I've received a few requests to do a tutorial video on snap-setting, so I did one with my methods for the two most-used snaps in leather-crafting, the heavy-duty Line 24 snaps and the lighter-duty Segma snaps.
At 3 1/2 minutes, the download was too big for the Blogger system, but I've posted it to YouTube. Here's the link -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_N6ieWtuMa8
Here is a summary of what it covers:
Part of the difficulty arises from the tools that many of us use.
The mallet-driven setters are economical but often not worth the savings, particularly when setting the Line 24 snaps.
If you set a lot of these snaps, or wish you could, I strongly recommend an investment in a snap-setting tool. There are a few on the market, but my favorite is the Pres-n-Snap.
Insanely, this tool is not available through the normal Leather-Crafting suppliers. You can, however, find it online if you do a search with the name spelled as above or through upholstery-tool outlets. Mine came with the parts for setting snaps and grommets for about $150.00. It works well with the Tandy Line 24 snaps and, in my opinion, was worth every penny.
For the Segma snaps, the drive-tools are adequate. They can be tricky nonetheless. My two main bits of advice are:
1) Focus your attention on the tool rather than the mallet, the project or your hand. Keeping this tool aligned vertically is critical.
2) Do not over-set the snap. Two or three firm strikes of the mallet should be sufficient. Over-setting will ruin the snap.
I hope this information is helpful!
