Klein Zippered Canvas Tool Pouches
Keeping small tools organized is a big deal for this woodworker. My mind has always been calmer when I have everything put away and easy to find. One of my favorite crutches are the Klein zippered pouches. These are inexpensive, widely available and durable. I keep all my drafting tools in one. A second pouch holds all my spare blades, lead for my pencils, replacement parts for tools, coping saw blades and etc.
Klein makes a lot other great tool bags. But these are my favorites.
And a Happy Thanksgiving to those of you in the United States!
Klein makes great tools and gear. The electrical trade has worked with their tools for generations, 2 generations in my family. I’m sure these bags are built with the same goal in mind- built to last.
Chris, for other canvas gear, take a look at the Duluth, MN-made Frost River products. All US-domestic raw materials, and manufactured in the same building as their retail store. Gorgeous pieces built to last. Very LAP-esque.
https://frostriver.com/
In the spirit of publishing the recipes for Katy’s wax and Piggly no Wiggly glue, may I suggest this would be an excellent use for dead jeans and minimal sewing machine skills?
Searching on “how to make a flat pouch” will yield a lot of tutorials. Basically you sew a rectangle of jeans fabric into a cylinder with a zipper up the length and then smash the cylinder flat with the zipper on one edge and sew the ends shut.
Items in most directions to ignore:
1. Most of these are using dressmaking/quilt/shirt weight fabrics so there is a lot of interfacing and lining, skip these.
2. For some incomprehensible reason people are into shortening zippers by cutting off both ends or the bottom end. Far easier if your zipper is too long is line up the fabric edge to the bottom of the zipper tape, and at the top end half an inch (1 cm or so for metric) from where the end of the fabric will be, made a 90 degree fold that puts the zipper tape end away from the zipper seam. Drive over this area rotating the wheel of the machine by hand to avoid landing on the zipper teeth. For your first one it will probably be easier to make the pouch the length of the zipper. Common zipper lengths are 9″, 10″ and 12″. Heavier than standard dressmaking zippers are sold for jacket pockets and those who make their own jeans, probably not much selection in the big chain stores but a lot online for the DIY/ultralight camping gear crowd.
I would make a loose zigzag around the perimeter of the fabric to avoid fraying later. Be sure when you do the ends that the zipper is partially open or you will struggle to turn it right side out.
From there it is a very short step to a “boxed bag”, think Dopp bag/shaving kit. You can make whatever size is convenient in your preferred aspect ratio. I have several as packing cubes sized to the dimensions of my bag 😉
I’ve been a big fan of these for years, but just picked a new one up online and was disappointed to see that the quality isn’t the same. Made in Mexico with thinner canvas and looser zipper than my old one. Anyone know a store that still sells the old stock made in US?
Chris: Another good source for good quality canvas zip tool pouches (and much else canvas besides, e.g., tool bags and tool rolls) is Readywares Supply Co. at http://www.readywares.com