Order and Chaos

Coolness... I just wanted to check since I have a severe case of overlooking the obvious solution, but for once I got it right on the first try. Only downside to this is now I don't have an excuse to go buy another new tool, heh...

Okay, looked at a larger version of the picture and saw the stop strip along the bottom edge. That makes sense with the open bottom loops. I asked and my neighbor only uses 2.75" and 3" shells, so I don't have to worry about making sure 2.5" English or 3.5" magnums fit.

This may seem like a silly question, but here we go anyways... I recently started on a project for a friend that required some of the parts to be made from sole bend leather. Extra thick leather (16 oz. & thicker), that the beginning of arthritis in my fingers doesn't appreciate dealing with. As I'm trying to knife my way through the sole bend, I'm thinking this stuff is almost as hard as wood, and that's when I decided to try taking the leather over to the scroll saw that I use for cutting out forms, and it happily buzzed right through the sole bend leaving me with a perfect 90 degree square edge that smoothed right out with a bit of careful sanding. (fine tooth blade, saw speed set to almost minimum to prevent friction burning of the edges) Here's the question. Is there a better way to cut sole bend? I don't have a clicker press, it would be nice, but most of the stuff I do is one off, no mass production.

A question related to shotgun shell belts... My neighbor is asking for basically the same thing, he would like for it to hold 20-24 qty of 12 gauge shells. A concern of mine is since he wants this for rabbit & squirrel hunting, shells will be pulled out of the loops fairly often, and I'm a little worried if I use too light of leather for the loops, the loops getting stretched out of shape may be an issue. I'm trying to figure out a way to keep things snug with the shells in the loops. One option I can think of is having the bottoms of the loops closed so even if there is some stretch, the shells can't fall through. The other idea I had was hiding a band of 2.5" elastic weave inside the shell loops...

Okay thanks, I didn't realize it was the same bobbin for multiple brands of machines. Ordering them straight from Artisan works for me. One of these days I'll even get Amazon and Ebay accounts...

Where can I get extra Bobbins for a Toro 3000 Artisan? I bought my machine used and it came with two bobbins, but I'd like to have some extras for the various weights and colors of thread. I tried doing a google search for them, but came up with results that didn't look anything like the ones I have now. Online, or brick & mortar store in the St Louis Mo area makes no difference to me.

How do I get rid of (or hide forever) all the Facebook related junk (popups, etc) that now seems to be part of the website and forums? Also, what do I have to do so images people post in the various threads are automatically previewed like they are supposed to be? Is there an updated FAQ for settings?

I like it. I've been trying to decide what to do with my soda can killer in regards to a holster or sling, it's a Ruger Charger-22, basically a 10/22 that has been built as a pistol. http://www.ruger.com/products/22Charger/models.html Using a normal Ruger 10 round rotary magazine that fits flush with the stock, a holster like yours would work well. The 15 and 25 round mags are banana clip style, so a holster becomes more complicated. The only sling style that makes sense to me would be a single mount point sling, with a swivel mount added to the butt of the stock.

The reason I'm asking is I remember the shoulder holster my uncle wore. He was a plainsclothes detective and it didn't have any kind of strap going to the belt, I think his duty pistol was a 5 shot Chief Special, and I don't recall any of his fellow detectives having their holsters hooked to their belts.

I've been practicing making different styles of holsters and decided to try using the shoulder harness pattern from the Stohman holster pattern book. When I pieced everything together to make a shoulder holster for my Ruger Redhawk .41 magnum with a 7.25" barrel, the muzzle end of the holster was just below my belt. That got me wondering, would it be useful or a hinderance to have a belt loop at the bottom of the holster to keep things from flopping around under my jacket? Is there a way to make the belt loop removeable (a line 24 snap) that would also allow it to swivel, would it need an elastic section in the belt loop to allow more flex and stretch? Using the same shoulder harness pattern for a friend's FNX in .45acp, his holster looks like it will stop about 1-2" above his belt line. If you do put a belt loop at the bottom, what do you consider to be a reasonable distance to decide if it does or does not need a loop at the bottom?

Gamers that have dice can always use another drawstring dice bag. I have a cheap wood cutting board that has one side covered in suede, when I disassemble something with tiny parts, nuts and screws, the parts don't roll away and vanish for 3 days only to show up once I bought a replacement part.

I have an idea for a powered edge burnisher and am trying to decide if it's a good or bad idea... My first attempt was sawing the pointy end off the tandy wood burnisher, bore a hole down the center and epoxy in a steel shaft to put in my cordless drill/driver. It makes things go quicker, but it's kind of ungainly trying to hold the drill in one hand and the leather piece in the other. For my next attempt I'm thinking of using an inexpensive hand mixer (three speeds, two counter rotating beaters). Cut the curvy bits off the metal shafts, epoxy the drilled burnishers in place, and mount it to a piece of 2"x8" that can be clamped/wingbolted to the workbench. So what do you think?

Judging by what I have seen in the Tandy pre-cut kits, theirs look to be, and this is purely a guess, somewhere in the 5 ounce range. In a related note I have a question also. Some messenger/courier bags have the straps mounted to the gussets like a normal purse, and some have the straps mounted to the back side of the bag. I can understand the straps being mounted to the back of the bag if the gussets are fairly narrow, but is this pretty much an esthetic/personal preference, or is there an advantage to one location over the other?

Maybe someone else has tried this already, but it sounds like you may want to look in to a modification I'm going to try on my older Singer walking foot machine to see how it works. I plan to order some new walking feet for the top side that are teflon coated for the top, and replace the feed dog underneath with the silicon rubber version. At a minimum the teflon coated foot up top will slide smoother on the top leather giving more even stich size, and it should reduce the machine marks to smooth lines on the bottom compared to the tank tracks mark the standard sawtooth feed dog underneath leaves.

