One of my neighbors is in law enforcement. He came by this morning because his new pistol didn't fit in his old scabbard. It was listed as the correct one, but wasn't even close. I sent him back to his house to find a piece of plastic at least 3/4" thick and 5" long. I had a piece of scrap delrin, but wanted him to at least sweat for a minute. Low and behold, he came back with a piece of plastic from a gardening tool. I felt bad about him destroying his tool, so I gave in and told him we would use "something of mine". He works hard for a living and has a new baby so I figured what the heck.
We split his scabbard down the middle at the top using a dremel tool. I milled down some delrin to .600 wide, .375 thick and 4.75 long. The Miller Lite had me on point so I slowed the RPM's and increased the feed rate to put a pattern on the outside. I then milled and chamfered a slot down the middle of the inside to allow the front sight to clear without any interference. Finally I put a radius on all the exposed edges to closer match the existing material and keep it comfortable to wear. That all went pretty easy. The big challenge was how to hold it so I could drill and tap. I ended up clamping the scabbard in a parallel clamp then putting the clamp in the milling vise. Worked great. Drilled and tapped 8 holes, 5-40. Using 1/4" screws (what I had on hand) worked really well, they did not protrude into the sight channel at all. No exposed metal inside anywhere.
The fit was good. I didn't have to open up to .600, but right at .600, there was no interference. At .500, the gun would slide in and out, but you could feel it dragging. Hopefully the extra clearance will slow down the holster rash. By keeping the delrin close to the top of the frame, the latch is very secure and gun doesn't move at all.
He offered to pay so I told him I wanted a get out of jail free card. He didn't give me one, he's probably just out of them right now.
We split his scabbard down the middle at the top using a dremel tool. I milled down some delrin to .600 wide, .375 thick and 4.75 long. The Miller Lite had me on point so I slowed the RPM's and increased the feed rate to put a pattern on the outside. I then milled and chamfered a slot down the middle of the inside to allow the front sight to clear without any interference. Finally I put a radius on all the exposed edges to closer match the existing material and keep it comfortable to wear. That all went pretty easy. The big challenge was how to hold it so I could drill and tap. I ended up clamping the scabbard in a parallel clamp then putting the clamp in the milling vise. Worked great. Drilled and tapped 8 holes, 5-40. Using 1/4" screws (what I had on hand) worked really well, they did not protrude into the sight channel at all. No exposed metal inside anywhere.
The fit was good. I didn't have to open up to .600, but right at .600, there was no interference. At .500, the gun would slide in and out, but you could feel it dragging. Hopefully the extra clearance will slow down the holster rash. By keeping the delrin close to the top of the frame, the latch is very secure and gun doesn't move at all.
He offered to pay so I told him I wanted a get out of jail free card. He didn't give me one, he's probably just out of them right now.