make a stitching pony

[Pepi]

I,d like to make a stitching pony[ the one that you sit at ,not the one that looks like a giant pair of tweezers ].if any one has mud map on how to make one i,ll be much in your debt . Ken

[MatthewD]

Here you go my friend

http://www.knifenetwork.com/workshop/tut_pony_burrows.shtml

[rharris]

Pepi

Al Stohlman's "The Art of Hand Stitching Leather" book has plans in the back for making a stitching horse. I made mine from it and it works great.

Russ

[Pepi]

Thanks guys ,really appreciate the advice .Down to the hardware on Mon for some timber,and I'll check the book shops on the weekend ,Ken

[Don101]

Welcome to the site Pepi and good luck with building the stitching pony, Don

just a thought my one was a present from the wife but if i was to build or buy another i would recomend an ajustable jaw that can be adjusted to different angles as some times like on the one ive got you can get a stiff back as you are always leaning to one side to check the stitching

[D.A. Kabatoff]

Hi Pepi,

Don101 brings up a very good point about the angle the clamp is set on. I am yet to see anyone commercially making a stitching horse that has the proper ergonomics to it. I've attached a photo of the one that I use that is roughly 80 years old. Found it on Ebay for about $100.00 and cleaned it up. You can see that the clamp is leaning to the left and slightly rotated to the right so that a right handed person has a better view of their work without leaning out to the side and and twisting their head to the left. The other benefit this setup has is that your right wrist is not bent inward when you shove your awl into the leather, instead the awl becomes a straight extension of the forearm and hand and the only bend is about a 90 degree at the elbow... much more comfortable angle to work from and easier to do consistently nice stitching. A good way to see the difference is to hold your left hand straight out in front of you and with your right hand, imitate the movement of poking holes with an awl. You will see how your right wrist is bent inward and how you have to lean outward to get a good view of your work; if you are sewing a few layers of heavy skirting like I am, you will quickly feel the difference. Now try angling your left hand off to the right a little and repeat the motion, you can see that your forearm, hand, and awl form a straight line... this is the angle you want to set your clamp when you build your horse.

Darc

[Beaverslayer]

Darc,

That leaver on the bottom rung, is that the clamping mechanism? If so, how exactly does it work?

It looks by the picture to have a leather strap attached, and that strap goes up and through the seat and clamp. I would be interested in seeing a picture of that detail.

Ken

[barra]

This is my home made stitching horse. I am not a carpenter but it works for me. What I did is work out the height that suits me for the horse to be above the actual base. I glued the wide pieces of wood to the upright bits to form the jaws. Added a couple of screws to the bottom of the jaws. Then I cut both the upright board and wide wooden bits in one hit. I then stapled some scrap leather to the jaws to protect my sewing jobs. The left hand side is bolted firm and the right side hinged (L&R is when stitching). This way I am pushing against the firm left hand side. The strap goes from the hinged right side, through a hole in the left side and connects to the pedal. The jaws open and when the pedal is pushed on, it tightens the hinged side firmly against the rigid side.

I have my splitter attached to the wide front as I don't want it on my main bench and where it is works for me. When stitching I cover the splitter to avoid accidents. I like the front being wide as I can also place done odd tools eg Awl, knife, pliers. The only thing I am going to change is the wide part at the back where the cushion is as it is a tad awkward to swing my leg over when sitting. I am going to modify this base one day. Anyone with basic wood working skills can make a workable horse. It may not look pretty like some but it works.

Oh yeah, do what Darc said about angling it. Mine leans over about 20 degrees to the left at a guess.

Barra

Edited July 20, 2007 by barra

[Knife Knut]

Darc,

That leaver on the bottom rung, is that the clamping mechanism? If so, how exactly does it work?

It looks by the picture to have a leather strap attached, and that strap goes up and through the seat and clamp. I would be interested in seeing a picture of that detail.

Ken

Ok since he didn't post pictures let me describe what you are wondering about (I can build things in my head, so I can describe to you what you are not able to see in the picture). Perhaps he will see this bump to the top and post the requested picture. Whatever.

At the moving arm the strap is tacked in place. The strap then goes through the slot in the moving arm, and goes down to a slot in the stationary arm. The slot in the stationary arm is closer to the base than the slot in the moving arm; this can be better seen in the picture barra gives us. From the slot in the stationary arm the strap goes through the baseplate, and is secured to the middle of the foot lever (this is mostly obscured by the vertical leg).

The foot pedal pivots at one end in the large dowel/spindle crosspiece; note the slot it pivots in in the square part of the spindle . The large crosspiece/splindle is also able to pivot in the vertical legs that hold it; note the hole going throught the vertical leg that holds it, and the spindle below it that serves as the actual structural member. These pivots allow the end of the pedal to move about in two dimensions (up/down left/right)

Near the foot end of the pedal there is a metal plate. The metal plate is able to engage the notched metal plate on the vertical leg in order to lock in place various thicknesses of work in the jaws against the tension of the strap, so that constant pressure need not be applied by the user to the lever.

So did I make things any clearer?

Also, my first post to this forum.

[Knife Knut]

Ok now I feel kinda dumb.

After some more research on stitching horses, I have found that this actually is built pretty closely to the one shown on pg 98 of oft quoted "Farm Woodwork" book (can be found at http://www.archive.org/details/farmwoodwork00roehgoog ). A search on this forum will turn up other pictures of ones they have built.

The main difference D. A. Kabatoff's version is in s the use of spindles and wood swivel joints instead of brackets. Perhaps the builder had access to these plans (the dating works out since the book was originally published in 1919), but added his own special touches. I personally find the version to be depicted here to be more elegant and have a higher degree of craftmanship that is needed to make the swivel parts from wood rather than metal.