Okay, so yesterday after the rain I roughed in the zero on the revolver’s new sight. Then this morning before the rain I took it out to 25 yards with a rest and fined it in…
And THEN I had to harden my heart and do something really scary…
This really committed me to the new thing, because I only have one holster. Now that I know it works, I’ll work on smoothing out the cut and learning how to burnish cut edges.
Introducing the new EDC normal!
The disadvantage, obviously, is that the pistol isn’t quite as useful as a quick reactive defense weapon*. The overwhelming advantage is that I can see the damned sight in all light conditions**, with or without glasses.
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*But mostly when I fire the pistol for realsies it’s just as a noisemaker to change a hostile animal’s plans. I very rarely have to kill anything but the occasional rattler.
**One of the things I feared was that full desert sun would blot out the red dot, a problem with red dots of 10 years ago. But they seem to have overcome that even in the lower-price models.
Hi Joel,
Whittle a point on a 6″ dowel or twig 3/8″ diameter, sand smooth. This will get into the corners. The other end cut a groove 1/8 deep all around 1/4″ from the end with a chain saw file. Now you have a good burnishing tool. Wet the leather a bit with water or saddle soap or something similar and it will fold down and smooth to a finished edge.
Somewhere on my desk among the little scraps of notes – “gum tragacanth” – for the next time I get near a Tandy’s. It’s been on that list for about 5-6 years – so I’m not exactly holding my breath!
In the meantime I’ve always just used sandpaper. 180-220 to take off any shaggy bits – and maybe 320 to smooth it out. Radius your cuts with the paper uniformly and they’ll blend better. Put the paper over a hard surface for this, not your finger – you want a hard contact area. Then I just finish it out with whatever I’m using as a leather oil at the time. It’s not as fancy as the hard burnished look – but it doesn’t stand out and scream “I bubba’d my good leather holster”. (quite as loudly!)
I had the thought on your last post that you were going to ‘adapt’ that holster. Right behind me on the table keeping a stainless speed six well attired is a vintage Shoemaker holster that came my way at the right price. Nice basketweave brown with double thickness leather for the simple body. (1/4″ thick) The only thing I didn’t like was the highway patrol type belt attachment – metal shank – forward and outward cant. After looking at it for a couple years I finally popped the stiches on the belt mount and turned it into a dandy cross-draw.
Let any among us who’s not done such a thing cast the first stone. It’d probably be worth noting too that now Joel has pretty much put an edge on his ‘return fire’ capabilities!
I am old and do not remember where I learned this: use raw egg white to burnish the edges of your cut leather after beveling the sharp edges. You can buy a beveling tool from Tandy’s or beak the lifting tab off of an old-fashioned church key bottle opener, sharpen with a small chainsaw file. Use it on a drawstroke.
The protein in the egg white does the trick.
Rub the treated edge vigorously until you see it shine. Adds some water-proofing to the raw edge.
I use a tine from a deer antler as my burnishing tool. The texture of the horn is just right.
Nice Joel, very nice. I’m glad that the red dot works and you have a sight cover for it.
As for slowing you down, depending on the range to target there is always the option to waste the first shot in trying to rattle the other fellow and give yourself a little time to pull off the cover. As Heinlein once wrote: “Get a shot off fast. This upsets him long enough to let you make your second shot perfect.”
So now you need a few snap caps and to practice, practice, practice. 👍 🙂