Awl makers

[chuck123wapati]

1 hour ago, Frodo said:

Just because it is old does not mean it is a good product,   30 years ago they made good drills and they made crap drills

You can not say everything that is old is better ,  It all boils down to what did you buy 30 years go? did you cheap out or buy top of the line?

But I will say this.  Metal gears in equipment instead of plastic gears is a MUCH better quality product.

I have 2   timberwolf 1/2'' angle drills    the older one is still a badass and the yellow POS has been in the shop 3 times  STRIPED GEARS

This is NOT a picture hanging drill,  this will hurt you

 

lol how true! 

[Spyros]

14 hours ago, Frodo said:

Just because it is old does not mean it is a good product,   30 years ago they made good drills and they made crap drills

You can not say everything that is old is better ,  It all boils down to what did you buy 30 years go? did you cheap out or buy top of the line?

Average.

[paloma]

before we used to design and manufacture for a lifetime, now we design and manufacture to renew frequently.

[jcuk]

1 hour ago, paloma said:

before we used to design and manufacture for a lifetime, now we design and manufacture to renew frequently.

Exactly that's why Dixons and others went out of business built to last a life time and some. When saddlers retired they sold their tools on to the new apprentice or someone else that may have  needed them and so on again after they retired, i have some tools over a hundred years old still work as well as the day they were made me thinks.

Many moons ago when i left school my first job was in a traditional iron mongers they sold good quality tools, knives, kitchen knives, scissors even cut that razors. I can remember the makes too if you want. Even to this day day i still like to go into traditional iron mongers and sadly a lot of those tools makers have gone replaced by makers of less quality tools but perfectly functional but not built to last also some of the better makers of days gone by are guilty of this maybe that's why they have survived and others didn't. We live in a throw away world, if there are old tools that can still do the job why not use them instead buying new ones which are manufactured using fossil fuels and sent thousands of miles around the planet.

  

JCUK

 

[Frodo]

..Altho i agree that quality tools from yesteryear should be,  And i AM pretty certain they ARE handed down and used by the next generation.  I see no evidence that this does not occur  I see posts where what not being taken into account is the fact that their ae more people in the world today than yeasteyear and that said, their are more leather workers .  their is not enough old tools from yesteryear to supply all the workers of todays society.

So we are now back to the beginning of the conversation and talking about  making an awl from steel and what steel should be used and what method used to shape the steel..  The below is just my opinion and i have no science to back it up,  It is what the ""Old Man said" 

2 kinds of steel,  high carbon and low carbon

you want to use a high carbon steel, 

heating process ,  you want to heat [anneal]  high carbon steel then let it cool, you do not want to quinch it

toss it in a box of sand, cover it with the sand. this will hold some of the heat and let it cool slowly, / evenly, 

Handles.  The Japanese laugh at Americans.  They say we spend our time and effort on the handle but neglect the blade, They spend there time on the blade and neglect the handle .  I think they are a tad bit more enlightened as to what deserves the attention 

 

 

 

Edited September 3, 2020 by Frodo

[jcuk]

4 hours ago, Frodo said:

..Altho i agree that quality tools from yesteryear should be,  And i AM pretty certain they ARE handed down and used by the next generation.  I see no evidence that this does not occur  I see posts where what not being taken into account is the fact that their ae more people in the world today than yeasteyear and that said, their are more leather workers .  their is not enough old tools from yesteryear to supply all the workers of todays society.

So we are now back to the beginning of the conversation and talking about  making an awl from steel and what steel should be used and what method used to shape the steel..  The below is just my opinion and i have no science to back it up,  It is what the ""Old Man said" 

2 kinds of steel,  high carbon and low carbon

you want to use a high carbon steel, 

heating process ,  you want to heat [anneal]  high carbon steel then let it cool, you do not want to quinch it

toss it in a box of sand, cover it with the sand. this will hold some of the heat and let it cool slowly, / evenly, 

Handles.  The Japanese laugh at Americans.  They say we spend our time and effort on the handle but neglect the blade, They spend there time on the blade and neglect the handle .  I think they are a tad bit more enlightened as to what deserves the attention 

 

 

 

Agreed to maybe there are more leatherworkers, so maybe not enough old tools to go around its just why can't we make these things closer to home keep our work force employed and i arm not just talking about leather tools either, we all got caught with our pants downs where PPE was concerned, it has to give everybody a kick up the rear end that we need to start manufacture more things closer to home again and not rely on others doing it for us.

