Dwight

Thanks maggie . . . it is as a matter of fact . . . . May God bless, Dwight

Since I only dip dye . . . I settled on 24 hours back years ago . . . and follow thru. Makes for easy planning on my work load. One thing you HAVE TO DO is make sure it is dry enough that you can buff off the excess dye pigment. And, . . . yes . . . there will always be some. That is what makes for a really nice looking piece of finished leather. Folks who do not buff off that pigment leave a grainy . . . ugly piece of leather work that will always feel like it has sand glued to the top of it. THAT is the dye. Buffing too soon can streak it . . . so wait until it is completely dry. May God bless, Dwight

Those are absolutely beautiful . . . and far beyond my capabilities . . . I'm using strips of the same leather used inside for the panels . . . using that as strips for my zipper. Yeah . . . brass zippers for sure . . . I plan on David's Bible cover most likely outliving his Bible. We do dumb things to books as people . . . and finally wind up wrecking them. But the other thing in that picture . . . the laced one !!! Never . . . and I mean never. I did a wallet one time . . . laced it around . . . decided then and there that if I ever . . . EVER . . . got that thing done . . . I would never . . . ever . . . do any more. I've kept that promise too. Got several pieces of that stuff hanging in the shop . . . I look at it and laugh at it from time to time. May God bless, Dwight

JR . . . from making holsters . . . I learned early on that a pattern of what you want to put in leather . . . makes making the leather a whole BIG bunch easier. I have a wooden "model" of David's Bible . . . with the added amount it will take to allow the Bible to rest in there without the edges becoming cramped or bent. A lady ruined my personal Bible when she made one for me and it was too small. Ignorantly at the time . . . I tried to use it anyway . . . ruined the spline. Long story short . . . I'm not familiar with Stohlmans book cover stuff . . . other things yes . . . that . . . no. But this fellow here on Leather Makers Supply . . . makes it so it is almost impossible to screw it up. Once you have the zipper on the interior (pulled around your pattern and "taped" together . . . you can open and close the zipper . . . telling you how hard or easy you will have it later. You then just add the outside cover . . . unzip it . . . turn it so the outside is facing up . . . start on one end of the open end of the zipper . . . sew up around it . . . come back on the other side of the zipper . . . do some lock stitches . . . cut the thread . . . you are done. I'm also going to add a couple card pockets . . . and a small triangular pocket like the fellow did on his sample he showed us. Looks like with the covid doing it's thing against me . . . probably be at least a few days . . . but I'll pop up pictures as I go . . . unless I forget. May God bless, Dwight

That's cool . . . quick . . . simple . . . and tastefully done . . . Make the next one green . . . looks better in a fly fishing setting . . . May God bless, Dwight

Not quite the same . . . but for years this did all my sewing . . . still have it set up like this . . . can remove the little flat table just by taking off a C clamp . . . but rarely found a need to do that. May God bless, Dwight

Have a Tippmann Boss I've had for 20+ years . . . replaced it's work with a Cowboy 4500 . . . Looked at the Outlaw . . . and it looks like a cheap chinese copy of the Boss. Mind you that is an opinion . . . based on observation . . . The Boss is tried and true . . . the Outlaw . . . well . . . there is it's name. May God bless, Dwight

I was up ahead of the idea in that I made a solid wood block the size of Dave's Bible . . . I tried hand sewing it though . . . with seriously bad results . . . and then I found his idea . . . will use it next . . . May God bless, Dwight

Thats it

Thanks, Frodo . . . but the other day I found a video . . . he shows how he does zippers on notebooks . . . all I gotta do is scale it up for the Bible. He also shows me where I went wrong on my first try . . . and how to beat it. It's actually a very informative video . . . Again . . . thanks, may God bless, Dwight

Dip dying is best for belts . . . they get a lot of abuse . . . from the belt loops . . . the rubbing against chairs . . . your automobile seat (or truck, etc) . . . holsters . . . other stuff you put on the belt like a tape measure . . . canteen . . . Endless examples . . . tells us belts get abused. Dip dying uses the most dye . . . because it penetrates the deepest. Airbrush does not penetrate . . . it lays on the surface . . . and most of it can be scraped off with a soft fingernail. Brush and wool applications depend on the guy doing the work. But dip dying will give you one thing the rest can't do . . . and that is MUCH better uniformity. It won't be perfect . . . but nothing beats it. If you are seriously concerned about dye use . . . only dye the outside layer . . . leave the liner un-dyed . . . it'll cut about 15 tp 25 percent of your dye use . . . but you will have to color the edges . . Been doing belts for over 20 yrs now . . . wearing one that is 20+ yrs old . . . it's a bit darker than original . . . but the color has never scraped off or faded. OH . . . and yes . . . I always cut my dye . . . 50 / 50 with Feibings thinner . . . and I always give my leather a light coat of neatsfoot oil 24 hrs before dying . . . and I don't hardly ever have any real problems with it all. May God bless, Dwight

