paris3200

Overall it looks good. I would suggest tightening up the stitching around the trigger guard. Looks like you've got quite a bit of room there.

As others have stated Angelus does sell direct. My experience with them have always been good. I would recommend getting a small quantity to experiment with color choices. The color chart at Turtle Feathers is about useless of leather. When ordering any quanity a quart (I think) or over you have to pay an addational hazaderous handling charge. I belive you can get up to 4 gallons on the same handling charge.

Am I mistaken or is the sweat shield smooth leather on both sides?

I think you would be happy with either Wicket and Craig or Herman Oaks. From what I can tell they are comparable when it comes to molding. Superiority will come down to the particular tanning batch and the time of year.

I appreciate you taking the time to outline your steps with pictures. I'm a little curious as to your edging method. It was my understanding that the waxed method was no longer recommended due to the fact that it was prone to wear off. Have you encountered this? If not, how do you prevent it?

Jeff, The dowel rod for the sight channel makes sense. I will give it a try. I am a little confused about the use of the steel bar. Do you place it through the loops in the molding process to get the holster in the correct shape for the belt? Gun Fighter, You've got a real valid point about stitching around the belt slot. I believe I will have to extend the holster a little in that area to have enough room for the stitching. I will give that a try though. Thanks everyone, Jason

Yes this one I'm going to leave natural. It was just intended to be a prototype to hammer out some design issues. I've also got to determine what dye to use. I had some Angleus that I had to cut dramatically to get the color I wanted, but the cutting caused the leather to dry out.

I finished up this one last week. I've just got a few small tweaks to do and I'll be pretty satisfied with this design. Let me know what you think. As you can probably guess its my take on the old Askins Avenger. Sorry for the sub par pictures. It was raining outside.

Good looking holster. I failed to find a flaw in the stamping.

That explanations makes perfect sense. I've got no problem scrapping a holster. If I did I would have given up a long time ago.

Jeff, If I understand things correctly the alcohol in the dye has stripped the natural oils from the leather. If so what would be the problem with replenishing the oils that we were removed with something like lexol conditioner or neats foot oil. I would think the problem with retention would be caused by over oiling the leather thereby leading to softening. I'll give 97% Isopropyl Alcohol a try. I'm just curious as to the theory behind the whole no oil thing.

I've been using Angelus dye to die my holster. In order to achieve the proper color that I wanted I had to dilute the dye with quite a bit of denatured alcohol. The only problem is that after dying the leather is extremely hard. I do know that I want stiff leather for holsters but I believe this might be too stiff. When I dye it and leave it to dry flat it actually curves up at the edges. Would you suggest applying a small amount of oil? If so, what type?

At work we actually have a device that goes inside the boots to stretch them. It's shaped like a foot and expands as you turn the handle. Depending on the type of leather we leave it in for either a few hours or overnight. You might consider taking them back to where you got them or a boot shop and see if they will stretch them. Otherwise I would just soak them and wear them dry.

Jeff, Absolutely beautiful holster. You should feel proud. It truly is an original design. I've never seen anything even remotely similar.

Its not just you. I'm getting a 404 error as well.

I would just like to see a candidate that at least acts like they've read the Constitution. I've voting McCain & Palin so I can at least keep my guns, how else would I mold holsters.

Can you provide a link to the page with the class descriptions and the tool list? I can't seem to find it on the site. Jason

Every once in a while when I get a little fed up because I'm still not where I want to be quality wise I do what you did here. I get out all my old holsters and line them up from the very first one to the latest. It helps me to see how far I've come. Even though I'm not where I want to be, I am getting close. Just gives you the energy to keep practicing. You've come a long way in a month. You should be proud. Jason

I just bought a new Osborne English Point strap end punch and it isn't even remotely sharp. Before I screw it up trying to sharpen it I was wondering if anyone had any tips on how I should go about sharpening it. Thanks, Jason

I realize this is an old topic, but I thought I should mention that you don't have to have adobe acrobat to create a pdf. Say for instance that you've typed up a quote or an invoice and that you want to email someone. If you type it up using open office, www.OpenOffice.org, you can simply create a pdf by clicking the 'export directly as pdf' button in the toolbar. Jason

The problem with that approach is your not removing anything from the registry. Jason

Yeah Wubi was what I was trying to get to, I just couldn't recall the name. It strikes me as an interesting idea. I was curious if anyone had any experience with it. I currently have dual boot setup on both my laptop and my wife's laptop. I'm not sure why we still have windows installed. Between the two of us we might use it once every three months. I'm also running Ubuntu on a web development/print/music server. I really like it. If you need a copy of heron and can't find one on the web I might be able to find an old cd floating around here. Let me know if you need it. Jason

Ian, If you were able to locate them I'd be interested in taking them off your hands. 1 1/2" is exactly what I'm looking for. PM me and we can work out the details. Thanks, Jason Hence:

Did you try the new dual boot install that you can do from windows add/remove programs? Jason

I'm trying to locate someone who sells a belt buckle thats appeared several times on this site. You can see it at http://www.gibsonprorodeo.com/GUNBEL6.jpg. I believe several other people have used it besides Bruce. I seem to recall that Weaver sells it. However Weaver doesn't sell to anyone without a Tax ID number. Anyone happen to know someone who sells them retail? Thanks, Jason