DIY Hybrid 2.0

[Warhammer]

I got quite a bit done last night. I laid out the finishied Kydex on the leather to determine my cant. I just eyeballed it at forst, then I measuered the angle and it turns out thet my guess came out right at 15 degrees. That was what I was looking ofr, so I marked the positiion. Next, I used an awl to mark the position for the holes in the leather, using the Kydex as a template.

I drilled out the leather, making the holse for the first row of stiching.

Then I flippped the leather over and follow3d the dots with my groover to make the inset groove that the sticki8ng would snug down inside. This gives you a flush surface when you're done, rather than having the stiching raised up above the surface of the leather.

Next, I temporarily stiched the leather and Kydex together. This held everything in the proper alignment while I drilled the holes for the other two lines of stitching.


After drilling all the holes, I again flipped the leather over and grooved the stitch lines on the back.

There you go... ready to start sewing.

[Warhammer]

I decided to single-needle stich the parts together. I started in the middle, went to the frist and and doubled back, wnet to the seconde and and then doubled back, ending in the middle. I overlapped the start and finish by about 2 stitches to keep theings locked together. Here'es the first row of stitching. I dirlled one or two holles off a little, so this one isn't as straight as I would have liked, but it's not too bad.

Done with the all three rwos of stiching. I broke the heads off of 3 needles doing this. The Kydex has no give, and when you hit a hole for the second time with the needle and thread, things get really tight. It took pulling the needle through with a pair of pliers, and some of the holes were a real effort. Make sure you really do a good job drilling the holes in the Kydex. I could defintely tell whcih holes had been drilled cleaner than the others. Also, I opted to use braided nylon thread rather than twisted thread. The braided thread is thicker and looks much better (IMHO) when stictched on the rather large holes of the Kydex. When you pull it tight, it flattens and fills in the hols more. However, the twisted thread is thinner and MUCH easier to sew with, especially on the second pass. Overall, I pretty happy with the look so far.

Here I have the homemade Kydex J-clips mounted. I remade the clips as my first version just looked too unrefined. I think these turned out much better. I like my holster to ride pretty high, so they are set pretty far up. I wnet ahead and added some extra holes for adjustment, but I think I'm going to like it pretty much where I have it set. The clips are spaced out from the leather using leather washers that I cut from the same material. They are mounted using Chicago screws. Once I'm positive of their placement, I'll hit the screws with a little bit of Loctite to make sure they stay secure. (you can see the leather spacing washers in this pic, too.)

Here, you can also see that I've started trimming the extra leather away. I like to do this slowly and in increments, since I can always cut more off, but I can't add it back on.

This is more or less the final shape. I may trim more off after wearing the holster, but that's it for now. I like to have a full sweat shield, rather than the "combat cut."

[Warhammer]

The last thing for the night was to bevel and slick the edges.

First I used a sanding block to smoth up the contours of the edge. Then, I ran my #3 edge beveler all the way around the holster on both the front and the back. Finally, I light wet the edges with water and ran my slicking wheel over them by hand. It really takes very little work to burninsh the edges to a nice, smooth contour.

I let the edges dry overnight before applying the edge dressing.

[Warhammer]

Alright, I applied the edge coat to day and did some final fidgeting. The Edge coat goes on really easily. You just wipe it on the edges with a sponge and let it dry. I did two coats to get a really nice black edge. A finished edge really does a lot to make a holster look good. This stuff also waterproof and protects the edges of the leather. It's probably overkill, but I went ahead and burnished the edges of the leather washers and edge coated them, too.



I heated up the Kydex to do some final fitting. I adjusted the retention of the pistol and added some pre-curve to the Kydex to make the holster fit my body better. The leather will form iteself over the next few days of wear.

I reainstalled the clips, and we're done!


Once I make a final decision on ride height, I'm definitely going to trim the excess off the bottom of the j-clips. I can already feel thet part digging into my hip.

[Warhammer]

Here is my homemade holster next to a professionally produced Kholster. (I daresay mine is prettier!)


And here are few pics of the holster in use. It's already quite comfortable, but it'll be even better after a few days of breaking in.

[Jbird5363]

Dude that came out nice I hope my kydex will be in tomorow. How do you shape or press the kydex onto the gun?
You should start selling those that looks better than the pro job.

[Warhammer]

Dude that came out nice I hope my kydex will be in tomorow. How do you shape or press the kydex onto the gun?
You should start selling those that looks better than the pro job.

I heat it with a heat gun and then press it around the gun using heavy gloves and a piece of camping mat. I'm too much of a perfectionist to sell them. By the time I finished fussing with a holster to make it "just right", there would be no profit margin left! Besides, I'd have to either have the gun or a mold of the gun, and I just don't have enough guns (but then we all have THAT problem).

[Jbird5363]

I feel ya on that my wife doesn't understand you can never own enough guns

[Jbird5363]

Do you heat the sheat up while it's ontop of the gun. I really want to pop a few of these out but I'd be real mad at myself if melted a lower being a little over zealous with the heat gun

[Warhammer]

Do you heat the sheat up while it's ontop of the gun. I really want to pop a few of these out but I'd be real mad at myself if melted a lower being a little over zealous with the heat gun

I heat up the Kydex off of the gun, then move the hot, pliable Kydex onto the gun and press it. I'd keep the heat gun away from your polymer pistol.

[Jbird5363]

I've made a couple and I'm quite happy with the results still figuring out best clip designs and so on but I'm real happy with them thanks for the write up. I did a little reaserch the type of plastic used on the the guns is the kind that only melts once if you try to reheat it just burns but you have to put a good bit of heat on it.

[Warhammer]

I've made a couple and I'm quite happy with the results still figuring out best clip designs and so on but I'm real happy with them thanks for the write up. I did a little reaserch the type of plastic used on the the guns is the kind that only melts once if you try to reheat it just burns but you have to put a good bit of heat on it.

Great! Post up some pics of your work.

I'm still working on belt clips as well. My J clips are pretty good, but they don't give much support if the pants I'm wearing don't have a pretty stiff waist band. I think I'm going to make up some C clips and some standart belt clips to try all the options. Since I almost always wear my shirts untucked, the standard clips should really be just fine. Even if I do go tucked, most people just really aren't observant enough to notice the clips and know what they mean anyway.