Agreed post has been somewhat highjacked, my awl blades and hafts got from Abbey England nothing fancy about blades or haft tend to abuse the haft so would not pay a high price for a exotic wood haft had them 20+ years still going strong maybe a little shorter now.

JCUK 

[Frodo]

23 minutes ago, jcuk said:

Agreed to maybe there are more leatherworkers, so maybe not enough old tools to go around its just why can't we make these things closer to home keep our work force employed and i arm not just talking about leather tools either, we all got caught with our pants downs where PPE was concerned, it has to give everybody a kick up the rear end that we need to start manufacture more things closer to home again and not rely on others doing it for us.

Agreed post has been somewhat highjacked, my awl blades and hafts got from Abbey England nothing fancy about blades or haft tend to abuse the haft so would not pay a high price for a exotic wood haft had them 20+ years still going strong maybe a little shorter now.

JCUK 

why can't we make these things closer to home keep our work force employed and i arm not just talking about leather tools either

 

Brother  You are preaching to the Choir,  I would rather buy from local boys than a chi chi shop. BUT

With all due respect to people who make stuff. An AWL, IN MY HUMBLE OPINION

is not worth  40,  50 USD  It just is not worth it.

[jcuk]

Nope most i have paid for an awl is around a tenner.

[jcuk]

On 9/2/2020 at 4:23 AM, Spyros said:

All valid concerns - as is my concern of how friggin greedy can a non-Chinese company be, trying to sell me a bunch of laminated offcuts cut by a C&C as a traditional saddlers clam for USD$200.  I'm not prepared to support anyone blindly just because of country of origin, they need to convince me first

Nor would i, never seen them cost much even over here, that's English clams have seen some rather expensive French clams. Pretty sure you could make your own.

https://www.abbeyengland.com/saddlers-clams-best-7357.html  £64..24

All the best

JCUK 

Edited September 4, 2020 by jcuk

[jhrleather]

As a professional wood carver and an amateur leather worker I own a Tormek machine  and  can say it works well for sharpening awl blades.  For awl blades I use mostly the  stropping wheel. 

[chrisash]

The reason you cannot make tham in your own country is the cost of labour and your government

You compare the cost of living between countries where as say in the UK the minimum wage per hour you must pay someoneis about £8.50 and the employer pays about 13% more to the government on top of this wage.

In the Far East the hourly rate to live on a probably under £1 per hour, but at the same time housing and food are also that much cheaper

When I operated on the North Sea and African Oil Barges in the 1970's the Americans got paid nearly double what a UK person got doing the same job

Therefore the items with lots of manual imput are far cheaper to produce than America or Europe can manage

Also the Far East believe far more on mass production in both quality and lesser quality items than the first world will not take the gamble on and pay little of the profit to the government so have far more money to invest in the most modern machenery 

The Buy made in the USA can be good and at the same time bad, good in that a percentage of US businesses make great products using high tech skills and equipment, whilst at the same time helps support the near dead companies who never invest and make things like the did 20-50 years ago and at the same time making them so cheap no modern facility can compete which is the future

The world postage agreement is also the killer letting the Far East countries like China  post goods around the world using the postal service with a silly low price to posters and free delivery to the states and europe meaning we are flooded with free postage items from China and Honk Kong plus others. we sellers ppay the full price for postage in our own countries whilst they pay next to nothing great idea

[paloma]

27 minutes ago, chrisash said:

The reason you cannot make tham in your own country is the cost of labour and your government

You compare the cost of living between countries where as say in the UK the minimum wage per hour you must pay someoneis about £8.50 and the employer pays about 13% more to the government on top of this wage.

In the Far East the hourly rate to live on a probably under £1 per hour, but at the same time housing and food are also that much cheaper

When I operated on the North Sea and African Oil Barges in the 1970's the Americans got paid nearly double what a UK person got doing the same job

Therefore the items with lots of manual imput are far cheaper to produce than America or Europe can manage

Also the Far East believe far more on mass production in both quality and lesser quality items than the first world will not take the gamble on and pay little of the profit to the government so have far more money to invest in the most modern machenery 

The Buy made in the USA can be good and at the same time bad, good in that a percentage of US businesses make great products using high tech skills and equipment, whilst at the same time helps support the near dead companies who never invest and make things like the did 20-50 years ago and at the same time making them so cheap no modern facility can compete which is the future

The world postage agreement is also the killer letting the Far East countries like China  post goods around the world using the postal service with a silly low price to posters and free delivery to the states and europe meaning we are flooded with free postage items from China and Honk Kong plus others. we sellers ppay the full price for postage in our own countries whilst they pay next to nothing great idea

yes yes yes it's all true !

