Dwight

Well, Brian, . . . thanks again until you are better paid. My Vietnam Veterans of America group will be mostly the users, . . . making "give away" tags with our name on em, . . . boys will be handing em out. May God bless, Dwight PS: I saw that belt dressing machine you made, . . . that is neat. It is always fun to see someone else who enjoys finding an answer to a problem without having to buy someone else's product and then rejuvenate it for your purpose.

Brian, . . . package came today, . . . looks great, . . . should work just fine. Sure wish there was some way I could repay you, . . . I'd offer you a fresh baked apple pie (just did two of em tonight, one goes to a fellow from our church who had eye surgery this week), . . . but it'd never get there in time to eat it. Let me know if there is anything I can help you with up this direction. May God bless, Dwight

Had a friend years ago, . . . liked to carry a roll of dimes in his pocket, . . . In case he had to make a lot of local calls of course. They're TSA proof. May God bless, Dwight

Glad to hear it my friend, . . . I used a Dremel for a long time, . . . wound up with a large job one time, . . . stopped and invented my burnisher (most of my tools like that are self invented if I can do it), . . . and the rest is history. I still use the Dremel for holsters and other small stuff, . . . but belts are threatened that if they don't burnish themselves, . . . they're going on the machine. And away we go. May God bless, Dwight

Hey, Cap, . . . to save you a bit of time, . . . I went out and grabbed my mike, . . . The tongue on the male part of the mold is .560 deep and 1.385 wide. The trough on the female part is 1.700 wide, . . . by .635 deep. The mags fit just right in the pouch this mold makes. May God bless, Dwight

Actually this is for a 1911, . . . 8 round mag that just about everyone is carrying these days, . . . who carries a 1911. I also have one for a Ruger p85, . . . works for Glocks and other double stack 9's. If it keeps up, . . . probably gonna have to make one for a Shield too, I'm thinking. If you make one, . . . allow enough room to get your leather in there, . . . and a few thousands over won't hurt you at all. The pic of the mold you see, . . . if I recall correctly, . . . it was for a little Springfield Micro .45, . . . Key to using it is get your leather well wetted, . . . I use a couple of "C" clamps, . . . one at each end, . . . slowly draw it down, . . . takes me 3 or 4 minutes to draw down each one, . . . but I sincerely do love the final effect. May God bless, Dwight

Olds cool, . . . I don't know what wood you were using, . . . and I didn't specify. That is southern yellow pine, . . . the kind mostly used for treated lumber. But you can also find it in dimensional lumber, . . . usually 2 x 8 or bigger, . . . It is tremendously strong, . . . If you notice my mold, . . . there is more than ample room for the leather in the "cracks", . . . and absolute necessity, . . . and maybe why yours are cracking. Also, . . . 5/6 oz is about the thickest you can do this way. Anyway, . . . good luck, may God bless, Dwight

It might be a little underpowered, . . . but if you take it slow, . . . it should work.\ Take it to a hardware store, . . . tell em you want the attachment for the shaft so you can put on a grinder wheel or buffing pad, . . . that is the start. Then you drill a hole as near dead center in a dowel rod (mine was an old broom handle), . . . put the keeper bolt through it, . . . screw it down tight, . . . grab a handfull of files and go to work. Make the size(s) you need for burnishing your belts. Then put a little neatsfoot oil / beeswax on it, . . . and burn some leather edges. You intentionally want to burn them, . . . it'll melt the wax into the pores of the wood, . . . make it smoother than a democrats old bald head. Mine I think is a 1750 rpm motor, . . . May God bless, Dwight

My first comeback to him would laughingly ask him if he had a plastic Walmart bag, . . . they're free to anyone buying anything there. But seriously, . . . I would make a mold like the one you see in the pictures here, . . . it'll have to have much thinner sides, . . . and you can only mold one at a time, . . . but I've used this home made rig for the last umpteen years, . . . makes perfect pouches out of 6 oz leather. In your case you would make a row of 6, . . . put the piece on the back for the flap, . . . after you have sewn belt tunnel straps to that back piece. Once you have the piece of leather in place, . . . a large "C" clamp at each end, . . . slowly draws the pieces together and forms that pouch for you. The trickiest one I do, . . . is for shoulder holsters, . . . two pouches, back to back. May God bless, Dwight

That particular sling, . . . I did not make, . . . and it is a military type with the brass keepers and all the holes up and down it. The mike says it is .130 thick, . . . which is just a GOOD 8 oz. Still good, still works, . . . I use it mostly with my lever action Marlin 39A Mountie, . . . it's a .22 lever action. I also had it on my lever action Savage 99, . . . it was a .308 rifle. May God bless, Dwight

This is a very simple holster to make, . . . a John Bianchi design, . . . I can send you the basic pattern if you would want it. May God bless, Dwight

