Bristling at the very suggestion

[spider]

Mr. Shirley:
Sorry if my last message sounded abrupt--it was. I was being called away but I wanted to get something out to you before you tried three cord. You'd end up unhappy.
I tend toward nine cords and eleven for bigger sizes and cowboy work boots. You'll cuss for a while, but I promise you'll be happier in the long run. One of the old good ones who was patient enough to try to teach me, told me the best test to know if your thread is strong enough is to wrap it around your hands with about a foot or so of slack in the thread and jerk it as hard as you can, trying to break it. He was about 230 lbs. and I never saw him break his own cord.
Also, though I'm sure this information is archived here somewhere, if your thread passes easily through your insole, the hole's too big. It'll be a fight for a while, and seem all but impossible till you get the hang of it, which you will. Least that's what they tell me, I'm still trying. Jerk each stitch as tight as you can. It'll "pop" into place.
I know some fellers who avoid bloody fingers by cutting the fingers out of a pair of soft gloves. I cut a strip of about three oz. leather three-quarters of an inch or so wide and a little over the length of the circumference of my finger. I skive it on both ends and glue them together with neoprene cement. I usually wear them on both my little fingers and ring finger. I'm sure someone can do it without cheating this way, but it ain't me.

Also, Mr Frommer: I always wondered about the odd number of cords we use in welting. Tonight, I'm going to wax together an even number of cords. If I don't I'll lie awake all night wondering.

Spider

[dw]

Spdder,

Well, hand leathers are mentioned in the literature from way back...maybe in Rees which would put it around the 1813 (?) Or maybe Garsault (1760's ?) There's even an old, old poem that mentions them if memory serves. So don't feel like you're all alone. I wouldn't try to inseam without them either.

I use a hand leather on the left hand--sort of like a deconstructed glove with all the fingers cut off, and a thumbstall on the right thumb. That's really all you need if you use the awl haft as it was traditionally used. I also use a hand leather on my right hand with a palm pad because I incurred some nerve damage in my right palm lo, these many years ago...when I first started and didn't know the difference between an generic awl haft and a shoemakers awl haft. The awl hafts I started with didn't have that mushroom shaped butt and that's what cased the damage.

Tight Stitches
DWFII--Member HCC

[spider]

Gentlemen:
I waxed a ten cord end and an eight cord end. The only square I could come up with was the man waxing ends on a Saturday night in a town where honky-tonks outnumber churches ten to one.

Spider

[amuckart]

I've been using bristles to sew up turned shoes and I've pretty much got the hang of the wax and getting the bristle onto the thread, either braided or wrapped. Enough at least that I've been able to show it to other people and get them doing it with some success. Thanks are due to David Kilgour for showing me this and making sense of what I'd been reading about.

What I'm having issues with though is building up the actual thread.

I'm right handed and what I used to do was feed the waxed ribbon left-to-right, twisting up sections over my knee. That had the problem that the bit I'd just twisted up wanted to untwist as I twisted up the next section. I solved that by feeding right-to-left so the just-twisted part of the thread is isolated from the piece I'm twisting by being held by my left hand. That was a bit of a "Dur!" moment for me, I can tell you.

I'm spooling off four pulls nose to outstretched thumb and forefinger long and either way I do it I struggle to manage the lengths of thread on either end of the section I'm currently twisting up. They get tangled or drag on the floor. Is there a trick to this? Knowing me it's something completely obvious that I've overlooked, I'm working pretty much purely of what is written here and while there is a wealth of great information I'm not a great book learner and I've never actually seen someone build up an entire long thread from start to finish.

Thanks.

[tomo]

Alasdair,
Saddlers traditionally use a hook on the bench and loop the thread over the hook and back to their lap where the thread is rubbed down the thigh until it seperates. then the end is pased around the hook and the process is repeated.
I hold the starting end of each cord in my left hand under the ring and little fingers. The ends that return from the hook are held in the left hand also but seperated from the other ends.
When I twist them I twist one lot of ends at a time down my thigh, then do the other lot.
I wax them before twisting - if it's a thick one, and again afterwards too. You just sort of shift it around the hook to wax that part.