Edited September 4, 2020 by paloma

[jcuk]

2 hours ago, chrisash said:

The reason you cannot make tham in your own country is the cost of labour and your government

You compare the cost of living between countries where as say in the UK the minimum wage per hour you must pay someoneis about £8.50 and the employer pays about 13% more to the government on top of this wage.

In the Far East the hourly rate to live on a probably under £1 per hour, but at the same time housing and food are also that much cheaper

When I operated on the North Sea and African Oil Barges in the 1970's the Americans got paid nearly double what a UK person got doing the same job

Therefore the items with lots of manual imput are far cheaper to produce than America or Europe can manage

Also the Far East believe far more on mass production in both quality and lesser quality items than the first world will not take the gamble on and pay little of the profit to the government so have far more money to invest in the most modern machenery 

The Buy made in the USA can be good and at the same time bad, good in that a percentage of US businesses make great products using high tech skills and equipment, whilst at the same time helps support the near dead companies who never invest and make things like the did 20-50 years ago and at the same time making them so cheap no modern facility can compete which is the future

The world postage agreement is also the killer letting the Far East countries like China  post goods around the world using the postal service with a silly low price to posters and free delivery to the states and europe meaning we are flooded with free postage items from China and Honk Kong plus others. we sellers ppay the full price for postage in our own countries whilst they pay next to nothing great idea

Yes agree too.

One thing though Dr Martins boots shut down their operation in Northampton laying pretty much all of their work force i think, relocating the the manufacturing to China to cut costs and not passing any of the saving onto the customers - lost me as a customer there and then and as with Hunter wellies formally handmade in Scotland which too were now getting made in China the quality dipped. There are was a rush to get any old D M s that were made in the UK why because better made.

So you know what happened the people at Dr Martin must have had had the bright idea to reopen some of there operation back in Northampton on a small scale calling them the originals yes they were more expensive but had no trouble getting plenty of customers so much so had to expand the operation back in the UK and up until the you know what came upon the world, they were still hiring people because of demand, people were choosing the original's over the Chinese made ones and yes i did get a pair myself.

I am not saying this could reverse all this but if the product is good enough in the first place, loyal people will support you that's why i like what Vergez Blanchand, Osborne and now George Barnsley are trying to do despite cheaper imports and yes i know its not all cheap and badly made.

 

JCUK

 

[chuck123wapati]

Read the Paris climate accord you will understand why your manufacturing is in China. And why your politicians are rich. They gave away your prosperity for their own.  China gets a free pass on pollution for 20 years. Trade deals by your politicians made that happen. Setting up world trade dominance by china utilizing their socialist slave labor. Our president has brought all this to the light for everyone to see. One example Canada paid 50% lower prices for drugs than the US at least that was the case until out president got a fair trade deal its a fact look it up and its why China wants him out!!

[DJole]

4 hours ago, jcuk said:

One thing though Dr Martins boots shut down their operation in Northampton laying pretty much all of their work force i think, relocating the the manufacturing to China to cut costs and not passing any of the saving onto the customers - lost me as a customer there and then and as with Hunter wellies formally handmade in Scotland which too were now getting made in China the quality dipped. There are was a rush to get any old D M s that were made in the UK why because better made.

So you know what happened the people at Dr Martin must have had had the bright idea to reopen some of there operation back in Northampton on a small scale calling them the originals yes they were more expensive but had no trouble getting plenty of customers so much so had to expand the operation back in the UK and up until the you know what came upon the world, they were still hiring people because of demand, people were choosing the original's over the Chinese made ones and yes i did get a pair myself.

I am not saying this could reverse all this but if the product is good enough in the first place, loyal people will support you that's why i like what Vergez Blanchand, Osborne and now George Barnsley are trying to do despite cheaper imports and yes i know its not all cheap and badly made.

I love the comfort of Docs... but yes, the Chinese-made ones are garbage.
Of the four pairs of Docs I own, two of them are Chinese made, and the leather is garbage -- the heel leather has actually ripped on one pair (horizontally just above the heel). I, being a leather guy, patched it up so I could still wear them. The two non-Chinese ones have fared MUCH better. One pair I have is about 16 years old, and pretty beat up, but the leather is still strong. The other pair is a discontinued low boot I snagged from a thrift store. I don't know how old they are, but hey are still going strong, although the cloth interior is ripping from wear, right where it meets the heel.
Oh, yeah...we were talking about awls, that's right!
I wish that somebody from Tandy, way back in the late 80s or so when I purchased my first awl there, had explained about polishing and sharpening. Of course, I didn't ask, because I didn't know, and there was no internet yet. I should do that, though. Looking at it just now, I had no idea it was so broad in width! The Osborne awl next to it is much narrower. 

