What Small Change(S) Helped Improve Your Leatherwork?

[rawcustom]

CGleather, it's a quote from the movie...

[cgleathercraft]

CGleather, it's a quote from the movie...

Ha! Well I feel foolish.

There's another tip - admit mistakes, no one knows everything.

[MonicaJacobson]

There's another tip - admit mistakes, no one knows everything.

+1

Nothing showcases this better than a bunch of strangers interacting on a forum.

[rawcustom]

Classic:

[cjmt]

1. Only listen to commercial free preferably mostly instrumental music. Electronic, world, classical, jazz, whatever is well produced and intelligent. Elevator music is for elevators. The goal is to eliminate distractions, and commercials are designed to distract.

Radio Paradise is a great streaming station. (not affiliated)

If in doubt, play bluegrass an full volume. "turn it up to eleven" as they say in spinal tap.

2. When creative blocks occur, sharpen and clean tools. Just touching your tools will move you past the block and create inspiration.

3. Invest in some great freshly roasted coffee, and make use of it. If you have 12 cups, take a break from stitching. Stitchin' and twitchin' don't mix....

(This may be number one actually...)

One of the best and most sensible posts I've seen here for a long time :-)

[dirtclod]

Finding leatherworker.net !!! I've been doing leather work full time for 30 years and i find new ways of doing things on here.

[Grey Drakkon]

Ok this is one of those things that I wonder if everyone already knew, or if there's a better way of doing it, but it seemed like sheer brilliance last night. I made a bracelet out of very soft veg tan, the kind that starts off with a fuzzy back and only gets worse the more you try to fix it. Using a straight edge with a blade just gives it the opportunity to flop around and make uneven edges that are still fuzzy, and using tape on the back makes it give you clean cuts, but peeling off the tape makes it fuzzy all over again. So I grabbed my nailclippers and SNIPPED the leather! I put a before and after picture below showing the first loop after the snap and how much more tidy it is. Using curved surgical scissors may be another way of cleaning it up, I'll have to experiment.

[jk215]

- Making sure all my tools were as sharp as possible. Especially before cutting anything intricate (lots of curves) or super thick.

- Starting edgework before the pieces are even stitched together. Making sure each edge of each piece is clean and even. After gluing I do a rough sanding to clean up the newly formed edge. After stitching continue with the process.

- Taking all the leatherworking "rules" with a grain of salt. I feel like a lot of people go by the book and never question whether or not that rule makes sense for the application. For example: getting criticzed for not having a deep stitching groove on a wallet made of 3 oz leather. When you stop to think about that for a second, the answer why presents itself pretty quickly.

[JREESER1]

Slow down! Think about the next step. It is much faster than correcting a hasty error.

jr

[chiefjason]

A recent time saver for edging my holsters. All edges are Feibing Pro Oil black. Dampen the edge. Color the edge before dying the holster. Once the edge is colored take it over and burnish it with just the oil black. The burnishing is now 90% finished. The oil black works so good damp it's not even funny. I might hit it later with liquid saddle soap and the burnisher. And do a final wax and hand burnish. But those are so much easier if I burnish it right after dying it.

Dampening the leather before dying, especially the pro oil black.

Final stropping of my knives with cardboard. Crazy sharp.

I hand stitch but chuck an awl in my floor drill press for making the holes. Grove, space, poke. Flip piece over and groove the back now that I can see the holes.

The tip on saving scrap is spot on. I used to never make sheaths or single clip IWB holsters. Now that I do I use the good leather that was too small for my clip covers. Scrap for welts or washers behind clips. I have a limit, too small and I just toss it. But I will keep a couple small pieces around to spread my contact cement with, long thin scrap sections of leather are great for that.