Back when I was working on a degree in technical illustration one of the instructors was showing us how to use an xacto knife to remove errant ink marks from the acetate. He accidentally sets the xacto in the tool groove up top crooked (the drawing table which was sloped), the knife begins merrily rolling down the table and falls, without thinking he tried to catch it... We had a stand in instructor for a couple days while his hand healed up.

Thanks for the assorted insights, suggestions, and mild critques. As to the input from the person that will be using the holster, I generally accepted what he wanted while we were spitballing ideas since he is a firearm instructor for the state, and I'm fairly certain this isn't going to be a CCW holster worn constantly, but now I know what to do when someone does want something that will use for years on a constant basis. Just for my own reference I did a quick edit on a photo to get a reference point for the stitching. One is "as finished" the other with the aid of a freebie graphics program an indicator to make sure it's visible as to where the inside (along the pistol body) stitch line should go?

The two sharp corners on the top layer now make me say "Doh! Why didn't I notice that?" especially since I just picket up one of those 9/16" corner punches. The edges, I was using my dremel with the smalll sanding drum on it so (to me anyways) instead of a smooth arc around the perimeter of the holster, there are wavy ups and downs. Next time I'll dress the edge flat on a larger diameter sanding drum using my el cheapo turn a hand drill in to a press drill stand. The Sig P229 seemed to be on the small side, or medium anyways to me compared to most of the semi-auto pistols I have. The suede was already attached to the upper layer on the inside (barge contact cement) when I wet formed that piece.

Okay, trying to put in the image again.

A friend picked up a Sig P229 in .40 caliber. I asked him if he was interested in having me make a holster for him since I need the practice. He sat with me as I drew out the pattern so it's the way he wanted. A slightly oversized sweat shield behind the handgrip area, and he wanted the muzzle recessed down at the bottom for protection. The two main pieces are from a 8/9 oz single shoulder, the back (and between the two layers) is lined with some of the suede Tandy calls the "super softy". I used Fiebings oil black, and gave it a couple coats of super sheen. The stitching at the top of the sweat plate, and along the top and bottom of the outer piece were sewn with my Toro aritsan 3000, the stitching joining the two pieces together were done the normal two needle by hand method. It still needs the belt slots punched in, the plan is use my 3/8" round for the ends, 2 inch long slots. Things I learned along the way, trim my fingernails before shaping or sewing the leather, make sure the edges are shaped properly before using the grooving tool, and don't rush on any of the steps.

Well, to be honest, if I buy ammo in a caliber that I don't own a firearm for, that does kinda give me an excuse to buy something later on that uses it, heheh.

I wound up using the method Katsass described. I used my 3/4" slot punch every 9/16", started with a rivet to anchor the strap, then tucked the strip of 4oz in and out, snugging it down on a cartridge, repeat the process until all the loops are created. Remove the cartridges and then some quick (a relative term) sewing between each loop to attach. The inside of the belt was lined with some fairly heavy suede so the inner part is hidden. Side note, if you need to buy ammo in a caliber for creating bullet loops, I found that there is a style of ammo called cowboy loads that are used for the competitive action shooters that cost about 2/3 what regular ammo would, due to the lighter powder loads in the rounds for reduced recoil. It's available in most popular six-gun calibers.

When I take photos of things I have made, I set the item on a piece of cloth that is both non-reflective and is a contrasting color in comparison to the item. The only two colors of background cloth I avoid using are either black or white. Since most of the items people will post pictures of here at the forum are typically small in size and a close up shot, you can get away with using something as simple as a grey t-shirt. As long as the edges of the t-shirt are not showing in the photo, it's all good. I've also used old bath towels as my background fabric. Yes I'm thrifty when it comes to the incidentals.

Thanks for the replies. I did a little experimenting with some scraps I had laying around. Right now my plan is the cartridge holder section is going to be a separate piece that will be attached to the main belt. The hardest part was digging around in the closet to figure out where I had put away that caliber ammo. On a positive note, I also found about 5 boxes of .45 long colt and some .444 marlin I forgot I even had. I spaced the 3/4" slots on 9/16's centerlines and with the 2-3oz strip to make the loops it left about 3/16" between each cartridge, so that should leave me plenty of room between each round using the thicker correct leather. Later on down the road I plan to make a similar gun belt for my .41 magnum redhawk. Hopefully I'll have all the parts ready to go together soon and can take some pictures to post.

So a friend at work mentions something about needing a longer belt buckle section on his gunslinger rig and I tell him I'm willing to try to do the job for him to get some practice. Apparently over the last few decades his gun belt has mysteriously gotten smaller by a couple inches, and I make the new belt piece with no problem, but then he mentions that he recently realized that he shoots a lot better left handed and would like to have a basic black no frills left handed rig (his old one is right handed). I figured what the heck and told him I'd be willing to try making one from scratch, and everything seems to be coming together fairly well except I'm not sure the right way to do the math to lay out the strap and stitch section spacing that will be turned in to the cartridge loops on the belt. I have the Stohlman holster book but it doesn't cover cartridge loops and was wondering if there was a different source book I could pick up that gave the measurements for various size cartridge loops. BTW, I'm trying to make the loops for .38spl/.357magnum rounds.

Is there any reason why you couldn't go to a tool store (Grainger as an example) and pick up an acorn burr bit the same size (or slightly larger) to use in a drill press to create your anvil?