If you buy the self adhesive 1 inch squares . . . you can put a small rivet in the middle of both pieces . . . should be plenty of enough velcro to hold them together . . . and the snaps will keep the velcro from pulling away from the leather. The only thing about velcro . . . I've had it get clogged with dust, lint, dirt, and stuff . . . so it doesn't hold as well . . . needs to be cleaned every now and then. May God bless, Dwight

It's called veggie tan . . . WET . . . and . . . PERSEVERANCE . . . LOL . . . may God bless, Dwight

Looks darn good from here . . . May God bless, Dwight

Hey 108 . . . I had to google to find out what thickness leather you are using . . . and from some of the responses . . . I guess you are using like 7/8 oz and layering it to make it thicker. That being said . . . one other quick point . . . your "10" watt laser . . . may or may not be a 10 watt laser. I have two of them . . . one produces 10 watts of laser burning power . . . the other one "consumes" about 10 watts of power but only produdes about 3000 milliwats at it's max burning power. I can tell you for an absolute fact . . . 3 passes of my big guy at 85% power . . . using my air assist . . . and 500 mm/min speed . . . it very cleanly and slickly cuts out pieces from my 1/8 inch plywood . . . on which I had previously engraved the Lord's prayer. I also make the key fobs you see here . . . they're generally out of 5/6 veg tan (scraps from other jobs) and I cut them in one pass at 50% power and I think 500 mm/min speed. The speed may be wrong . . . I'd have to go dig in my files . . . but it cut in one pass . . . no problem. The big thing you do need is the air assist . . . and some serious exhaust system . . . burning leather STINKS bad. All of the little incursions around the edges of the Lord's prayer were easily and beutifully cut by my laser . . . and stacking them on top of each other . . . no one was differently cut than another except the first one. I put in the wrong numbers for the size. One of those "let's see how it works" ideas when getting started. The prayer pieces went to the ladies as a New Year's gift The key fobs went to the guys. I used to cut those key fobs out by hand . . . ohhhhhhhhHHHHHHH how I hated that. Piece of cake now. Anyway . . . PM me if I can help you any further . . . OH . . . and if you haven't learned how to use LaserGRBL software yet . . . LEARN . . . it'll do just about anything you would ever need laser software to do May God bless, Dwight

Used to be a fellow on here . . . Katsass I believe was his handle . . . and he did a bucket of M&G . . . and dunked his holsters in it. He swore by it. He was down in Arizona or New Mexico I think . . . was always laying out the holsters in the sun to darken them. May God bless, Dwight

Nothing you will do to the leather will guarantee you as good and long lasting results for a thumb break . . . as will one of the little Tandy stiffeners. If you are using double leather for your holster . . . sandwich it . . . if only single layer . . . put it on the back side toward the wearer . . . away from the weapon. Can't tell you how many of these I've done . . . so far no problems. And I KNOW there would have been sooner or later having done it another way. May God bless, Dwight

All of that final coat is not needed . . . in fact . . . you will almost undoubtedly wind up with many cracks in the finish . . . especially in places where the leather is seriously bent. You may get away with it by bending it as soon as you apply the finish . . . and then touch up the finish . . . that's your only hope. But like posted above . . . as soon as it is dry to the touch . . . get that work done. May God bless, Dwight

Thanks, Chief

Bruce beat me to it . . . May God bless, Dwight

Thanks, Nick . . .

A buddy's wife got herself a Ruger Security 380 . . . needs a holster for it. Went out to see about a mold for one . . . nada, nein, no, nothing happening. Anyone know if any of their other guns is close enough to use for a well molded holster???? Thanks . . . may God bless, Dwight

Dogs that would mess my equipment up like that . . . just might wind up someone else's dog right quick. If they lived thru the exercise. Dogs are like kids . . . they need edjumacation . . . May God bless, Dwight

p51p28 . . . I just had to say "thank you" for the giggle this morning . . . as I read "wide mouth bars" . . . the image I caught was basically any Navy town . . . and the closer the bar was to the docks . . . the wider mouthed the folks were there . . . I know that is not what you meant . . . but being an old Vietnam Navy boy . . . that was my first thought and I had to laugh at it. But back to your question . . . if you took some kydex plastic (Tandy sells it) or for that matter even some PVC plastic . . . cut it in strips an inch or so wide . . . wrapped them in 3/4 oz veg tan . . . sewed a seam only on one edge . . . you would have a pretty stout bar . . . and all you have to do is leave a tab on each end on each side for a rivet . . . and your problem is solved. If that won't work . . . pop a picture up . . . we'll all take another look at it. But my electrician's tool pouches I wore for years only had a piece of 9/10 oz veg tan . . . and it held them together and open for as long as I had them. May God bless, Dwight

Looks really good . . . design, execution, ammenities . . . But you are a better man than I . . . to do all that hand stitching. I'm a machine guy . . . no machine . . . no do. . . lol May God bless, Dwight