Saturday, November 14, 2015

Flamed Titanium & Leather Laced Sheath

County Comm recently sent me a care package of items to work with, including a couple of 4" Titanium Widgy Bars and Brass/Ti Screw Links

I gave the titanium pieces a once over with a butane torch to give them a bit of color beyond the common gray finish titanium usually has.

I figured I'd try making a leather sheath for one of the widgy bars, to keep it from being noisy on a loaded edc keyring and also help prevent the tool from stabbing my leg when kept in a front pocket.


I've had a bag of scrap leather pieces that I'd bought back around 2008, at the time planning to use some for a sling pouch with paracord , but other than using some of the leather strips for some short and simple Turk's head knots or monkey's fists, the bag has been tucked away in a storage bin in the closet.  I dug some out and cut a section to use as an open ended pouch for one of the widgy bars, doing some leather edge lacing, The Double Loop stitching as seen in a YouTube tutorial video.


I don't have much in the way of leather working tools, so I just used scissors to cut out an estimated size to fit the pry bar plus stitching/lacing, a tape measure to mark out spacing for holes, Dremel tool with drill bit to make the holes, and a lacing needle to work the leather lacing.


The pry bar is a snug fit and seems to hold well enough to not fall out on its own, and the curved widgy bar also fit the same sheath too.   I wasn't sure it would at first, but it fits and holds nicely.

Some West Country Whipping wraps applied to the widgy bars, red 1/16" Atwood Utility Rope on one and green with black tracer Tether Cord on the other.  The ends are trimmed and you can sew, melt, glue, or tuck to finish.


I used my wood burning tool to melt the ends in place, but folks should experiment with different methods to see which they prefer for any given project, and it's good to know more than one way to finish.  As an example, using natrual fiber cord, like cotton, hemp, or jute twine, means you can't melt/singe the ends in place like you can with synthetic nylon or poly cords, so sewing, gluing, tucking, or whipping the ends in place would  be done instead.

Note that the wrap is the same on both prybars, but that anytime you use cord that has a different color tracer thread in it, combination colors, or camo, that it can make it difficult to see the pattern of the knot work, so I personally prefer solid colors most of the time for decorative work, but the other variations can certainly be useful too.

A couple of edc setups with paracord wrist lanyards and Copper Cord Clutch beads are shown with the widgy bars, Victorinox Cadet Swiss Army Knives in red and a rare copper one from my collection, and Olight S10 LED flashlight on one, and Maratac Copper CR123 on the other.


I still have a few knotty projects planned for the tether cord, 1x4 Deluxe Anodized Screwdriver, Brass Pico Pull, XL Clear Polycarbonate Pico Pull, and Paracord Para-Pac.


I used orange 0.9mm string to tie a 3 pass Gaucho knot around the blue anodized screwdriver, finished with a light coat of krazy glue, and the knot works great for added grip when using the tool.

A short leftover scrap of leather was used for the Spanish ring knot on the XL Polycarbonate Pull, which I filled with a variety of aspirin, benadryl, ibuprofen, and tylenol, to cover a variety of daily over-the-counter med needs that can fit on a zipper pull or keyring, using a FreeKey System Accessory ring.

I also added one to the Brass Pico Pull with benadryl and aspirin in it, also for quick attachment to a zipper pull or keyring.

I'm leaving the Paracord Para-Pac intact, to keep in a zombie survival ziplock jacket pocket kit or inside a Nalgene storage kit.









2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Did you do the engine turning on your leatherman?

It looks really cool.

Stormdrane said...

That's a Sheffield copy of a Kershaw A100 multitool, that came with that nice finish on it. It's been a good go to tool kept in the kitchen gadget drawer for the years I've had that one, originally purchased at an AutoZone parts store. :)