 

[chuck123wapati]

On 9/3/2020 at 11:57 AM, Frodo said:

why can't we make these things closer to home keep our work force employed and i arm not just talking about leather tools either

 

Brother  You are preaching to the Choir,  I would rather buy from local boys than a chi chi shop. BUT

With all due respect to people who make stuff. An AWL, IN MY HUMBLE OPINION

is not worth  40,  50 USD  It just is not worth it.

your right friend they aren't worth 40 or 50 bucks and is why no one here can compete. tariff and trade agreements by dishonest politicians has created our chi chi dominated manufacturing world. The only way we could have kept in competition with a country of slaves is if our politicians wouldn't have sold us out for the Paris climate agreement. I'm just glad I don't need to buy one lol i can make one anytime i want.

[chuck123wapati]

On 9/3/2020 at 11:20 AM, jcuk said:

Agreed to maybe there are more leatherworkers, so maybe not enough old tools to go around its just why can't we make these things closer to home keep our work force employed and i arm not just talking about leather tools either, we all got caught with our pants downs where PPE was concerned, it has to give everybody a kick up the rear end that we need to start manufacture more things closer to home again and not rely on others doing it for us.

Agreed post has been somewhat highjacked, my awl blades and hafts got from Abbey England nothing fancy about blades or haft tend to abuse the haft so would not pay a high price for a exotic wood haft had them 20+ years still going strong maybe a little shorter now.

JCUK 

You hit the nail on the head with your comment about ppe Its not just that secretive trade deals are what set the course for the Chinese to take the ball and run. now they own the un and the WHO so it isn't going to get better anytime soon. A fancy haft is no big deal to me a lathe cant tell if its turning beech, pine  or walnut imo. Its all about self satisfaction, what i like, what you like maybe two different things but neither is wrong. I own some really expensive firearms but guess what i use em and abuse em and don't care a bit if the finish gets scratched i have no problem doing the same with my awls without concern.

[Frodo]

33 minutes ago, chuck123wapati said:

your right friend they aren't worth 40 or 50 bucks and is why no one here can compete. tariff and trade agreements by dishonest politicians has created our chi chi dominated manufacturing world. The only way we could have kept in competition with a country of slaves is if our politicians wouldn't have sold us out for the Paris climate agreement. I'm just glad I don't need to buy one lol i can make one anytime i want.

I have one of yours.  To me, It is worth more than 50 bucks in sentimental value alone. ,  It is a tool i will PROUDLY hand off to one of the boys

but. the sob has poked my dam finger twice already.  lol

 

i was flicking the blood at my wife and she hit me.   I need to turn her in on a red flag charge....NO wait.  They will take my..Never mind I will just endure the beatings like a good husband  LoL  

 

Edited September 4, 2020 by Frodo

[dikman]

Frodo, you're supposed to poke the awl into the leather, not your finger.

[Spyros]

Solovair is head & shoulders better than Dr Martins, try them.  I think they're made in England too (from what google tells me)

[Spyros]

What do you guys have against chisels?

[Retswerb]

8 hours ago, Frodo said:

but. the sob has poked my dam finger twice already.  lol

Proof that you’ve got awl sharpening figured out! 

[Spyros]

Ι've come to the realisation that if I want something made in Australia I have to make it myself.

Which is perfectly fine by me.

[jcuk]

4 hours ago, Spyros said:

Solovair is head & shoulders better than Dr Martins, try them.  I think they're made in England too (from what google tells me)

Look like you may have had Chinese made ones, your first pair of DMs over here was like a right of passage for a certain generation, graduated from monkey boots. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solovair

JCUK

[Spyros]

46 minutes ago, jcuk said:

Look like you may have had Chinese made ones, your first pair of DMs over here was like a right of passage for a certain generation, graduated from monkey boots. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solovair

JCUK

Ι've been buying Doc Martens for 32 years

It was not a rite of passage but it was a bit of a statement in Greece where i grew up.  Just finished the look for all kids who wanted to be a little different.

Competition is just better at the mo.

Edited September 5, 2020 by Spyros