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ac-mech wrote:i just finish this for a glock 26...

That looks sweet! Nice job, you've got plenty of room to move your clips up and down to adjust ride and cant. The kydex looks great!

paulhailes wrote:How easy is it to mold the Kydex? I wouldn't mind making a holster that could fit my 3.8 XDm with a TLR-3 attached.

It is EXTREMELY easy to work with. I've seen some guys heat it up in the oven but it does give off a plasticy smell and they wife may not like that. I just heat mine up with a heatgun I bought at Autozone. I made a video of another holsters that I modified the Kydex on here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvYQIYQpp58

I find it's much easier to work with the heatgun then trying to rush it from the oven to the workbench. And if you mess it up, you just re-heat it and the image of the gun just fades back out of it in about 30 seconds! You can heat and re-heat until you get it just the way you like it, you don't have to be afraid of messing up the Kydex. Just be a little bit careful not to hold the heatgun in one spot for too long. Just keep waving it around in circles and you'll be fine.

Use a piece of foam to smash down on the kydex on your pistol and get the Kydex to wrap around it the edges. Again, trial and error workred best for me. You can practice a few times without much worry.

I got my leather from Hobby Lobby, it's a bit too thin though. I bought a kit from "Old Faithful Hosters" that should be here next week. I'll post some more pictures once I get it put together.

Thanks man! Yours looks great, looks professional.

The thread is actually waxed leather stitching, it's the same stuff used on pure leather holsters. It's super strong. Although, I'm not really happy with the performance of my holster because the leather I used is too thin so the retention on it stinks. It also rides to hight so I need to lower the clips.

I'm really happy with the kydex portion though, that part turned out exactly as I wanted. I kind of scalloped the top and got a good thumb safety pocket on there. Next time I will use thicker leather and a thicker Kydex. This one was .040" thick, I think I will up it to .060. Right now it crushes a little bit when the gun is unholstered.

Actually the Old Faithful Holster kit is looking pretty good to me http://oldfaithfulholsters.com/. I wish I'd seen that kit before I made this one, but this was a good learning experience.

Okay so I've been messing around with Kydex and a heatgun. I really love working with this stuff and can think of all kinds of uses for it now that I see how easy it is to work with. I got some leather, waxed leather stiching, a tapestry needle and permission from the wife to hide out in the garage for three nights! Here are the results, what do you guys think?

It's pretty comfortable, although I have to say I like my all kydex FIST holster a little better. The thing I really like about this crossbreed style is that it distributes the weight a little better on your belt. The thing I don't like is that you can definitely feel all that leather up against your skin on a hot day. It's comfortable to wear, but you definitely feel like you're 'wearing' something compared to my FIST Kydex IWB. That little thing just feels like you tucked your pistol in your belt. I will definitely use both holsters depending on how I'm dressed. I think the leather will work wearing 'dress' clothes with an undershirt. The FIST Kydex IWB will before evenings and weekends:



I'm really happy with the way the Kydex formed around the thumb safety to keep it locked:





This leather piece is raw so I might tan it later and i'm thinking of adding a 'combat cut' once its nice and formed to my hip:



Here's my FIST Kydex: