Estimated project time 45mins

This was my second project working with kydex, and I decided to make it from one piece of kydex, for the holster it's self and the belt attachment. I've provided the diagram that I traced onto the kydex (found here) so that you may avoid that whole planning stage that takes up a significant amount of time.

For this project, I traced the template down onto the Kydex, and then cut it out using my dremel tool with a cutting disc on it. Be careful of what you put underneath it, as it will leave black lines in it. It also helps to clamp the kydex down while you are doing this, so that it isn't flying around. The key to cutting with a dremel is using the lowest speed you have availible, and going slowly. Faster speeds will just melt the kydex and leave you with a bit of a mess.

Sharpie is now making a 'metalic' marker that is perfect for tracing the pattern. It is a silver colored marker, for great visibility on dark colors. I'd suggest picking up a pack of them! Here is a link to see what they look like, and read about the proper care and feeding of the marker (must store tip down).

The next step was to begin forming the kydex. I did this by heating all of the patern except for the belt loop tab. I heated it with my heat gun (purchased at a big box home improvement store for 24.99 - heat gun.) I tend to use the lower heat setting first, moving the gun around slowly to try and evenly heat all of the surface I am forming. Then I throw the gun to high, and go over everything once to make sure it is good and heated. This whole heating process shouldn't take more than a couple minutes on a small piece like this. Remember to keep the belt loop tab cold, it makes a good handle!

Next I placed the leatherman down on the hot kydex on top of a foam pad, and with gloved hands, wrapped the kydex around the leatherman tool. I then placed another pad on top, being careful to make sure the kydex was still wrapped tightly around the leatherman wave tool, and placed a foot square piece of 3/4 plywood on top of that. Then it was time to rest, so I sat on it! I sat with my weight on it while a complete song played on the radio (about three mins.) Then I removed it (still wearing gloves) and got ready for a second shaping.

The sheath should now be pretty well formed, but I heated up each of the side tabs separately (with the heat gun), and squeezed them in, with the leatherman inside. Don't try this with a tool with plastic pieces! Then held them for a couple minutes, to let them cool. Welding gloves are great for this task, although you don't have much dexterity, you can hold the hot kydex and barely feel the warmth coming off it. After doing the left side tab, I did the right side, held that, and then did the bottom, and held that for another three minutes. At this point i'm holding the whole sheath tightly in my hand, to let if form to the shape.

The previous step is why I use a heat gun for these type of sheaths. It allows a great amount of control in the final shaping, and keeps the back side of the sheath fairly rigid so that it will work well with a belt.

The next step is forming the belt loop. This is an easy task, using your belt loop template. I have a piece of 1/4 plywood that I have cut to 4inches by 1 and 3/4 inches. This size fits my belts well. Simply heat up the belt loop tab and roll it over the plywood like you would a belt. This step usually only takes one forming, but you can go back and tweak any points that you would like.

Final step is sanding down all the rough edges, and squaring everything up. For this I used two different tools. One is a large belt sander, and the other a dremel. I use the belt sander to true up any edges that are out of whack. When you form the kydex around a irregular object like the leatherman wave, you are bound to end up with differing amounts of material left in different places.

Then I go over the entire piece with a dremel, and an old sanding wheel that is pretty worn out. It takes off material, but not too much at a time, which is the key to getting the shape just right. The pictures on this page reflect the sheath before it has gone through this step. I have of course done this since. Again, LOW speed is the key to not melting the kydex with the dremel.

Good Luck in your projects, I'd love to see pictures, and will post them below if you send them to me, along with your comments!