I think they're related but it's Sheoak, really neat looking stuff!
Thanks, it's taken me a while to get a process down. I'll have to show how I stitch them, it's bizarre but it's the only way I can get it to work. Since the back side of the sheaths abruptly change thicknesses at the belt slot like a little shelf, the foot tries to bend it down and because the belt loop is right next to it, it gets crooked and will skewed the stitchline.
I fugured out a way to avoid it by leaving the welt about a half inch proud from the rest of the pieces and temporarily tacking pieces of leather onto the welt to make little skis that keep the thinner part of the sheath from getting smashed by the foot. It let's the sheath ride flat in the machine, preventing the bend and keeping a straight stitch line. As long as the knot is set at a good depth it works out. Stitching them upside down would technically work but would give me the ugly back side stitch that happens with a machine on the front.
For those of you that are reading this and are lost so far, don't worry, just know that I have your back
A little bit to explain why one side looks better in a machine stitch. First off it's just cosmetic. A machine stitch will very rarely look as good on the backside as it can in the front because of the way the needle pierces leather. When the needle pierces into it, it pushes the leather into the hole, when it punches out the back side, it pushes leather out along with it. Imagine puncturing a thin piece of tin with a nail, one side would be smooth and concave while the back side would be jagged and raised up like a tiny volcano. Same thing applies to leather and your thread looks smoother when it's.going into the concave hole as opposed to the tiny volcano. That's why a machine stitch will always have a better top side.
With handstitching you punch the holes from each side so you never have that little volcano every exposed hole is concave so the thread glides down and gives you a cleaner appearance. It's a cosmetic difference mostly. Is a handstitch stronger theoretically? Yes, but having ripped apart both machine stitch and handstitch pieces that I've screwed up, they are bith insanely strong for their purpose, insanely. I think people think machine stitched leather is like a hem in your shirt, with leather it's nothing remotely like that, the knots are deep inside the thickness and won't run.
A lot of that probably made absolutely zero sense whatsoever without pictures I know.
Maybe I'll record a video of what I mean and make things even more confusing!!!
