Arty, just so you know that holster was my first semi serious leather craft project. It's really not that hard to learn and do if you're handy at any number of building crafts of other sorts. If you want one of your own then go for it.
I traced around the pistol to produce the pocket leaving about a 3/8 margin of leather to the stitch lines then just blended a nice rounding so there would be no obvious "wings" to catch the gun and get soft later on. The leather was marked out for cutting and stitch lines using the star wheel stitch marker as a "tracer" through the plans right onto the leather. The two pieces were cut and glued to join them through the wing's area with contact cement. Then I used a groover to make the stitching grooves so they would be under the leathers surface. Then a marking wheel to lay out the stitch points, punched the holes with a leather punch then hand stitched using two needles. It was all time consumning and boring but not really that difficult. The only tricky part being to get the groover lines nice and even. But 5 minutes of practice on the scraps will soon sharpen up your hand for this. After that marking and punching is easy and just plain time consumning.
The trick when it's all stitched is to bag your gun in a fairly heavy and sturdy plastic bag. I think I found that the BCLCB bag worked well. Then run the leather under really hot tap water for about a minute. From there while it's still warm jam the pistol down into the pocket and work it into position to stretch the leather. The area around the trigger will need a couple of blocks of stiff foam rubber and small patches of scrap plywood or similar to force the leather to stretch down into the guard like mine did. It'll take some extra time to dry due to blocking the leather this way so be prepared to be patient. I locked mine away for a couple of days to let it dry fully.
To make a holster of this sort you'll need the following;
- Heavy leather about 2.5 to 3.0mm thick. I can't remember the right name for the "weight grade" used by the industry.
- A good knife to cut the leather. A heavy duty box cutter/drywall knife works well.
- Leatherworking grooving tool, stitch marking wheel tool, single point diamond shaped stitch punch tool, waxed cotton "sinew" leather thread, leather sewing needles, leather dye, hole punch.
- Contact cement to glue the wings together before stitching.
- Medium and fine sandpaper and a burnishing tool to finish the edges.
The leather punch is to punch the holes at the ends of the belt slots before doing the straight cuts.
When it's done between the hot water and the leather dye the leather will have a tough and stiff nature. DO NOT OIL the leather or you'll make it go soft and supple. That's the very last thing you want for a holster. Instead just wax it with a good non coloured shoe wax or boot grease/wax. It'll both lubricate the leather and protect it while not making it go soft. Wax both the inside and out. Re-wax about once a year or as needed depending on if you shoot in rainy day matches where it gets wet fairly often. When you notice it soaking up water or getting water stained it's time to re-wax.
