Mods, this probably belongs in the holster sub-forum, but I wanted to get some exposure up here. Move as desired.
With summer coming I’ve been interested in experimenting with "cargo shorts carry". I’ve looked around at various vendor’s offerings for pocket carry but recently I had an “aha!” moment. When I bought my G23 the guy threw in a cheap Fobus paddle holster because he didn’t have any “good ones” available at the time. He said it would “get me by until I got a real holster”. Well, I never did use it. But recently the thought occurred to me to try and cannibalize it and see if I could turn it into a viable pocket holster. Hell, it didn’t cost me anything, but for a pocket holster it had some promise: It’s light, thin, flexible – all the things you DON’T want in a belt holster and all the things you DO want in a pocket holster. So I cut into it and I was so thoroughly pleased with the results I thought I would share. Now I don’t recommend you go run out and buy one of these holsters to rip it apart, but then again, they can be found for less than $20 in some places. And with less than 20 mins of work and a few pop rivets, VIOLA, a nice kydex pocket holster for the summer.
Here it is…before surgery.
I crushed the 3 rivet heads holding the paddle to the holster with a pliers and pulled them out the other side. Did the same thing for the two rivets below the trigger guard holding the two pieces of the holster together.
Check out the lip on the paddle that snags a belt…looks like it will make a nice thumb push for a pocket holster, no?
I put my weapon in the holster and laid it on top of the paddle – positioned to “thumb push” about 1/3rd of the way down the slide. Marked the edges of the holster on the paddle with a sharpie.
Notice the outline of the holster top.
I made a sweeping arc to about 1/2" from the thumb push. Took me two tries to get the position right.
I cut along the line using a big tin snips I have for flashing/vinyl siding. It cut the kydex like butter.
I held the “thumb push” in place against the holster and marked the location of the three holes with a sharpie.
I cut the top off the rest of the paddle. Trimmed off the top of the piece to the left. This piece became my pocket “snag”. I held the pocket snag against the holster below the trigger guard and marked the locations of the holes with a sharpie. I had to trim the pocket snag to fit.
Drilled all the holes with a 3/16” drill bit.
The back of the holster where the paddle connected has two little nipples – filed them off or the “thumb push” wouldn’t rest nicely.
I pop riveted the thumb push and the pocket snag onto the holster with 5mm rivets. For the thumb push I used 1/4” rivets. The pocket snag is joining 3 pieces of kydex, so I opted for a 1/2" rivet, but I think I could have gotten away with 1/4”
Filed off sharp edges with a very fine metal file.
Done!
It works better than I expected. The combination thumb push and pocket snag make for flawless unholstering from a cargo pocket, or even a side pocket if they're deep enough.
Call me cheap, but I'm flabbergasted with my own ingenuity...
With summer coming I’ve been interested in experimenting with "cargo shorts carry". I’ve looked around at various vendor’s offerings for pocket carry but recently I had an “aha!” moment. When I bought my G23 the guy threw in a cheap Fobus paddle holster because he didn’t have any “good ones” available at the time. He said it would “get me by until I got a real holster”. Well, I never did use it. But recently the thought occurred to me to try and cannibalize it and see if I could turn it into a viable pocket holster. Hell, it didn’t cost me anything, but for a pocket holster it had some promise: It’s light, thin, flexible – all the things you DON’T want in a belt holster and all the things you DO want in a pocket holster. So I cut into it and I was so thoroughly pleased with the results I thought I would share. Now I don’t recommend you go run out and buy one of these holsters to rip it apart, but then again, they can be found for less than $20 in some places. And with less than 20 mins of work and a few pop rivets, VIOLA, a nice kydex pocket holster for the summer.
Here it is…before surgery.
I crushed the 3 rivet heads holding the paddle to the holster with a pliers and pulled them out the other side. Did the same thing for the two rivets below the trigger guard holding the two pieces of the holster together.
Check out the lip on the paddle that snags a belt…looks like it will make a nice thumb push for a pocket holster, no?
I put my weapon in the holster and laid it on top of the paddle – positioned to “thumb push” about 1/3rd of the way down the slide. Marked the edges of the holster on the paddle with a sharpie.
Notice the outline of the holster top.
I made a sweeping arc to about 1/2" from the thumb push. Took me two tries to get the position right.
I cut along the line using a big tin snips I have for flashing/vinyl siding. It cut the kydex like butter.
I held the “thumb push” in place against the holster and marked the location of the three holes with a sharpie.
I cut the top off the rest of the paddle. Trimmed off the top of the piece to the left. This piece became my pocket “snag”. I held the pocket snag against the holster below the trigger guard and marked the locations of the holes with a sharpie. I had to trim the pocket snag to fit.
Drilled all the holes with a 3/16” drill bit.
The back of the holster where the paddle connected has two little nipples – filed them off or the “thumb push” wouldn’t rest nicely.
I pop riveted the thumb push and the pocket snag onto the holster with 5mm rivets. For the thumb push I used 1/4” rivets. The pocket snag is joining 3 pieces of kydex, so I opted for a 1/2" rivet, but I think I could have gotten away with 1/4”
Filed off sharp edges with a very fine metal file.
Done!
It works better than I expected. The combination thumb push and pocket snag make for flawless unholstering from a cargo pocket, or even a side pocket if they're deep enough.
Call me cheap, but I'm flabbergasted with my own ingenuity...
