BConklin

thanks

New to me... Is there a special snap that works best - or can I use a line 24 snap?

I'm late to the party but that's a fine looking holster. I just picked up an 03 in 32ACP....I fell in love with it in the store and had to have it.

Thanks for the feedback folks. It is a nice piece of leather...I'm thinking the first project I'll use it for is doubled up for a gunbelt.

I was up at the "local" Tandy store yesterday and I bought a very nice double shoulder in 6-7 oz. ...in retrospect I'm thinking it might be too light for holsters. I'd appreciate recommendations as to what it would be good for - is it too light for gunbelts?

Like I said - I couldn't imagine I was the only one doing it. That tip about putting another piece of bag in there inside out is a good tip - I was thinking a turn or two of regular plastic wrap around the holster might shield it from the ridges. But on some pieces, the ridges can be a neat effect. Ah - I see. I was searching from the home page...nothing. Once on the forum I see there are plenty of hits. Thanks.

I made a concealed carry style holster for a Mod 1935 Beretta yesterday...a quick job of it just to get a feel for it. I used 6-7 oz leather and after wetting it thoroughly I wrapped the gun up in plastic wrap, jammed it into the holster and set the whole thing into a one quart food saver bag and vac-packed it. Worked like a charm! The only drawback was the little parallel ridges in the bag were embossed into the surface of the leather. My solution was to do it again turning the holster in the bag to make a nice cross hatch effect. After maybe 20 minutes in the bag, I took it out and popped it into the convection oven at 170° ( the lowest setting I can get) for about half an hour. It came out as hard as wood and perfectly formed to the gun. I input "Food Saver" and "Vacuum Bagger" into the search engine for the site and came up with no returns...but I can't imagine I'm the only one doing this.

...or you could take a file and put a slight radius on the sight - then touch up blue. That's the way my Mark II was set up. When I wet molded the holster for it I just made a channel for it by pinching the holster with my thumbs all the way back from the sight, ..you can see it in this pic

No - the tan was thinned probably 25% with denatured alchohol already. I shot the liner with that using a Preval sprayer, then, to 2- 3 ounces of the thinned tan I added a little more alchohol and then maybe a little more than 1/2 tsp of oxblood then I sprayed the outside. I like using thinned dye in the sprayer - it gives me good control over the amount of color. Just shoot a coat, let it soak in, then add more coats until you get it where you want it.

if you're looking for a cheap way to spray your finishes (and dyes if you want) try a Preval sprayer. It's an aerosol can that you attach a small jar to. Fill the jar with eco flow or resolene, or mop and glo and water...etc and spray your work. They're readily available at hardware stores - Home Depot included, and they're not expensive at all- less than $10. One can is good for two or three holsters anyway. I like them especially for dyeing as they give you good control. You can thin the dye down and spray nice even coats until you get the right level of coloring you want. Just remember to wear a respirator....clouds of Fieblings thinned with denatured alchohol are not something you want to breathe in.

Oh there are some flaws, for sure - but although this is my fourth holster, it's the first holster I've made that I didn't have to undo something and go back and redo it correctly. I try to think of mistakes as opportunities - like the time I made the mistake of doing my edge bevelling AFTER I dyed the piece. But hey - I liked the results and I built that look into this holster as well. and then there are the times when they're just mistakes - like my second holster...I had to pull all that hand stitching from the main seam and re stitch it FOUR TIMES before I got the holster right. Thanks for the compliments.

Yes - my design all the way around. The hammer strap posed a problem for me as to where I wanted to anchor it - inside the holster..and if so,, where? or inside the crease of the belt flap? I kind of like what I came up with. Of course the proof will be how it works out in the field. Which brings me to your next question - is the target model more accurate? I don't know - where I shoot has been under snow since I got the gun :/

Nice looking holsters! I've been making hunter style holsters so far - but my next project will probably be something similar to what you've made there. I agree about the addictive qualities of holster-making. I put the finishing touches on my first holster (and like you, my first piece of leatherworking) back on January 20th, 2011. Last night I finished my fourth. At this rate I'm all set for the next month - but after that I'll need to buy more guns.

Thanks - I'm trying to get a good feel for the basics: design, dying, stitching, finishing.. etc. I'm just now starting to take my first tentative steps into tooling and carving on scraps. Not sure I'll be doing any holsters that way for a while though, it looks to me like a great way to mess up a decent piece of holster leather pretty quickly

Just finished this one last night. I made it for my Uberti target model 1858 Remington with 8" barrel. It's 8 oz - lined with calfskin. I like the effects I'm getting with the contrasting edges but I admit it looks better in person than it does in these photos. Without that mirror sheen you get from the dark leather behind the gloss it looks as if it's been dented and chopped up - when in fact it's quite smooth - but the color is mottled as it's just the raw leather. I like the color I got mixing tan and oxblood on the outside - and contrasting it with the diluted tan of the liner. I'm not crazy, however, about the single line of stitches in the back to hold the hammer strap - it looks like a repair or something. My reasoning behind it was that I didn't want a larger piece of leather inside the holster which might interfere with the gun coming out or going back in. Next time I think I'll make the hidden end of the strap into a paddle shape.

beautiful - I love the finish on the leather. It really shows nicely in the photos on the pouch. Is the snap brass?

Well I'm happy you brought it back up to the top, Cheryl. That's some amazing work.

Perfect - thanks Art

OTB? Do you have a link? Google isn't bringing up anything much

It is tall for sure! You can see where the barrel sits in the holster and there's plenty of room between it and the fold. As for that hawk's beak, the front sight on mine has been modified. The sharp edges were rounded over so I had no problems with that. I'm thinking of offering these for sale in the future though so I'll have to figure out some way to deal with the chisel like front sights on the originals. Those things looks like they could split a holster in half in no time. I was thinking of some sort of U shaped gaurd or track glued and stitched inside but I'm not sure what to make it out of.

Anybody know where I can find brass line 24 snaps with posts longer than 5/16"?

That is a really cool holster. I like the camo pattern. I disagree about the stitching though - hand stitching is just about my favorite part in the process. Being a newbie I don't know how most people do it - but I lay out all my stitch holes on the pattern using dividers - then poke through the pattern holes to the leather to mark it with an awl, then punch out all the holes in the leather with a diamond punch. Admittedly it's a time consuming process - I suppose if I was making them for money I'd want a machine....

Thanks folks! Might try something in black next....

because of the differences in our monitors of course there's going to be some variation in what we see BUT - holding a holster that I just made up to the screen I'd say it's a dead ringer for the color I got using Fieblings Tan, thinned slightly with denatured alcohol, and followed by wet forming the holster with the butt end of a stainless steel butter knife with the gun inside.

This one gave me lots of challenges - with both the designing and the execution. I wanted a mag sheath that could piggyback on the holster - OR ride on my belt. Once I figured out a design I liked on paper I set about making it up. Got the main seam stitched and the gun barely fit. Pulled all the hand stitches and put in a filler - then it didn't fit at all because the filler was too wide. So I pulled the stitches again, trimmed the filler and stitched it up again....then I didn't like the safety strap. I'd used a thinner leather and the color didn't match nicely so I pulled the stitches again, made new straps and stitched it up again. Then I cut the friggin hole for the Sam Browne post wrong - putting the little slot below the hole instead of above...No way was I gonna sew that main seam again so I just made the hole oblong and went with it. After all was said and done this is what I came up with -