making a rapier scabbard

[silas thatcher]

andrew and i have started stage fighting with the local rennie group ... ( yes, it is by a certified teacher ) their training uses rapiers , so we bought two, yet they have no scabbards... kinda guess they figure that these are for stage combat, not wearing out and about... dunno

so, i wanna make scabbards for them, and can use them for an earlier portrayal as well... searched on the web for for a few idears and came up pretty much empty handed...

i want to make them out of thick leather as opposed to the standard wood and then leather wrap typical for a cutless

does any one have a link or two they'd like to share with us ??

[rusty spike]

Hey silas if you pm me I will send y7ou my new phone nuber and you can call and I will tell you howto do the project you men tioned see ya

[michaelsbagley]

I've made both leather only, and leather covered wood scabbards... And to be honest, I found while it is a bit more work, the leather covered wood was easier (to me).

Short version is, wrap the leather around the blade (wetting the leather can help if it is thicker), then stitch the seam. Doing the seam in the center blade is nicer looking than a seam on the edge of the blade, also less likely to get frayed or split. And voila.

Some nice touches you can do to make it better looking (and perhaps more functional) is to make the scabber a couple of inches longer than it needs to be and fold the top few inches back over itself. It kind of acts like a leather throat/chape to the scabbard. Skiving down the leather seam can give it a more professional and smoother look as well. I am a huge fan of melting wax into the leather, as it helps stiffen the leather if done correctly. (Although some will say this can make the scabbard more brittle and more likely to break).

There's a lot of different ways to do this, it can be a fun (and frustrating) project, so good luck with it. Definitely post pics if you can. Love to hear how it works out for you.

[silas thatcher]

micheal, actually chatted with trish about this and she sent me some how pics ( i'm guessing on ones she did ) and gave alot of info that i will try...the leather i have is slighly thicker than what she recommended, but i will try it any way, and as a last resort get some thinner stuff... if it doesn't turn out stiff enough i'll pester ya about the wax thing :)

rusty -- pm sent !!

[Guest]

This isn't "period", and I haven't tried it.... but I read about someone who made knife sheaths by covering the knife blade with layers of masking tape, and then covering that with a thin layer of Epoxy putty, and sewing a leather cover over that. I'm not sure how he got all of the masking tape out of the sheath, maybe he also covered them with some kind of mold release....But it was suppose to make a sturdy/stiff knife sheath.

[silas thatcher]

soaked in water and formed around the blade and clamped.... have to wait until tomorrow when it's dry... then the final sewing, trimming, dyeing etc. begin... hopefully it will turn out pretty good...

[Jib]

As a side note silas: My stage combat training is through a Renaissance Faire group. They also teach small sword which is more GAOP. Perhaps your group does too?