Thin Awls

[whitIL]

Hello--

I'm sewing by hand and fairly new at it. Sometimes I would like to sew something that doesn't require much strength and that I would prefer to not draw attention to with standard size stitches. A couple of examples might make this clearer. To make a magnetic closure I recently sewed a small magnet between some 6-7 oz leather and a very thin piece of leather. The thin leather was on the inside, but the stitches came through the front and I would rather have had something more subtle. Another example would be a watch band where the leather is thin and the scale is small.

To solve my problem I've been looking for a thin awl that I could use. I tried filing down a Tandy small awl, but it was hard to keep the shape true and worse, as the awl got thinner, it got weaker so that I had trouble pushing it through the 6-7 oz leather along with the very thin piece of leather without bending the awl.

I'm surprised that diamond awls don't come in a substantial variety of thicknesses (especially small). How do people sewing by hand get small holes. I could drill small holes, but then they wouldn't be diamond shaped. Is that not important for small leather that doesn't require a lot of strength?

Am I missing something obvious like SmallAwlsAreUs.com?

Thanks.

--Whit

[barehandcustoms]

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Beading-Awl-5-leather-punching-pin-pushing-sewing-Jewelers-hand-tools-4pc-T005-/201152863812?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2ed5a51e44

I ordered a batch of these a long time ago and they were the smallest awl I have ever used. They are cheaply made but very small and get the job done. I would suggest pulling the small needle out and making your own handle. They are just heated up and pushed into the little plastic handles.

Another option is to drill a tiny hole into a wooden handle then press a sewing needle into it. Make sure the hole is just a bit smaller then the needle and apply a bit of glue to secure it. You can always resharpen the point if you dull it a bit when pushing it into the handle.

[Hi Im Joe]

I think OP wants diamond shaped awls.

[barehandcustoms]

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Leathercraft-Stitching-Awl-for-Sewing-Leather-Diamond-Point-2mm-/111415264500?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item19f0de04f4

2mm diamond awl thin enough?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Craft-Sha-Leathercraft-Stitching-Awl-Sewing-Leather-Standard-Diamond-Point/121271695228?_trksid=p2045573.c100033.m2042&_trkparms=aid%3D111001%26algo%3DREC.SEED%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D24902%26meid%3D3171736558e2489195f41aecdd2c8abf%26pid%3D100033%26prg%3D10502%26rk%3D1%26rkt%3D4%26sd%3D121271695228

Another small diamond awl

I have always read that the smallest hole you can get away with is the best for a good looking stitch job. You might want to try a regular awl if the diamond awl is making holes too big. 2mm is still a pretty big hole if you are using small thread. Just a thought.

Edited August 20, 2014 by barehandcustoms

[TXAG]

I guess it would be too much to ask for a US-manufactured source of these? I have read in several places that the asian stuff is poorly made, made of inferior metal and dulls easily, etc.

[Hi Im Joe]

The Craft Sha from goods japan I have heard very good things about. Just make sure to pay for the shipping. The free shipping takes FOREVER.

I have this awl blade:

https://www.osborneleathertools.com/product_details.php?pid=362

The E42.

With this haft:

https://www.osborneleathertools.com/product_details.php?pid=356

[barehandcustoms]

http://www.sheridanleather.com/Awl_Handle_p/dt-awl-handle.htm

http://www.sheridanleather.com/Awl_Blades_p/dt-awl-blades.htm

*make sure you select slim from the drop down*

Excellent American made tool but quite expensive

Edited August 20, 2014 by barehandcustoms

[TXAG]

I'm not sure how thin those awls are...I am also looking for thinner awls for finer hand stitching, same as the OP...

Also, I already have an excellent awl handle.

[DavidL]

vergez blanchard has a great blade. Fineleatherworking.com stock vergez and has great service and reasonable prices on tools. Needs a quick touch up on a stone and green compound and works perfectly.

[TXAG]

Ok, again -- how thin are the blades? There are numerous other threads that cover awl blades in general...I am, like the OP, really only interested in hearing about great quality ***thin*** awl blades (diamond-shaped) for 9SPI or higher.

Last time I looked at fineleatherworking.com, they had an extremely tiny selection available.

Thanks.

Edited August 20, 2014 by TXAG

[WyomingSlick]

Just buy some glovers needles and drill a hole in whatever tickles your fancy for a handle, and mount the needle in there. Since they come in very small sized you should be able to make a fine of an awl as you want, plus they will allready be plenty sharp

[barehandcustoms]

Looks like everything listed above is 2mm in size. I did some more checking around but that seems to be the minimum for the high end and low end awl makers. My guess is that anything smaller than that tends to bend or break. If you just want quality thin diamond awl blades then your answer is already listed above.

I may do some more digging around and see what is out there. I am kind of curious to see if other industries have similar diamond shaped tools that could be used to do what you want. Maybe there is a jewelers tool that gets down towards 1mm to 1.5mm in size.

Edited August 20, 2014 by barehandcustoms

[DavidL]

I do 9 spi and 7 spi with the 38mm vergez awl which is actually 38mm long but 3mm wide. After a month and experimenting with stropping the awl is now 2mm and I only sharpen the tip now. You could just shave off a fraction of a mm using a stone which you will need anyways to touch up the blades. A blade could possibly be 1mm for anything as small as 14 spi, but you won't be able to find it online most likely.

