Decking About

I haven't had a great deal of time in the last few weeks to work on the facile. My time has been spent on other stuff, mostly making the most of some good weather to crack on with my lovely wife's new deck. I've also been working on Tweed Pete's new saddle and painting some pinstripes for him. In addition, fellow quiz member Brian asked me to make him a temporary doohicky to turn his fully suspended MTB into a hard tail whilst he gets a replacement for the rear shock. None of it is hugely time consuming but it all adds up.

To recap, I'm trying to capture the style of an early 1890's saddle. Here are a few examples of what I mean with the dates of the publication I found the illustration contained in.

 Cyclist Annual  and Year Book 1892.

Cyclist Annual  and Year Book 1892.

Cyclist Annual  and Year Book 1893.

The Cyclist Year Book 1894.

The Cyclist Year Book 1894.

Pete came up trumps with some copper rivets, exactly the right size and easy on the wallet at only 9c each. They are designed for installing new brake or clutch linings on large vehicles. I'm going to buy a few spares whilst I can. The two side rivets on the nose were quite hard to set, the deep flaps made it hard to get in to head the rivets. I ended up making a device to squeeze rather than hammer them.

Knackered Wright's saddle.

Replacement Knight's saddle showing the 

fabulous new stamp that I forgot to mention ages ago now.

Another gratuitous photo.

The steps used are previously documented here and here when I made the saddle for the facile.

I broke my mill this week. The casting at the top of the column became loose on the column. This happened gradually, I couldn't understand why my cuts seems to be varying regardless of the dial settings. The casting is glued with Loctite to the column and the repair, once I'd identified the problem, was relatively easy. I simply heated the casting with a torch to destroy the remaining Loctite bond and then wiggled it off, a very good clean up and then re glue with some fresh Loctite. It appears to be OK now. The original Loctite has only lasted 37 years, I'll have to have a word with Dad about his workmanship.


In other news, my cycling has suffered since the bridge over the Ashley River has shut. All the good local cycling is the other side of the river, this side is the Canterbury Plains, flat, straight, boring roads. In desperation to find a hill to ride, I rediscovered the joy of riding a road bike on gravel roads. It can be a little hit or miss but at this time of year the roads are usually damp which keeps the dust down and often have a super smooth strip where vehicle tyres run. This strip is often smoother than the usual coarse chip of the sealed roads. I fondly imagine it is similar to how the Victorian cinder velodromes rode with a narrow, very smooth racing line.

A Riveting Post

The promising start to the saddle making last week didn't end well. I got the saddle top cut out, creased the edge, cut out the vent and then screwed up the rivet holes. I tried to punch them through from below after marking the positions. The punch tended to wander a little going through the thickness of the leather. The result is that whilst the holes are lined up correctly with those in the cantle plate and the nose piece, the upper sides of the rivets do not line up perfectly on the top side of the saddle. Since I have plenty of leather, I chalked it up to experience and made another. Tim has told me how he makes his holes so this time should be better. Also the second time around I made a few changes to how I stretched the leather top over the block to make the process slightly easier and quicker. I didn't work, it took me longer. For some reason the second top is softer than the first one, this one marks very easily whereas the first one was quite hard, I'll carry on though and see how it works out.

Right where did we get to?

First thing is to cut the leather off the block and make it the right shape.

I asked Tim about how to get both sides the same and unfortunately there is no easy way. Fortunately the facile I am copying still had the original saddle leather so I was able to accurately copy the shape and dimensions.

Next run an edge beveller around the inner edge to produce a smooth chamfer.

Then dampen the leather slightly and run an edge creaser around the outer edge to

 produce a line. This requires care, particularly around the tight bend on the nose.

Then bevel the outer edge.

Then cut out the vent from the top of the saddle. 

I took measurements, photos and a rubbing from the original since I felt this was important to get the dimensions correct. Tim advised that I get a clickers knife to cut the vent. I failed to find one anywhere but I discovered that there is an easily available Stanley knife blade (5192) that is very similarly shaped. The blade is reasonably easy to control and well suited to this job. As an aside, Mr Middleton recently introduced me to diamond files. They come in at least three grades, the finest being of most use to me. I've been using mine to touch up high speed steel cutting tools in the lathe. I recently spotted a curved one and bought it with a view to honing these hooked Stanley knife blades. It turns out that I can get the Stanley blades sharper than new with it, scalpel sharp in fact, I'm most impressed and if you don't already own one, go and get one immediately if not sooner.