The hook is just an old snap hook with the catch bit removed and tacked to the bench with a scrap of leather (it stays attached to the bench permanately). You can also have a hole drilled into the bench top near the edge and push a drive awl into this hole to loop the threads around, just make the hole a neat fit so the awl doesn't flop round like a boy in a - well wash my mouth out, we won't go there! you see what I mean.

Not sure if the 'ol bootmakers did it this way but the ol' Saddlers sure did.

Good to see you posting again.

More power to y'awl
Tomo

[dw]

Spider,

I waxed a ten cord end and an eight cord end...

I never could see a difference either, but that's what the old books say. I think it mostly comes into play when you're hand sewing the outsole in the traditional manner--using a square awl and making the hole at 90° to the edge of the welt...and 12 to 16 spi. The goal is stitches that look like tiny square beads strung end to end...no twist, no rope effect. I don't ordinarily outseam by hand either but I have done...and that effect (which you can still find on some high end Lobbs and other bespoke maker's work) is difficult to achieve consistently, believe me.

Tight Stitches
DWFII--Member HCC

[dw]

Alasdair, Tom,

I don't think there is any one way that shoemakers do this although historical shoemakers tend to do everything seated and not move much once they get ensconced.

I was taught to "skein off"--four yards--which can be done very easily while seated. The ends get tapered as part of the skeining off process and the next step is just to stagger the ends of each strand of linen yarn. Again, this is easily done while sitting, but because it is done seated there can be some tangling especially if there are crumbs on the floor.

Unlike some of the more traditional makers, however, I stand up and anchor my "lingle" to a bench at that point. I then separate and wax three strands, and repeat until all strands are waxed. This insures good wax penetration, which is essential for both strength and longevity as a good handwax/coad is antibacterial.

I then gather all three strand bundles together and roll across the thigh (thigh to knee) to twist...with the taw towards the right.

Burnishing the wax in by rubbing the waxed end with a peice of leather helps set the twists and drives the wax into the fibers of the thread.

I can't say I've ever had problems with untwisting or tangling with this method, but maybe because you're in the Southern Hemisphere you need to twist the other direction...



Tight Stitches
DWFII--Member HCC

[spider]

Mr. Frommer:

Up until recently, I was living a long way from anywhere, packing my groceries in on a mule. Out of necessity as much as anything else, I sewed everything by hand, including sewing the welt to the sole. I was never happy with the results, and started to pack my boots into town where Paul Krause has a hook-needle Landis. The biggest difference to me was not time--I had that in spades. It was that I was unable to jerk the thread tight enough to keep dirt from working its way in and eventually breaking my threads. Your post above has gotten me thinking.
First off, twelve to sixteen spi seems incredible. How in the world is that done without creating a "postage stamp?" If it's been done before, it can be done again. The fact that it's difficult, perversely enough, makes me want to do it.
Secondly, what size cord would a person use? Five is what most of us run in a hook needle machine, but again, I don't see how it's possible to use cord that heavy with only sixteen (or even twelve) spi.

[dw]

Spider,

Call me DW...no matter how well I get to know you I'm dern sure not going to call you daily.

Well, if memory serves Rees says sixteen spi is for "middling" work. In other words, not yet the finest.

As for pulling the thread tight...I am somewhat of a maverick in that regard. I don't believe the urban myth that a machine will pull the stitches tighter than you can with your hands...no way is that gonna happen in my experience. More consistently tight...maybe--if you are unexperienced in stitching by hand.

