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Make your own,

Rusty Young Man

Regular Member
Joined
Jun 19, 2013
Messages
1,548
Location
Árida Zona
Hot waxing leather makes it like armor, except very water resistant. The leather for the cross draw is only 5 oz, but it is very stiff and does not collapse. I use mostly paraffin from tea candles, but I have used bees wax. The soldiers in Europe used bees wax to make their leather armor. Beeswax has a higher melting point then most paraffin wax, but my holsters hold up well even when it is hot outside. I have not checked the melting point of the candles, but tea candles are small slow burning candles. I can buy them cheap from Big Lots.

Wait, so the ~130 Fahrenheit melting point of common candle paraffin hasn't been an issue? I figured you only used bees wax or high melting point (150-165 Fahrenheit) wax. Then again, maybe heat like that is only an AZ worry?

@j4l: really like the look of the first holster and the "CDB" sheath.
 

davidmcbeth

Banned
Joined
Jan 14, 2012
Messages
16,167
Location
earth's crust
Maybe I'll make a belt too hold all my mags .... not that I can only have rounders (lol) I'll need to carry about 25-50 mags around .... anyone make a vest w/mag holders or belts for mag?
 

Rusty Young Man

Regular Member
Joined
Jun 19, 2013
Messages
1,548
Location
Árida Zona
I like leather, and I like hot wax

:p

I finally went through with it, and now have stiff-as-Kydex leather. I call it Leatherdex (TM).
It started off as a hesitant experiment to hot wax my "regular" belt, then turned into a hot waxing frenzy in which I also waxed my gun belt and my holster.

BTW, Walking Wolf wasn't lying about the stiffness of the draw. I had to re-do my holster and let it cool with my sidearm + THREE thick bags to get a rough equivalent of the pre-wax draw. This must have been the first time I looked like a complete idiot while OCing (with what looked like bags in my holster). I'll get some photos up as soon as I can.


*Add.*
Just to avoid confusion, the holster itself is a Galco Concealable, and the belts were made by a shoe repair guy in the PHX area who does all sorts of leather work. I have yet to formally start leather working beyond some (crude-looking) knife sheaths I made about 2 years ago.
 
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b0neZ

Regular Member
Joined
Feb 15, 2012
Messages
505
Location
Davis County, Utah
:p

I finally went through with it, and now have stiff-as-Kydex leather. I call it Leatherdex (TM).
It started off as a hesitant experiment to hot wax my "regular" belt, then turned into a hot waxing frenzy in which I also waxed my gun belt and my holster.

BTW, Walking Wolf wasn't lying about the stiffness of the draw. I had to re-do my holster and let it cool with my sidearm + THREE thick bags to get a rough equivalent of the pre-wax draw. This must have been the first time I looked like a complete idiot while OCing (with what looked like bags in my holster). I'll get some photos up as soon as I can.

Please do post pics when possible!

What kind of wax did you use, and did you dunk the pieces, or brush it on?
 

Rusty Young Man

Regular Member
Joined
Jun 19, 2013
Messages
1,548
Location
Árida Zona
I actually did take a few photos of the process for my gun belt, so I'll try to get those up sometime between tonight and Monday night.

I bought a slab of high melting point paraffin wax locally (~150 Fahrentheit), and I melted some of it (~3 lbs?) in one of those large corn cans. I just melted enough to give me an extra half inch over the depth of my belt (so it had roughly 2.5 inches of wax in there).
Hot Waxing01.jpg

I rolled up the belt and dunked it into the wax while keeping it warm.
Hot Waxing02.jpg
Bubbles of air formed, and I kind of stirred it to speed this up.
Hot Waxing03b.jpg
After about 20 minutes (anything worth doing is worth overdoing), I uncurled the belt out bit by bit, wiping off the excess wax with a cotton rag. Sorry, no pics, but I took my time and burnt my fingers quite a bit.
Then I just set the belt in a cookie sheet to cool and harden in an oval shape akin to my waist dimensions.
Hot Waxing Process10.jpg
The holster was done nearly the same, but so as to avoid using more wax, I just tipped the can to soak half the holster at a time. I made sure to wrap my 1911 in two thick bags (the first time), then dunked the holster. I held it long enough to warm up the leather for each half, then pulled it out and wiped it as well, including the insides (good thing, since even then I have a slight excess in there).
Hot Waxing05b.jpg

Once it was wiped down, I put the bagged gun into it and put it on my belt (the first one I did that evening, which had cooled after 30 minutes), placing it into the normal carry position and burning my fingers some more.

When it had cooled, I discovered that TWO hands were needed to draw the bagged gun. Unbagged, it could be done with one hand, but JUST BARELY. So I repeated the procedure, but used THREE thick bags for the final forming.
Hot Waxing06.jpg
Now my holster is Kydex-hard, but leather-awesome. I call it Leatherdex. Grips it really well, and *clicks* into place when reholstering.

*Add.*
Just to avoid confusion, the holster itself is a Galco Concealable, and the belts were made by a shoe repair guy in the PHX area who does all sorts of leather work. I have yet to formally start leather working beyond some (crude-looking) knife sheaths I made about 2 years ago.
 
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tjsilva1911

New member
Joined
Jun 9, 2015
Messages
3
Location
US
Looks good. Ive been doing the same thing for about 6 months now and everyone gets better and better. I got most of my patterns and knowledge from adamsleatherworks.com
0778dd339204de4afb5a98935af5a015.jpg


Sent from my XT1045 using Tapatalk
 
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JoshGoshR

Regular Member
Joined
Jun 4, 2015
Messages
11
Location
MI
Really cool, it is always great when you can do things yourself. Handmade items are usually nicer than store bought. I make a lot of my own furniture and it turns out better quality than those bought in the stores.
 

snubbyfan

New member
Joined
Nov 2, 2012
Messages
9
Location
West Virginia
I've been making holsters and belts for other people. Finally I got a chance to make one for myself.


I had already made the belt, made the holster to match.


Since it's lined and welted, that's a 5 layer edge.




With something like that, it should be a crime not to open carry.
 
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solus

Regular Member
Joined
Aug 22, 2013
Messages
9,315
Location
here nc
nice work & nice touch with turquoise concho...is it sand cast silver?

watch for pm as i think the sig tribal would appreciate such a nice holster

ipse
 
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