Next make the rivet holes. 

This time I took Tim's advice about the rivet holes and managed to get them in the right place. The upper sides need to be countersunk to allow the rivets to lie flush with the surface so that clothing doesn't catch on them.

Dye all the cut edges and when dry burnish to a gloss finish, 

I cheated and used my polished mop to do this. 

Lightly toasted leather doesn't half smell bad you know.

Then comes the bit that I was nervous about, the two creases along the sides of the saddle top. These two lines have to be the same and are done freehand with no guides. I marked the positions lightly with pencil to make sure they were symmetrical and then just went for it. I don't have the correct creasing tool for this so I smoothed the edge of an old fashioned steel tyre lever and used that.

The leather has to dampened again before creasing the line.

Then rivet the top on using copper rivets. I had just enough genuine 1/2" Brooks rivets left over from a previous job. Tim advised that these rivets are too large to be historically correct so I turned them down in the lathe until the heads were 3/8" as per the originals. I hate turning copper, it's so soft that it's hard, a little like sweeping water into a pile. Or herding cats. Or something.

The five holes that I had drilled, the three in the nose piece and the two new holes in the cantle plate were easy to rivet since I had sized them to the rivets. The four original, outermost holes in the cantle plate were larger and I couldn't get the rivets to hold properly and consequently had to remove them and have a little think. Of course I had no rivets left so I had to make some more from some much larger copper rivets used to hold truck brake shoes on. My Father has a large pot full and I stole some many years ago. This time I made some little copper washers and used them as roves to hold the tension on the rivet whilst I headed it, this worked out well. I'm not completely happy with the leather top, I think I could do better but I'll ride it and see how it works out in use.

The saddle is still not yet complete, I'm having a makers stamp made but it hasn't arrived yet. I'll post a photo when I get it.

I can now sit on the bike, and very comfortable it is to, which means that I can now make the handle T grips and get them at the right ergonomic angle. More later.


In other news, this week we've had a bad dose of redundancy going around at work. It's interesting that when the list of redundancies is announced all those on the list become work place pariahs. The fortunate few remaining in employment no longer make eye contact or want to linger and chat. They may catch redundancy you see. For those readers familiar with the traditions of English pantomimes.

"Where's my career"?

All together now children, "It's behind you".

 To my surprise, I am one of the lucky few to be kept on. I've had a lot of time off this year to look after my children and I didn't expect to survive the cut.

I explained what redundancy meant to my children and shortly afterwards they demonstrated their clear understanding of the nature of the problem by playing 'redundancy touch' (no returns allowed). This game is very similar to 'cheese touch', 'Jamie touch' or 'double dog poo touch'. Jamie being an unfortunate boy in my son's class. Children can be so pleasant.

On Tenterhooks

Assorted shipments have arrived and so work on the saddle can resume. You may recall that I'm following the advice of Tim, who is an expert at this stuff. The first thing to do is to obtain half a cow. And not just any old half of a cow either. I don't actually need half a cow but this is the smallest amount I can obtain directly from the supplier and I'm sure it will get used. Tim gave his recommendations for the type of leather I needed and I was almost able to obtain what he advised. The important bit is that the leather is naturally tanned (with oak bark etc.) and is suitably thick. Chrome tanned leather (most leather is tanned with chromium salts) won't do at all, it won't move enough when stretched over the block and won't retain the new shape when dried. Also the part of the animal is important too. Tim advises using the butt rather than the shoulder as it will stretch less when complete and will be more durable. Also, as every female on the planet knows, the butt is thicker than the shoulder.

Half a cow, yesterday.

My hide was produced by Chahin tannery in Mexico, it is 6 mm skirting, Tim thinks that this is too thick and has suggested ways of thinning it. Since I have so much leather, I'm going to try at full thickness first and then do it again if it doesn't work well. It's all a new learning experience for me.

The orientation of the saddle on the hide is also important, it needs to run vertically, up the animals side rather than along it's back. This is again to prevent unwanted stretch.

