leather on the table portion just using finger pressure. I did take a 2x4 and cut/glue a piece of scrap on it that I can use as a foot if I have some tough sections. I am actually using a cheap plastic cutting board under it that is working out well as a temporary table until I can make a thin metal adjustable table that will be adjusted to use as a guide for faster punching stitching holes.

My advice is buy a bigger arbor press to have more clearance.

[Dangerous Beans]

Try a pricking iron, a no 7 11/2 iron will give you 7 stitches per inch, 12 holes per strike.

Have a look at the beginning of this video I did for another member.

http://youtu.be/0gtonQ3YF5s

Nige