My first carved holster.

[Hags]

Very nice! My wife tells me that the mistakes I see from 6 inches are invisible to everyone else. But I still see them, and will work to eliminate them.

[Steve75]

On 6/5/2022 at 11:59 PM, dikman said:

It won't win any beauty prize, given the problems I had with it, but I learned a lot (like don't make the welt so bloody thick!!). I made it so the trigger guard would sit inside, resting on a "ledge" so there is zero resistance to pulling out the revolver, which made it 7/8" thick. This is the absolute max that my 4500 will sew, but I forgot that as the machine crawls up the thicker stuff the stitch length will shorten. It also went off-line  right at the top, as I turned the corner the bottom edge of the holster caught in the slot of the needle bar, which I didn't realise until it was too late. This was because it was such a tight fit under the feet. I also broke one #26 needle and bent another! 

The colour came out close to what I wanted, although a little more red would have been nice. I have one more (similar) holster to make and a matching belt. Rather than use the same carving pattern I'll make it slightly different, with less background space and bigger leaves.

 

Slim Jim or California Holster provides a great uninterrupted canvas to carve.  I made two of them for my Uberti 1860s.  When I made mine I made the belt loop independent as opposed to folding over leather to create it.  I sewed the belt loop on before I glued in the pigskin lining, it made it easier for me to sew the belt loop on.  I hand sewed the holsters which included toe plugs.  No matter how flawed our masterpiece is most folks will not even notice the flaws.

[dikman]

Steve, you're quite right, the reactions from people who have seen it range from impressed to awestruck!! The fact that holsters are uncommon here, let alone carved ones, probably has more to do with it than the quality of the workmanship. You're right in that to be period correct the belt loop should be sewn as a separate piece on the back, however for my needs I needed the holster to sit a bit lower, to make it easier to clear the holster when drawing an 8" barrel.

Your idea of stitching the loop before gluing the liner had already occurred to me as it would be much neater than this effort. With the folded drop loop the loop part of the liner would have to be glued first, folded over and stitched to the holster and then the rest of the liner glued to the holster. It would be do-able but a bit tricky if the holster is formed with a curve first, but I think it's the way to go

I'm still working on the design for the next two, I just scrapped the first drawing as it just didn't look right.

Did you post any pics of your holsters?

Edited July 17, 2022 by dikman

[Bert03241]

Beautiful work, I do laser engraving and it will never match the beauty of hand carving. I just dont have the talent for carving, or should I say patients I'm so in envy of you guys that do this kind of work

[dikman]

Thank you for the kind words, Bert, but my effort is pretty mediocre compared to what others are doing on here. I have a long way to go yet.

[Wild Bill46]

That's really nice in every way. 

carving, tooling, Color execution, stitching, even presentation. Great job !

[Davm]

Post a photo of the belt if possible.  I'm working on a similar project and finished a double loop holster for a 4 3/4" gun.  One fortunate thing, the loops cover some of the carving, so... between the loops and the border my "so-so" carving ended up looking better than I thought.  The carving on the belt, that has been actually more difficult, I'm trying to come up with a pattern and have taken a little from various things I've seen and so far I am practicing sections on scrap pieces of leather.  I have a problem with scrolls. The Tandy book has you use a camouflage stamp around the perimeter and you can get things "out of round" and then the background stamp sort of blends in- in any event re-thinking the pattern all the time.  But having fun.

[dikman]

Belt??? I still have to make a couple more holsters first but it's all come to a grinding halt as I can't come up with a design I'm happy with. I've also been thinking about the belt and looking at various designs. My feelings at the moment are no edge tooling, carving only, maybe just flowers and leaves. Scrolls fall into the same category as basketweave for me - while I can appreciate a well executed pattern they don't have a lot of appeal for my projects.

[AzShooter]

Great job all around.

 

[Davm]

Well laugh :) if you must but this belt, it is the tapered end style, so the section with the bullet loops is about 2" wide and the buckle and tongue area 1 1/2" wide.  I have drawn out flowers, leaves, scrolls etc. but there seems to be a lot of background area.  The holster, I use rawhide lace which is a different color, then a border (stamped) and it is a double loop, so there are loops over the pouch area. In short, there is a lot going on so if the flowers, etc. aren't perfect, you can "sort of" get away with it.  Besides you have a large area for the pattern. But on a belt, everything has to be stretched out in a long skinny line and I just don't like what I've come up with, I've redrawn a lot and I practice on scraps.   I've searched the net and actually a lot of the carved belts in my opinion don't really look that good.  BUT I'll go on going on. This is the best hobby I've ever undertaken, love it.