Brooks saddles are moulded under high pressure as in this short film at (6:00).  Do make sure you watch part two as well. Obviously my shed doesn't run to such tooling so I need to do it manually.

The first thing to do is to make the wooden block that the leather will be moulded over. When I did this previously I used one large piece of timber and carved it out. I used a lump of oak just because I happened to have it lying around. This was hard work and I wouldn't recommend it. So this time I decided to laminate the block from planks of pine, this has a big advantage that I'll get to in a minute.

Cutting out the laminates.

First mark the outline on the planks and then jigsaw them out. I used a coping saw just because I'm a retro grouch and like doing stuff by hand. Actually, I can't easily get blades for my jigsaw, it being an older model bought in England many years ago and now residing in NZ.

Glue them all together and clamp it up for 24 hours.

Clean up the profile before doing any shaping. 

I found that large metal working bastard files were better than a wood rasp designed for the job.

Then start to shape the block to match the saddle cantle plate and nose piece. 

Most importantly the the block needs to be a shape that you think will be comfortable to sit on. After so many miles cycling, I happen to know reasonably well what that means for me. That shape is not a simple triangle with folded over edges. The sides of such saddles tend to dig in most painfully. This is where the laminated construction comes into it's own, the lamination lines make it easy to see when you have both sides the same.

Finally when you are happy with the shape, varnish the block to protect it from moisture. 

A Brooks B70 has deep side flaps so I made my block quite deep to allow for this.

Now we need a way to stretch the leather over the block. When I did this previously I punched a series of holes around the perimeter of the leather and then threaded cord through the holes. By using a series of wedges I was able to tighten the cord. This wasn't very satisfactory and the tension in the cords wasn't easily adjusted. I hit upon the idea of using adjustable tenterhooks. Once again punch the series of holes around the circumference and then screw a series of wood screws around the base of the block. The leather can then be stretched by threading zip ties through each hole and around a screw head.

Tenterhook tensioning technique.

Next dunk the leather in some warm water. You will see air bubbles rising out of the edges and face of the leather, You need to keep it in the water until all the bubbles have stopped and then a bit longer for good measure. I left it in for an hour as Brooks do but that is probably overkill. When you take the leather out of the water it has a rubbery, gooey feel to it.

So now strap it down onto the block with the zip ties, it is possible to massage the leather down to conform to the shape of the block and then tighten the zip ties to hold it in place. Due to the thickness of the hide and the three dimensional nature of my block this is not a quick process and it is quite hard to completely remove the bulge on the top of the saddle. It would probably be easier with two people. One to massage the leather down the sides and the other to tighten the straps at the same time.

I'm going to buy shares in a zip tie company.

This whole process took me an hour and a half from getting the leather out of the water to having the leather tightly conforming to the block. Tim has recommended a specific type of dye to use when the leather is still wet, so the next step is to make a dauber (I made it earlier from cotton wool wrapped in cotton cloth) and give the saddle a number of coats until the desired colour is achieved. Then leave it to dry.

So far so good, but now the skilled bit starts.

To be continued...

<out of character rant>

In other news, we have had two cyclists killed this week in Christchurch. My thoughts are with both families, really they are. In recent months I've started to notice a worrying tendency for the press to report on the clothing choices that dead cyclists make. In both cases the cyclists were wearing helmets which is a legal requirement here in NZ, this was duly reported. Also noted was the fact that the cyclists were not wearing high visibility clothing. It appears to be a subtle shift in the blame process. Note that both collisions, I won't call them accidents, were in bright daylight in dry conditions and within 1 km of each other. The cyclists are effectively being partially blamed for being killed by not dressing like a Christmas tree. Do all cars have to be painted bright orange? Is the colour of cars involved in collisions noted in the press? With all the post earthquake roadworks, demolition and building going on in Christchurch, at least half of the population of the city and most of the road network are swathed in bright orange traffic cones and high visibility jackets. This has become the new normal and consequently a cyclist does not stand out anymore.

New Zealand driving standards are very poor when compared with developed countries. Factor in the national sport of drink driving and you arrive at the shameful road toll that we have. Until people start to drive with some awareness and empathy, things will not improve.

I'm not holding my breath.

</out of character rant>