Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Leather work

I don't believe he's talking about your grammar. And you don't write like someone lacking education.

Tag

Leatherworker.net is a forum filled with great people more than willing to help and answer questions.

If you can get the swivel knife figured out, the rest isn’t all that bad.

Verylargeboots;
Top of the morning from the still dark valley here in south central BC, I hope the day is shaping up acceptably out east and you're all well.

With the standard preamble that I'm just some guy who likes to fool around with stuff, here goes.

Also I don't do much carving, have done a wee bit of stamping, but most of what I do is knife sheaths or the odd holster.

I've had the best luck with oak tanned saddle leather as it's easy to wet mold and can be glued with HD contact cement.

As mentioned previously, watch all the videos you can for sure, but if you're like me who learns by my own mistakes, I'd suggest getting a chunk of leather, a roll of waxed linen thread, an awl and a package of needles.

While it's not exactly necessary, I do a lock stitch which my late father taught me that he'd used repairing harness as a kid. Since I can't find a video showing it, I'll attempt a quick description.

We've started with about twice the length of waxed linen thread that we think we'll need - trust me, we need that much...

At each end I'll put a needle, which I've rounded the tip on so I bleed a wee bit less as we're putting them through pre-punched awl holes.

After we put the thread through one hole, we'll put one side through the second hole but don't pull the thread tight. As we put the second needle through that hole, then loop the thread once around the other side, then pull it tight.

It's not a knot for sure per se, but it does lock each stitch somewhat and makes a tighter stitching job.

If you're making a sheath, I like to glue a welt in the center so the blade isn't running in and out on the stitches, but it's not required.

A couple of examples of what I've done.

Little bird and trout I did up from a ebay 52100 blade that's just okay - nothing special unfortunately, along with a wet molded oak tanned leather sheath.



A pair of Russell inspired skinners made from Simmonds D2 planer blades from the sawmill that used to be just down the road. The scales are California bighorn pickups and the sheath underneath.



Again, I'm not much of a leather carver and wouldn't say that's a job I'm even fond of, but I draw on what I think I want to see and more or less attack it with carving gouges.

Keep them sharp and go slow.

Anyways as always there's many roads to Mecca and while I'm not ready to repair horse collars on it, I've rebuilt a couple saddles so maybe I can remember that enough to help a fellow pilgrim on the path so to speak..

Good luck and hope that was useful.

Dwayne

BladeForums has a leather working forum. This cowboy is a pro and will
share any and all tips, shortcuts, secrets etc., on and on. Mainly holsters
knife sheaths, chaps and saddles .Lots of other pros too.

Kaywoodie has made some things out of leather, also.

I remember doing some of that in shop class in middle school. Made a key case and a wallet I think. It was many years ago so I have forgotten most of it. You might check around and see if there are any classes at a community college or art school. Youtube is good, but for some things, it really helps if you can ask questions and get some feedback.


Jerry

I used to do leather work, had some skill, but the skill went during my time in the Army, without practice. A knife sheath is about the easiest product to start with, as it is one piece with a filler for the knife's sharp edge side. You can use a leather thong sheith keeper for the knife, like the old Puma sheath setup. Suggest you get the basic tools first. Marker tool, hole punch, cutting knives, needles, pusher, edger, etc. You can make thread from nylon string or rope, by pulling it apart. Quite a few places sell supplies, including dyes and stains plus tool and tanned leather sheets. Ripley MS, First Monday used to have quite a few leather folks show up there, including trailers full of leather bales. I bought several full sheets of leather at Ripley. But has been a while ago and always today, make sure it is still functioning first.

As you can tell, I'm still learning, but this holster won first place in it's category and best in show at our county fair last year.

Just get some scrap and start practicing.

Get a book or two first

Find a mentor

The regional w.h. for Tandy is a few
miles from here. They used to have oodles of
instructional books, and lessons on site.
They sell a bunch of pre-cut kits of different kinds
and like everything else, they sell a bunch of
stuff you'll probably never use. Be thinking
whether or not if you want to do tooling and
such. That's the deepest rabbit hole I see
many go down

Good Luck

I ain't mad at that.

There are several facets of leatherwork that could each be a college course.

Choosing leather
Casing leather
Making patterns
Stitching
Stamping
Tooling/carving
Finishing
Burnishing edges
Molding holsters

It’s kind of like learning music. You can go just as far down that rabbit hole as your wallet and interest will take you.

Yo there, to start you can make some of your own tools that work just as well as the boughten ones! I'll do my best to explain. Stitching spacer, cut down a table fork & sharpen the shorter tines. Any razor knife from home depo works fine. You can usually get scalpel blades & handles from co-op or farm supply. Princess auto has stitching awles for around $10.00 & Tandy has needles for $10.00!!! Tandy sucks. Edge slicker is easy it's a piece of wood with a grove filed in it. You can make a round one for your drill with something round (small) drill center with drill, put a machine screw through the hole & Locke it on with nut & washer. Go easy with this one, I have some made for the drill but also made some for the dremel, easy to burn the edges with dremall. Chisels are pretty easy, buy a cheap set from dollar store & carry on. When there pooched buy another set or sharpen. Hole punches you may half to buy better quality ones (cleaner holes). Edge markers are easy to make, cheap harbour freight inside & outside calipers. Some sort of board to cut on or pound stamps on. Mine is a plastic boat gas tank I cut the side out of. Ruler for measurements & cut against, get the drafting one with the 3 sides to it, easier to hold onto when cutting but keeps fingers out of the way+ has 6 different scales for spacing. You'll need a square, cheap harbour freight is fine. Some tips........ don't try to cut leather in one swipe, lighter pressure even strokes makes for nicer edge. Keep hands reeeeeealy clean, & fingernails short. Always make a pattern first if possible it gives you a three dimensional reference. I don't carve anything, don't have the artistic skill. Stamps, don't over do it. For boarders that's fine but eight deer heads on one project looks chity. I don't stamp, I use a small C clamp & leave it over night. Hope this helps you some. GWPGUY. 🐾👣🇨🇦

Now’s a great time to pick up hobby.

Whether is fly fishing , leather working, chainsaw sculpting.. etc..

There’s a YouTube video about it.
There’s prolly a Reddit sub about it
There’s prolly a forum about it..

Maybe even an old school club in your area.