[Macca]

Try & find the 33mm long blanchard awl blades over there, they are 2.3mm at the widest point, they are ok for 9SPI, decent steel & can be ground even smaller as required (you might want to thin them a little for 9SPI, depends on the leather you are using & how far you push the awl through). I ground some down a bit for 12SPI+ work.

Careful though, go a lot thinner & the blade will snap if you put any up/down pressure on it, they are hard steel, but brittle when thin.

Edited August 20, 2014 by Macca

[Hi Im Joe]

I do 9 spi and 7 spi with the 38mm vergez awl which is actually 38mm long but 3mm wide. After a month and experimenting with stropping the awl is now 2mm and I only sharpen the tip now. You could just shave off a fraction of a mm using a stone which you will need anyways to touch up the blades. A blade could possibly be 1mm for anything as small as 14 spi, but you won't be able to find it online most likely.

You stropped 1mm off an awl blade?

[DavidL]

meant to write honed and stropped.

[Hi Im Joe]

Ummm...ok.

[papadanny]

I have put small leather "washers" on my awl to not make to big a hole when necessary.

[DavidL]

how wide of an awl does 7 SPI need? Im thinking 3.5mm or maybe 4.

[whitIL]

Thanks to all the people who took the time to respond and make suggestions. It is wonderful to have a place where so many people will share and help. As the discussion developed I realized that I don't even know how to measure the width of a diamond shaped awl. I can measure my Tandy awl several different ways.



I don't see any awls mentioned above that are significantly smaller than what I have (depending on how you measure). I have to admit that some of them look a lot nicer.

I'm going to take some time to think it over and perhaps buy one or two of the awls people have mentioned.

Simon from GoodsJapan wrote to me, "Generally very fine stitching holes are recommended against as such holes have the effect of weakening leather to the point that it can tear off at the stitch line easily, like a cheque being torn off along the perforated line". That makes sense to me, yet I see watchbands that have much smaller holes than I can make. Are those all sewn with a machine? Why don't they tear like a perforated check? Can a leather sewing machine sew with many different size needles and threads?

There is so much I don't know.

--Whit

[billybopp]

Sewing machines do generally make a smaller hole than we use in hand sewing leather, and can use a fairly wide range or needle / thread sizes.

As for tearing, the GoodsJapan guy is right .. To an extent. You have to consider how big the holes are in relation to the leather between the holes, and also the direction in which the line of stichting will be stressed, and how much that stress will be.

Consider something like a saddle stirrup strap where it will sometimes hold a lot of weight: It mostly only gets stressed along its length when the rider is standing in the stirrup. Therefore, stitching all along it's length would not be a problem, as there is still a lot of leather intact to take that weight. Stitching across the width of the strap, on the other hand, leaves a much smaller percentage of the leather intact and could leave the rider in the dirt. Something like a bag handle that might need to take a lot of weight in relation to the strap size could end up in a bad way.

Consider a belt for your pants: Again, sewing down the edges of the belt is no problem at all. Sewing across the belt may or may not be a problem. If the holes are a larger percentage of the area than leather is, just maybe somebody that is really strong might tear along the dotted line. The same would be true of a watch band. That said, I have bought a commercially made watch band that after a lot of wear had an edge zip off like a piece of paper towel .. but then it was a crap band to begin with.

Somewhere between no stitching across a strap and a straight line across is a curved or angled line of stitches. The stress does not spread the same hole to hole, so tearing is less likely than with the straight line. It's not as strong as no line of stitches, tho.

Food for thought

Bill

[mrtreat32]

I have 2 of the douglas slim awl blades someone mentioned earlier and a vergez blanchard 43mm blade from fine leather working.

Out of those two brands the Vergez blanchard blade is thinner. I set it into the awl handle so that only a small amount is sticking out and after using a pricking iron I use just a small amount of the blade to finish opening the hole made by the iron. Poking through with only a little more than the tip of the blade on thinner prokects.. I sew 9spi and 11spi and if done that way it is not too big of a hole.

They also sell a size 38mm blade that has a width of only 2.5mm at its widest point.

[Nuttish]

I think you were on the right track and that it was just an execution problem. I have never seen smaller awl needles than have been mentioned here.

I would suggest you figure out what the appropriate angle for your particular diamond is, buy a water stone, and try again. I've done the same. Draw a picture of the angle and put it next it on the bench next to your stone.

Nigel Armitage has a video about sharpening awls. I'd treat them like knives, but his strategy of moving them across the stone in the dimension of the point-to-base probably makes it easier to keep a consistent angle even if it ruins that part of a stone.

[ramrod]

if you have acces to a grinder (or a dremel) you could hone down an existing awl. or make your own. i made mine out of a hex wrench. it is very thin - thin enough to do 12 spi with no problem.

if you are set on buying one, i'd try the goodsjapan awl that was linked. there seems to be very good feedback from that company by leatherworkers on this site. personally speaking, i'd steer clear of the chinese ones. i can't even recall of a decent chinese product i've ever bought.

[DavidL]

The japanese awls are made with lesser quality steel or at least the one I got from goods japan. I don't know what type of steel , but not very good at polishing up.It was incredibly sharp to begin with though.

The cheap japanese utility knife was made of the same steel as the awl (felt the same and looked the same), and cut nearly as sharp as my custom clicker knife, only downside to the utility knife was it didn't hold its edge because the steel wasn't nearly as hard.

Knipknives is where I got the knife and want to give a plug for a nicely crafted knife. I would pick up an awl from him if he offered one in a second.