Follow this link: http://www.thehcc.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2640

and towards the bottom you will see a photo of a pair of alligator boots that I stitched by hand (the outsoles), on my knee with a square awl, and the standard "7" cord Teklon (although it is actually only comprised of four strands) at 10spi. I could have done 12 easily with some practice but you may be correct that I'd have to ease up a bit on the thickness of my thread if I were to go with 16spi. Al Saguto is the guy to talk to on this...he's probably done 16spi.

As for postage stamping...June Swann talks about boots she examined that were stitched at 64 to the inch. Of course that was on the uppers but it was done by hand with an awl and a very, very fine bristle.

Tight Stitches
DWFII--Member HCC

edited 8 April 2007 at 20:16

[spider]

Sir:
Thank you for the link. Game on, as we say. I'm going to have to study your pictures a while and spend some time with my files to get the right awl shape & size, but I think I see the way through it. Thanks again.

[dw]

Spider,

I have to correct myself...going back over the original post, dating back to 2002...I realized that the "7" cord Teklon was supposed to be equivalent to seven cord linen (not 9 cord). Then I remembered (it's been five [!!] years) that I had bought the 7 cord linen specifically to do the outsole stitching and that I chose it to come as close, in size, as possible to the six cord linen I use in my Landis F. So that makes sense.

But to further clarify, you may notice in the original post and photo that the stitches are a bit longer than they are wide. Yet, as I said, the goal is a bead-like effect...meaning that ideally the stitch length will be identical to the stitch width. Now if we assume that a six or seven cord linen thread is one-sixteenth of an inch in diameter (generous in my estimation) then 16spi would be about right.

Hope that helps...and makes up for the confusion of haste and uncertain memory.

Tight Stitches
DWFII--Member HCC

[spider]

Concerning making sewing cords:
In Al Stohlman's "The Art of Hand Sewing Leather" there is a description complete with photos of how to build a cord. It's a pretty readily available book.

[amuckart]

DW, TomO

Thank you for your responses. I think I understand what I've been doing wrong now. I've got no idea what a "lingle" is, but from your descriptions it sounds like you're anchoring either the middle, or one end, of the thread to your bench while you twist it up.

Not having space for an established area with a bench dedicated to the work what I had been doing is twisting up as much of the thread as I could anchor between my right knee and outstretched left arm, meaning I had to do the thread in three or four passes, with the issue that the just-twisted section adjacent to the section I was twisting got either tangled from being spun around or untwisted.

I'm not 100% sure I understand your description but it sounds like you're holding both ends of your thread in your left hand, with the middle in your hook and twisting them up one at a time. Is that right?

Now that I've moved (Tom, I'm in Wellington now) I've actually got a workspace with a table. Anchoring the middle of the thread to that certainly makes life easier.

Spider, thanks for the pointer to the Stohlman book. I'll get my hands on a copy soon.

[dw]

Alasdair,

We were just talking about preserving traditions and terminology...lingle is an old Scots term for the waxed end.

As for twisting up...I genrally anchor my 12 foot 'lingle' at or near the middle, wax one half, twist that half, burnish that half and then move on to the other half. You could bristle while your at it but I generally wait til I have the whole thread waxed before splitting and wrapping the bristles.

Tight Stitches
DWFII--Member HCC

[amuckart]

DW, in a message in the August 15 6:00pm archive said of attaching bristles:

"The old-timers (and you can still find some Mexicans who do it this way) who took the time to master the split bristle method could wrap up a bristle in hardly more time than Rees' (your) method. I never learned to do it but the trick was to twist one leg of the bristle (this takes virtually no time) with the taw and then counter twist the other leg by itself. And then let go of the point and the whole thing will twist about itself as quick as a wink. Effectively you are making rope. I've seen the results (they are very similar if not identical to my admittedly slow method) and it's impressive."

I re-read this the other day and had a play with it, I haven't had a chance to sew up anything with them yet but after playing a couple of threads worth this seems like a right quick way of getting a length of split mono on the end of a thread. I haven't got it real neat yet but I once managed to get it just right and twist up both legs by rolling them down my thigh without getting them wrapped around each other.

