Dwight

Mine are generally in the .180 to .220 inches thick when it is done. Starts out as Tandy leather 7/8 oz . . . same thickness for both pieces. Toward the ends of a side of their leather . . . it is usually a bit tougher leather . . . so I make the buckle end out of that tough leather . . . and it is only one thickness . . . the outer leather. It then folds nicely back over . . . gets two Chicago screws and a buckle and a belt keeper. Have never in over 20 years had a belt "wear out" in that buckle area . . . or have problems slipping thru belt loops or buckles. Truthfully never saw any sense in a double layer attached to the buckle. Jus the way I do it though . . . and it is not universal. May God bless, Dwight

Hey, Handstitched . . . those are both really good looking pieces of work. Belt is a tad flashy for this ol preacher . . . but I'd make one for a friend. Anyway . . . if I were doing either one . . . I'd go back to my original suggestion . . . a drum sander for the martingales . . . and a band saw for the belt. OR . . . that little 30 inch belt sander that Amazon sells https://www.amazon.com/EX-ELECTRONIX-EXPRESS-Mini-Sander/dp/B004D96ZCG/ref=asc_df_B004D96ZCG/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=309735728871&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=8573954697880619670&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9014870&hvtargid=pla-521860277467&psc=1 It'll do the trick for you in short order. I've got two of the little belt sanders . . . one is used in the leather shop . . . other out in the wood / metal shop. Noisy little rascal . . . but they do the job. May God bless, Dwight

If I did that . . . I would do like Alexis mentioned . . . make a pattern. Make the full size blank . . . trace the pattern on it . . . and if they are shallow . . . make the indentations with a drum sander. If they are deep . . . cut em out roughly on a band saw . . . then run them thru the drum sander . . . should make a nice belt. May God bless, Dwight

The main thing I found . . . and it will be a deal killer to a large number of people . . . Your pictures are way, way, too big as far as megabytes are concerned. It took well over a minute for the first page to load . . . That first page picture should not be over 500KB . . . and my guess it is 10 or 12 megs. It should load in not over 10 seconds. People will not generally sit and wait for pictures to populate on a website they are going to for the first time . . . especially if it us just another "unknown" site. A 500 KB picture will give all the detail anyone needs to determine if they are going to do business with you. May God bless, Dwight

Welcome to the club . . . don't feel alone . . . if it weren't for my Samsung Galaxy and Adobe Photoshop Works . . . my website would be a few words and that's it. Mine is very generic . . . dwightsgunleather.com . . . you are welcome to take a look at it. May God bless, Dwight

I only put one per end . . . as I put the blank end on a red paper eraser . . . and seriously push down and screw tight with my screwdriver on the other side. If I can . . . I try to talk them into a woven . . . 4 hole . . . leather thong. THEY don't come loose. Never had one come loose yet . . . and when I've gone back to change something . . . it has been a pain at times. May God bless, Dwight

I had my favorite coffee mug in the shop . . . a board knocked it off into the tractor . . . and into pieces. Good ol epoxy saved the day because it was just a few pieces broken . . . not fully shattered. We laugh and call it my "integrated" cup . . . but the integration has proved to be good. May God bless, Dwight

Good job . . . I always wanted a small finish carpenter's hammer with leather handles . . . never got one . . . May God bless, Dwight

McBecklesworth . . . would you do us a favor here . . . we've got some folks on here that seem to think it takes 20 or 30 oz leather for a chair seat . . . or something nearby. Have someone seriously measure the thickness of the leather . . . and tell us in decimal inches just how thick it is. I've sat in too many of those years ago . . . and they were not thick leather seats. May God bless, Dwight

Just take a micrometer and measure the thickness . . . measure all three pieces to make sure they are the same. The thing to remember is that 1/64 th of an inch is 1 oz leather . . . the chart below will help you decide. My guess from persona experience in times past . . . this will be in the 5 oz to 7 oz size range. Thank you by the way . . . for the good memory. It has been years since I sat in one of these . . . rocking on the front porch . . . watching the world go by. When some of our folks could not afford leather . . . we cut up one inch wide strips of inner tubes and wove them to form a seat. They were really comfortable if the owner wasn't say a 300 pounder . . . lol. Would sure like to do it again. May God bless, Dwight

I wouldn't wear one to a dog fight . . . May God bless, Dwight

Well, Doc . . . here is the real deal. As you can see . . . paint is long gone. Box like thing at the top is a package that once was full of the razor knife blades . . . laying side by side . . . in a decade plus years . . . I've used 2/3 or so of it. You can see the full size blade . . . with the broken one above it . . . done with 2 pairs of pliers. The "standard" blade that ain't worth a crap . . . cost I think 10 bucks . . . and could never be sharpened past screwdriver end sharpness is there rusting away. Anyway . . . this is my tool . . . works like a champ. May God bless, Dwight

