Horsewright
Knifemaker / Craftsman / Service Provider
- Joined
- Oct 4, 2011
- Messages
- 11,672
I've been using water buffalo leather (veg tan) for a few years now. Its a great strap/belt leather and I've gone through quite a bit of it.
About 6 months back I noticed that chrome tan (chap type leather) water buffalo was now available. I ordered some up for a chap project and it rapidly became very popular. I've since made four pairs of shotgun chaps, three pairs of chinks and two pairs of charmitas:
Shotgun chaps:
Chinks:
Charmitas:
Its attributes? Well its relatively inexpensive about $3.60 a square foot. Its a beautiful "broke in" medium brown that folks really like. It has a great texture and a wonderful feel. It breathes very well in hot conditions and keeps ya warm in cold, so its very comfortable and it drapes very well. It might be the perfect chap leather.
Its detractions? Well the sides are small. About 15 square feet. So in making any kind of leggings I need two sides, one for each leg. The problem is ya get ya a pretty big pile of scrap built up pretty fast. What ya gonna do with it? Thought I'd share some of the things we've come up with:
One of the first things I came up with was for lining on my Rangeflap holsters. I was already using the belt water buffalo scraps for the flap strap and also the belt loop on the back:
My one concern here was how well would it edge. It did great as long as it has the firmness of the veg tan backing.
Needed to make up some buckaroo folding knife pouches.
When using a new leather for this application I'll make up a trial pattern first. Some leathers seem to cause tarnish really fast, others don't at all. So I made up one, put a folder of mine with nickel silver bolsters on it and left it on the bathroom counter for several weeks. No problems. So I've made a LOT of these guys now from this leather. We'll usually make ten at a time. We use a different chap leather for the strap as I think the buffalo might be a little stretchy for that use.
A guy picked up his water buffalo belt one day and asked if I could make a matching sheath for his Leatherman. These sheaths have to have some wet molding done to them for retention and the regular belt water buffalo doesn't mold well. I came up with the idea of overlaying this chap leather on regular veg tan to make this sheath:
It worked so well and I liked it so well, I made myself a holster:
The guy that teaches Nichole's CCW classes saw that pic on Instagram and he ordered one for his pistol. Decided to make two others for stock as we're getting ready for a show. So I made up three yesterday. In process:
I'd previously made up a few water buffalo belts too for stock. We had a pretty good selection of larger sizes but need some smaller ones. This left some belt buffalo straps sitting on the cutting table 20 inches long or so. I cut up a couple for various other thinner straps needed on other projects but still had four laying there. I thought hmm what about slobber straps. We had't made any slobber straps in a few years. So we did, busted out two sets, overlaying the chap buffalo on the belt buffalo.
Slobber straps are used to attach a mecate type rein to a snaffle bit. Here's a couple of pics of a carved pair we made my son to show ya how they work:
Kinda warming up to this deal. I'd just made my first roughout belt. In fact the neighbor bought it before it was finished it was so cool. I thought why not a overlaid belt it'd be kinda roughoutish:
I made it over 7/8 oz Herman Oak.
Kinda wondering what other ideas we could come up with, hmmm?
About 6 months back I noticed that chrome tan (chap type leather) water buffalo was now available. I ordered some up for a chap project and it rapidly became very popular. I've since made four pairs of shotgun chaps, three pairs of chinks and two pairs of charmitas:
Shotgun chaps:
Chinks:
Charmitas:
Its attributes? Well its relatively inexpensive about $3.60 a square foot. Its a beautiful "broke in" medium brown that folks really like. It has a great texture and a wonderful feel. It breathes very well in hot conditions and keeps ya warm in cold, so its very comfortable and it drapes very well. It might be the perfect chap leather.
Its detractions? Well the sides are small. About 15 square feet. So in making any kind of leggings I need two sides, one for each leg. The problem is ya get ya a pretty big pile of scrap built up pretty fast. What ya gonna do with it? Thought I'd share some of the things we've come up with:
One of the first things I came up with was for lining on my Rangeflap holsters. I was already using the belt water buffalo scraps for the flap strap and also the belt loop on the back:
My one concern here was how well would it edge. It did great as long as it has the firmness of the veg tan backing.
Needed to make up some buckaroo folding knife pouches.
When using a new leather for this application I'll make up a trial pattern first. Some leathers seem to cause tarnish really fast, others don't at all. So I made up one, put a folder of mine with nickel silver bolsters on it and left it on the bathroom counter for several weeks. No problems. So I've made a LOT of these guys now from this leather. We'll usually make ten at a time. We use a different chap leather for the strap as I think the buffalo might be a little stretchy for that use.
A guy picked up his water buffalo belt one day and asked if I could make a matching sheath for his Leatherman. These sheaths have to have some wet molding done to them for retention and the regular belt water buffalo doesn't mold well. I came up with the idea of overlaying this chap leather on regular veg tan to make this sheath:
It worked so well and I liked it so well, I made myself a holster:
The guy that teaches Nichole's CCW classes saw that pic on Instagram and he ordered one for his pistol. Decided to make two others for stock as we're getting ready for a show. So I made up three yesterday. In process:
I'd previously made up a few water buffalo belts too for stock. We had a pretty good selection of larger sizes but need some smaller ones. This left some belt buffalo straps sitting on the cutting table 20 inches long or so. I cut up a couple for various other thinner straps needed on other projects but still had four laying there. I thought hmm what about slobber straps. We had't made any slobber straps in a few years. So we did, busted out two sets, overlaying the chap buffalo on the belt buffalo.
Slobber straps are used to attach a mecate type rein to a snaffle bit. Here's a couple of pics of a carved pair we made my son to show ya how they work:
Kinda warming up to this deal. I'd just made my first roughout belt. In fact the neighbor bought it before it was finished it was so cool. I thought why not a overlaid belt it'd be kinda roughoutish:
I made it over 7/8 oz Herman Oak.
Kinda wondering what other ideas we could come up with, hmmm?
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