I'm currently working on my first items using alligator. When I purchased the hide, I noticed a lot of other hides vary in price greatly, even ones that were the same size and color. My question is, how would I go about pricing an item I make when the materials vary in price every time? If I had a wallet design that was popular, it doesn't seem I would be able to have a set price when the cost of the alligator changes. Just looking for some insight. Thanks.

I recently acquired a techsew bell skiver. I have been trying to make a beveled skive but have not been able to. I've watched 'techniques of the bell skiver' but just come up short. So as best as i can describe my setup, i have the tension lever on the very first notch and the presser foot rocked back like in Philips video. When I skive the leather, i can still feel a step in the transition rather than a slope to the edge. I can still kind of see the step. I'm also using a 20mm wide foot and the leather I'm trying on is coming in at about 1mm thick. My machine came with a 50, 30 and 20. One thing I noticed, in your video, your tensioner doesn't seem to have much tension on the first or even second notch. On my machine, there seems to be a lot more tension even just on my first notch. Now, my machine is new so the spring may need to be broken in. But does spring tension have that significant of an impact on a bevel skive from a step skive? Maybe more angle in the foot?

Hi everyone, my name is Jaime and I live in Houston, Tx. I started leather crafting about 6 months ago and have been trying to soak up everything I can ever since. I work full time as a CNC machinist and mess around with leather projects on the side. I'm looking forward to getting to know everyone here and learning new things. As I better myself in the craft, I hope to be able to contribute as well. As for Phil, thank you for what you do for the community and keep up the great work!! I'm glad to be apart of this.