Shotgun shell belt

[Riem]

I've interacted on this forum about the shotgun shell belt I was making for a friend. It's done now.

Leather for the belt: Bovine vegtan, 3.5 - 4 mm thick from the Oasis tannery (oasistanning.co.za)

Leather for the loops: Calfskin vegtan, 1.4 - 1.6 mm thick from Leatherite (Leatherite.co.za)

Thread: A 1.0 mm braided poly/nylon thread I stumbled upon at a local shoe repair supplier who sold it as "handsewing thread".

Buckle and rivets: antique brass (surely "fake antique" is a better description). Buckle is 40 mm wide.

All stitching done by hand. Stitch length 6 mm.

Dye: Staycraft medium brown, thereafter a coat of Neetsfoot oil.

Edges slicked by hand with a piece of denim and beeswax, and then recoloured with a permanent marker pen.

Finish: Kiwi brown boot polish, a good rub of Plush Hide Food,

What else? O yeah, about six weeks of a-couple-of-minutes-here-and-there time - which sometimes turned into a couple of hours...

 

 

Feedback welcome - I don't want to tell you of all the flaws I know about - too many to mention... Please don't spare the critique, it's the only way I'll learn.

Thanks for looking!

[Eddie Q]

Very nicely made, bet it's heavy all loaded up.

[plinkercases]

Well done sir. Hand sewn?

[Riem]

4 hours ago, Eddie Q said:

Very nicely made, bet it's heavy all loaded up.

Thank you! I bet it will be but I've not tested the weight yet. Over here it's illegal to have ammo in your possession if you don't have a licence for the firearm. I don't own a shotgun, so it will have to wait until I can deliver it.

3 hours ago, plinkercases said:

Well done sir. Hand sewn?

Thanks, yes it's all hand sewn. Approximately 3 metres of sewing in this beast, by my calculation.  I don't own a sewing machine but since I'm a hobbyist I don't have a 'business case' to spend so much money on a machine. I do enjoy the hand sewing even if it's a challenge to keep the stitch lines straight and to lay the stitches with as near a precision as I can muster.

[plinkercases]

Well it is fine result and well worth your effort.

[garypl]

Nice job Riem - it turned out well!

Gary

[dikman]

Very nice Riem. You did a good job on it, I'm sure the recipient will like it.

[Order and Chaos]

A question related to shotgun shell belts...

My neighbor is asking for basically the same thing, he would like for it to hold 20-24 qty of 12 gauge shells. A concern of mine is since he wants this for rabbit & squirrel hunting, shells will be pulled out of the loops fairly often, and I'm a little worried if I use too light of leather for the loops, the loops getting stretched out of shape may be an issue. I'm trying to figure out a way to keep things snug with the shells in the loops. One option I can think of is having the bottoms of the loops closed so even if there is some stretch, the shells can't fall through. The other idea I had was hiding a band of 2.5" elastic weave inside the shell loops...

[dikman]

It would have to stretch an awful lot to let the cartridges fall through as the rims would stop that happening! Personally, I don't think it's likely to be much of a problem, but you could use heavy military grade elastic instead, or heavy cotton webbing, both of which were used at times by the military (mainly because they don't cause a buildup of verdigris if the cartridges are left in the loops).

[Riem]

2 hours ago, Order and Chaos said:

A question related to shotgun shell belts...

My neighbor is asking for basically the same thing, he would like for it to hold 20-24 qty of 12 gauge shells. A concern of mine is since he wants this for rabbit & squirrel hunting, shells will be pulled out of the loops fairly often, and I'm a little worried if I use too light of leather for the loops, the loops getting stretched out of shape may be an issue. I'm trying to figure out a way to keep things snug with the shells in the loops. One option I can think of is having the bottoms of the loops closed so even if there is some stretch, the shells can't fall through. The other idea I had was hiding a band of 2.5" elastic weave inside the shell loops...

I acknowledge the concern that the loops may stretch or otherwise become loose over time enabling the cartridge to slip through. I too have that at the back of my mind. In my case, the loops are made from 1.6mm calfskin vegtan. I tried to mitigate by sewing a 10mm strip below the loops as a type of stop. Time will tell whether that will be sufficient to prevent loss of cartridges.

a different construction approach is to cut slots through the belt and then loop the cartridge retaining strip through that. If you search for cartridge belt here on leatherworker.net you'll find several examples and good advice about how that is done. I didn't follow that advice due to constraints with the tools I had available...

[falcon45]

Excellent job Riem!

[Riem]

5 minutes ago, falcon45 said:

Excellent job Riem!

Thanks a lot, Falcon! Appreciate it.

[Order and Chaos]

Okay, looked at a larger version of the picture and saw the stop strip along the bottom edge. That makes sense with the open bottom loops. I asked and my neighbor only uses 2.75" and 3" shells, so I don't have to worry about making sure 2.5" English or 3.5" magnums fit.

 

 

[Riem]

2 hours ago, Order and Chaos said:

Okay, looked at a larger version of the picture and saw the stop strip along the bottom edge. That makes sense with the open bottom loops. I asked and my neighbor only uses 2.75" and 3" shells, so I don't have to worry about making sure 2.5" English or 3.5" magnums fit.

Glad you seem to have a way forward. I handed the one I made to the new owner this past weekend (at his daughter's wedding) and phoned him this afternoon. He was ecstatic and couldn't stop showing it around - not sure if he is more taken with the belt or the new son-in-law...