Yes . . . I've used it successfully on leatherwork. Too expensive to use on a large scale though. May God bless, Dwight

Yeah . . . what he said . . . ^^^^^^ I have made "boxes" that hang on the belt carrying .380's . . . and the like . . . but when the flap comes up . . . the hand can grab the gun . . . and it's game on. I think the coroner would ID the body as having been a CCW licensee . . . and he had a cell phone. May God bless, Dwight

That is some beautiful work . . . time consuming as well . . . I sat here and looked at the red / black / white diamond pattern and said to myself I'd love to have that . . . but I have no idea what in the world I would do with it. Hope you find folks who can take the second step . . . May God bless, Dwight

You should have put the belt on . . . and marked the belt either next to the first belt loop on the left side . . . between 1 and 2 . . . but next to 1 . . . OR . . . just before you get to the last belt loop on your right side. It should not have been attached to the tongue . . . but rather the belt itself . . . and about as high as you can get it. As you presently have it . . . it will be a total pain to get thru the belt loops . . . and will hang down in front . . . and be uncomfortable. But it is a good start. May God bless, Dwight

My brother in law gave me an aluminum strap cutter some 10 or 12 years ago . . . I buy drywall razor blades . . . snap them in half with two pairs of pliers . . . use those blades till they get dull . . . break a new one and I'm good for another month or so. Works for me.. . . . (this is not mine . . . but is the same type . . . . black paint is long long worn off . . . left side is slick and shiny from all the leather passing by it) May God bless, Dwight

That's some good lookin work . . . on a good lookin rifle. I've a .22 in a similar stock . . . bull barrel . . . bipod . . . it'll do little one inch circles at 50 yds if I do my part. Yes . . . those friends are few and far between. Am I correct that you may be doing some rat shooting?? May God bless, Dwight

It's a whole lot easier to make a flat backed pancake . . . you can get almost the same look . . . especially the tooling. OR . . . you make the holster . . . the back of it will be sewn to the belt loop piece . . . then folded over and the side seam sewn . It is some tricky sewing . . . and I really don't think this one was done that way . . . but the T nuts and screws will ALWAYS allow the holster to flop . . . and if you are not up to a floppy holster . . . (I'm one who can't stand it) . . . then ya gotta sew the thing. May God bless, Dwight

Personally . . . not working on "items" per se . . . Working on improving my processes and skills (summer is a low time for me usually) . . . and trying new "things". Got a laser engraver for instance . . . already have two jobs to do with it . . . still learning how to get it to work on those jobs. Couple of years ago . . . bit the bullet on a new sewing machine . . . it has made life a whole bunch better. Used the down time to learn how to make it tick. May God bless, Dwight

If you make the bends over a round pipe or other type object . . . with the leather wet . . . there will be almost no "wrinkles" or bunching. Beats the holy heck out of trying to cut the liner as close and good looking as I do with sanding the edges and then bending. But that is just my preferred way . . . and there is more than one way to skin a cat or line a holster. May God bless, Dwight

Just for kicks and giggles . . . I have a bunch of really flat faced cardboard in my garage. A buddy got it somewhere . . . we use it for target practice out on the shooting range. Well . . . been burning up my wood . . . and some leather scraps . . . trying to figure this laser thing out. Thought . . . "Hmm . . . wonder what ol Lee Ermey would look like on cardboard" . . . found out. And it is darn near a perfect duplicate of leather . . . so now I got a real cheap substitute for starting to check out a burn . . . but needing to check the settings first. I can check the settings on cardboard . . . and have a pretty good idea of what I have to do to make it look better on leather. May God bless, Dwight

Good looking gun . . . holster certainly is great as well. I'd love to have one like that with one change . . . redrill the cylinder to accept .45LC Just not a black powder fan. May God bless, Dwight

It will undoubtedly be a long time . . . but some day I hope to be able to see results like the one above. Thanks for showing us that it actually can be done. I'm thinking I would love to see a 12 by 20 or so of the Last Supper . . . May God bless, Dwight

Two things I can think of . . . First is the trick I saw one of the guys down at Tandy do . . . he smacked the snap with a mallet to get it to close. Worked real good after that It is the trick I do. The other thing you might try . . . put a plastic freezer bag over the male part and smack the female down on it. I use that to expand holsters and knife sheaths that were too tight. Worst case scenario . . . didn't work. May God bless, Dwight