Tooled Holster

[particle]

Hello all - I'm currently working on a couple tooled holsters and need your opinion on this one. The customer originally ordered natural leather with natural colored thread. He later requested black leather, but did not specify black thread so we rolled forward with natural thread. Honestly, this is my favorite of all the holsters I've built thus far... I have a couple questions.

1) Will the natural thread accept black dye? It's the thread I bought from Tippmann to use with my Boss. I don't think I'll have any problems dying it black, aside from rub-off, but I think with enough buffing and plenty of sealer, it should be fine and should take the color fine.

2) The customer wasn't sure what he thought of the recess for the ejection port. I have seen other holsters boned deeply like I have done, but wanted to get your opinion to see if you thought it looked bad. The customer wasn't crazy about it. I suppose I could re-wet the leather in that area and pull it out some, but that wouldn't leave much retention in that area.

Anyway, I'd appreciate your thoughts on this holster, and would like to hear if you see any room for improvement. I'm not done with it - the edges still need to be burnished, and final sealers need to be applied.

Thanks,

Eric

[dirtclod]

Nice holster. I dye the thread all the time red and blue espically and as far as i know it's never been a problem. Sense i have never seen red or blue thread in a 207 277 size.

[dmr400]

Particle,

I really like that holster! Tooling looks good, and the black appeals to me. Have to say though, I'm with the customer, the ejection port kinda ruins the top line of the pistol. Question, how far back from the front sight does your dowel for the sight track go? I like to take mine all the way out of the holster, that way you can mold the port and still have a top line that continues the entire length of the piece, without a sight track that tapers down as you pull the pistol further out of the holster. If this doesn't make sense let me know and I'll try and explain what I mean better.

[particle]

Thanks guys. Dmr, I'm not sure how long the sight track dowel is off the top of my head - I usually take it to about the front of the trigger guard, as by the time the muzzle clears the holster to that point, it can move front to back a bit more. Being that the floral carving was there, I couldn't mold very aggressively on the tooling, thus I made the indention like I did. I wish I could remember where I had seen that done before.

Well, I've been needing to order the stirrup attachment from Tippman - guess I'll order a couple presser feet while I'm there.

Edited June 15, 2010 by particle

[Shorts]

Neat holster for sure. I prefer black on black but the white on black adds a particular flavor and style that matches the tooling.

As for the ejection port molding you have a couple options.

- scoot the mouth reinforcement over to line up closer to the slide stitch line. You need it close enough the foot can step up and walk on it while far enough the needle foot thingy has enough room to continue on a straight path. Press your ejection port for the retention. You will have a shallow indentation. Because of that you need to bone the ej port line. It doesn't need to be deep, it just needs to be drawn. It gives definition to the shallow area and you accomplish the retention needed.

- notch the mouth reinforcement for the ejection port. I've begun to toy with this design as well.

- run a straight dowel line and use your boning tool to notch under the edge of the reinforced mouth piece. You can define the ej port edge, again, accomplishing some retention and keeping good aesthetics.

Hope you don't mind, I painted your photo to demonstrate.

[particle]

Thank you Shorts for taking the time to markup the images. I really like the looks of your reinforcement piece going up close to the adjacent stitch line. I guess I didn't think about straddling the edge of the reinforcement piece with the presser foot to stitch the top of the slide. That looks much better than the way I cut my reinforcement piece so far away.

[TexasJack]

I like the look of the holster and the tooling. Also liked the comments, as they were both very constructive.

[dmr400]

Agreed that the pistol has some wiggle room as the trigger guard leaves the leather. Personally, I like to rock my pistol backwards as that happens when drawing for time, and the full length sight track ensures there isn't any of the infamous fuzz as the slide keeps the top of the sight from digging in as it pivots. But I have to say, the more I look at this holster the more I like the color scheme. I've been doing some white thread on black leather lately, and I just really like the contrast. Great minds, eh?

I like your makers mark too, very calligraphic. Almost reminds me of Arabic script, but I've had that on the brain for a while

[Shorts]

I was just upstairs and I snapped a pic real quick to illustrate what I talked about up there:

My clearance of the stitch line and RM edge is 1/8"

Edited June 17, 2010 by Shorts

[particle]

WOW!! That's "cuttin' it close"!!! Thanks for sharing - that gives me confidence to move it over quite a bit. Leaves more room for tooling anyway!

[Shorts]

WOW!! That's "cuttin' it close"!!! Thanks for sharing - that gives me confidence to move it over quite a bit. Leaves more room for tooling anyway!

You're welcome. Sometimes I boo-boo and get it too close

But the more you do it the better you get at judging the position and it'll be automatic. And you'll definitely have room for the tooling as the foot walks outside your border.