The one thing I'm not sure about in what DW said in that bit I quoted is the counter-twist for the other leg. I found it needed to be twisted in the same direction as the leg that gets twisted in with the taw for the thing to want to twist together. If you counter twist it it'll just sit there because you've put equal but opposite tension on the legs.

I still haven't quite got the hang of securely anchoring the very tip of the taw into a split bristle. More reading is required I think.

[amuckart]

DW,

Thanks for the clarification, that sounds pretty much like what I've been doing since I read your and TomO's responses.

I should have guessed the origins of lingle, being as I'm Scots born and bred. It's been a long time though and I'm obviously losing it being assimilated into antipodean society.

[dw]

Alasdair,

Well, Like I said, I never had any luck with it but that was because I couldn't get that last leg to twist with my fingers.

I think the theory is sound...you have the first leg and the thread twisted one way. Then you twist up the second leg (all by itself) the other way and...this is important...then grasp the thread and both legs at their terminal ends and let go of the tip of the bristle. The thread and the first leg should twist one way, taking the second leg with it. But the counter twist on the second leg should create a "tension" that will prevent everything from unraveling.

The way I do it--my "braiding method"--is wrapping one leg at a time around the taw. One leg one way, the other the other way. The results are very similar. But not as fast.

Again, since I can't do it as described in the archive post, I'm no expert....so take it with a grain of salt.

Tight Stitches
DWFII--Member HCC

[shoestring]

Well guys I have been so discombobulated with "Bristles & Wax Ends" it's all starting to make sense.I have experimented with making quit a few short samples which gets better an better each time.I have even decided to hole a piece og leather just to burnish the ends before using them.Also in my quest to learn this skill I ran across an article printed in a 1999 Shop Talk by a Bill Nemichezk (sp)describing how he makes bristles and the wax end stay there.Have fun in your endevors all that's learning this must have skill like myself.

Ed

[amuckart]

I have a question about thread strength.

Wax, build quality, final diameter etc being equal will a cord made from more thin threads, say 5 strands of #12, be stronger than one made from fewer thicker ones, say 3 strands of #10?

I've been building butted closing seams in 4-6oz uppers with 3 strands of #10. Thicker than that and I can't awl flesh-edge holes big enough to get the thread through without tearing out, but I've just broken my second thread on the shoe I'm working on at the moment and I'm wondering if going to more strands of finer thread would be a good idea.

I've just recently got hold of some #12 and the built up cords seem to be about the same diameter so I'll give it a shot, I was just curious as to whether anyone knew which should be stronger in theory.


Thanks.

[romango]

Bill Harris' fish line splitter from the AGM.

5680.jpg

[amuckart]

Fantastic! I'd love to see photos of this from more angles and/or hear where I can buy a couple or three from.

Splitting line is one of the hurdles that trips people when I've tried to teach what little I know about making waxed ends.

I was thinking yesterday as I split a roll of maxima that something like a very very small welt mill (I think that's what they're called) and a razor blade might work to split bristles but this looks much neater.

[paul]

Bill,

Did I understand you when you said Dick was going to look into making some of these splitters up for you?

PK

[romango]

Here are a couple more views. Gotta love that super-macro camera function.

5687.jpg

5688.jpg

[lancepryor]

I have a question about threads. When I've been sewing both outsoles and inseams lately, I've noticed my (home-made, linen) threads becoming 'untwisted.' I believe this is caused by the thread being pulled through a small hole, which in essence 'strips' the thread, making the twist tighter on the side of the thread that has not yet made its way through the hole, leaving the thread that has exited the hole less twisted. Over time/multiple stitches, I lose alot of the twist. So, is this something others have experienced? If so, is there any solution other than stopping and retwisting/rewaxing the thread every so often?

Thanks,
Lance

[romango]

I've noticed that too. I think sufficiently waxed thread might prevent it though.