Personally, . . . there is very little that goes out of my shop not being burnished, . . . and belts are never allowed out that way. I use my Dremel at about 1600 rpm or so (it has a scale on the back telling me how fast I'm going), . . . AND I use a discarded HVAC fan motor, . . . I put a home-made burnishing tool on it. I also have arthritis in the 72 year old hands, . . . but they can muster through this 5 minutes to make the belt look like a craftsman did it, . . . It looks like the pics below. May God bless, Dwight

Can you tell us what kind of projects you are doing? How long / how wide / what thickness of leather??? The poundo boards is a great idea, . . . but so is an 8 inch long, 2 inch wide, 1/4 inch thick piece of steel. I use even smaller pieces sometimes when I'm too lazy to get up and go get my piece of marble. Just let us know, . . . some of us may have some even better ideas. May God bless, Dwight

AND, . . . if it was .45 caliber.......... Actually just kidding the BHP is a fine piece of firearm technology, . . . I respect it, . . . but it just is not my cup of tea. We had a Bos'n Mate in Vietnam, . . . carried one on the PBR boats, . . . I never saw it go, . . . but his brag was that it had a "go fast" switch which turned it into a machine pistol. That was the first one I ever saw. I actually prefer making holsters for the 1911, . . . to me they always look "like a holster should look", . . . and sometimes I just cannot get that "look" that I personally want from my work, . . . on some of these new plastic fantastic firearms. The next one is the Colt Detective Special, . . . and other small revolvers about that size, . . . they come out good for me, . . . I enjoy making them as well. May God bless, Dwight

Brian, . . . thank you so much, . . . looking forward to getting this project under way. May God bless, Dwight

"Western style holster" is a really big piece of real estate, TrentonP, . . . can you be a bit more definitive? Mexican loop? John Wayne over the belt? Clint Eastwood spaghetti western? Lone Ranger ? There are dozens of different styles, . . . holler back with some more info, . . . we'll see what we can come up with. May God bless, Dwight

I've personally never had good results with the full strength stuff. Thin it like garypl said, . . . I brush it on with cheap bristle brushes, . . . love the finish. Usually 2 light coats works for all my belts, holsters, and knife sheaths. May God bless, Dwight

Brian, . . . PM me with details about how to pay you. That is exactly what I'm looking for. Dwight Cimino 1323 Cline Road Waldo, Ohio 43356 USA BTW, . . . are you in the Brisbane / Gold Coast area? Got some good memories of that area from when we visited many years ago. Long story, . . . but there was a possibility that I might have come back there permanently, . . . just didn't work out. I'd a had to have been a stockman if I did. May God bless, Dwight

Down thru the years I've accumulated the quart bottles that originally had dye or reducer or something similar. They are all Feibing's bottles, . . . and after I dye a belt or holster or whatever, . . . I just pour it back in the bottle. Bottles are labeled and kept on the shelf in a certain order, . . . so it works out well for me. Hope this helps. May God bless, Dwight

Shoot me that picture, Brian, . . . Add how you would want to be paid, . . . AND, . . . thank you, . . . many times over. May God bless, Dwight

Thanks Big Sioux, . . . I'll give Texas Custom Dies a shout. May God bless, Dwight

I'm looking for someone to make a clicker die for me, . . . just one simple little die I can use to pop out leather key fobs, . . . 1 at a time. The overall pattern looks like the image below, . . . 1 3/8 inches wide, . . . overall length is 5 1/2 inches. Anyone with a reasonably priced source? It cannot be anything expensive, simply because the final product will more or less be for give-away, . . . vs, . . . a profitable venture. Thanks, may God bless, Dwight

Do yourself a favor, . . . this set of DVD's will save you a ton of guessing, . . . and get you started out right. http://www.ebay.com/itm/John-Bianchis-The-Arts-and-Secrets-of-Advanced-Western-Holster-Making-/112511827522?hash=item1a323a3e42:g:w1IAAOSwjTlZhkcJ You will have to do a bit of "remodeling" in order to get what you want for CAS and SASS, . . . but the basic technique and leather workmanship starts there. May God bless, Dwight

Honestly, . . . I do not know, . . . but when I saw that particular one on Ebay, . . . and it being called a Shawnee pattern, . . . I just kind of linked in with it, . . . I assumed, . . . as is done with most things, . . . a person will develop a pattern of things he likes to do, . . . and how he likes to do it, . . . I figured it was probably that way even with the Indians, . . . perhaps they found a blacksmith who would make theirs a certain way, . . . as his trademark, . . . and is became associated with them. Anyway, . . . I liked the looks of it. I'ts really not a lot different from yours, . . . the blade is probably only an inch or so wider, . . . but I like that pattern. May God bless, Dwight

Thanks, Dave, . . . it's close, . . . but the Shawnee pattern had a slightly wider blade, . . . that's the one I'm hoping to find. One was on Ebay a few months back, . . . and I got outbid on it. May God bless, Dwight