Why is there "Excess Padding" on kydex sheaths?

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lieferung

lieferung

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I notice a lot of kydex sheaths have (what seems to me) an excessive amount of border around the blade area where the holes are. Is there a practical reason for this? I like a slimmer sheath and I'm getting a Street Beat soon, I was wondering if trimming the kydex edge would compromise the sheath at all.
 
I'm not sure as well.

I know some of the Tek Lok systems are pretty wide. Also, most kydex sheath makers use 1/4" eyelets or screw head fasteners to hold the 2 pieces together. So, I would think you need a larger border surrounding the knife to allow for the hardware.
With leather, you only have the stitch line width to deal with. Therefore, a much slimmer sheath which is closer to the borders of the knife with the allowance of the welt width.

I don't see why one couldn't take some of the excess off the kydex borders without compromising the hardware/fasteners.

Just my thoughts ?
 
I make kydex and leather sheaths with my knives and have never really thought about taking 99.9% of the bulk/excess material away. I try and make them compact yet spaced to where I think looks appealing. These types of kydex materials really are not strained or abused other then getting lightly bumped around in a bag or so. But some folks that like to have a working/tactical knife who do self defense courses with firearms and knives are known to do a lot of rolling on the ground and being a little more harsh with their equipment. So having a bunch of rivets spaced closely and measure precisely works best for them for strength of the sheath separating the rivets and gives them more versatility with mounting options. As High Standard said, 1/4" rivets are widely used because that's what's required for a #8 screw to be used for belt attachments.. Id say I haven't made a sheath to be as skeletonized as possible for the slimmest edc sheath but it can be done if you know your not going to torture it..

You can get away from having rivets on one side of the sheath also if you do a taco style.

Here's a pic of a couple of mine recently:
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Moderator edit - sales discussion removed
 
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I'm sure this won't be a popular opinion, but it's generally a lack of: ability/skill/knowledge/experience/priorities.

Making a compact sheath is harder than making a two piece pancake with rivets on both sides. Even more difficult when doing it as a taco sheath, and very few makers actually know how to get the fold of the kydex to follow the spine of the knife. A compact taco style sheath is plenty robust to stand up to daily carry and use.

Many makers make a sheath to have as many attachments positions as possible, instead of tailoring the sheath to the user's intended role/carry.

Not everyone has the experience to know what truly makes a great sheath; whether it's not having handled great sheaths to have a true metric of comparison, or not carrying a fixed blade daily, or not doing so in a concealable manner.

And probably the biggest reason; most sheaths are made by knifemakers. Just because someone is great at making knives, does not mean they are great at making sheaths. Many knifemakers enjoy making knives, but do not enjoy making sheaths. As such, the sheath is an afterthought instead of being carefully designed and built to work with the knife as a system.
 
blade man,

Can you offer some additional information on how to get the fold of the Kydex to follow the curve of the spine? Can you show some examples of great Kydex sheaths and talk about the features/aspects and why they are important?
 
I'm not an expert but I'll jump in with some thoughts.

Retention mechanism is super important (and this can also get into the blade design since that affects options).

I like a sheath that clicks into place but isn't excessively hard to remove.

I like a sheath that offers a thumb ramp of some kind that gives you a little leverage to remove the blade without just ripping at the sheath as a whole.

Having a lip at the top of the sheath helps with this and with inserting the knife without looking.

The slope of the lip into the body of the sheath also makes a difference. I've had sheaths where every time I went to resheath the knife the point would get stuck at the top of the sheath.
 
i4Marc said:
blade man,

Can you offer some additional information on how to get the fold of the Kydex to follow the curve of the spine? Can you show some examples of great Kydex sheaths and talk about the features/aspects and why they are important?
Click to expand...

I missed this message, sorry. I'd be happy to, I'll update here in the next few days.
 
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