View Full Version : Some Thoughts on IWB Holsters
I wrote this a few years back and after reading some recent threads on choosing a holster, I thought this might be of interest to some of the membership.
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As has been discussed previously, this holster is a refinement of the original Summer Special holster designed and first offered by Bruce Nelson.
Nelson was an undercover narcotics officer and one of the original instructor's at API/Gunsite [in fact, he was one of the instructors in the first pistol class ever taught at Gunsite].
Nelson, and most of the narcs that he built Summer Specials for, carried straight drop holsters in the appendix position.
Shortly after Milt Sparks began producing the Summer Special, he began some slight improvements to the original design. These included the addition of a second belt loop [Nelson's original used a single loop with a one-way snap] and stitching in two strips of leather into the sight channel to serve as 'sight rails' to prevent the front sight from dragging &/or digging a trough in the leading edge of the holster. Sparks also began offering the design with a muzzle rearward/FBI rake as well as the original straight drop.
In 1992, Milt Sparks began offering the Summer Special 2 which incorporated interchangeable belt loops & a sweat shield. Additionally, if you ordered it with a muzzle rearward rake, it was increased from the FBI standard 15-degrees to a 20-degree angle. The early SS-2s were also offered in a straight drop config. My first Summer Special 2 was a straight drop for a 5-inch M1911 purchased in September, 1992 as I recall.
The original Summer Special did not feature a lot of detailed molding, or boning, of the holster body. The holster body was a fairly generic 'gun' shape. This was done to maximize the contact between the rough side out leather and the trouser material to, theoretically, offer as much stabilization of the gun & holster as possible. This practice was continued into the early 90s.
In 1995, the custom holster business was dealt a one-two punch with the deaths of both Bruce Nelson [at age 47] and Milt Sparks [at age 78]. In the case of Nelson, their was no protege to take over and Nelson Combat Leather ceased to exist. Sparks had turned over the day-to-day operation of his shop to Tony Kanaley back in the late 80s, so Sparks gear continued, and continues to be available.
In late 1996, I switched from carrying a 5-inch M1911 to carrying a mid-frame Glock. At the same time, I switched from a Summer Special IWB to belt mounted kydex.
Following some events with my local training group relating to kydex holsters and a visit in May of 2004 to John Benner's school, TDI, for the second offering of their ECQ course and the inaugral offering of SouthNarc's ECQC-1 class in July of 2004, I became absolutely convinced of the superiority of the leather inside the waistband holster for dealing with worse case, in-your-face, kissing distance problems.
Given SouthNarc's endorsement of the SS-2 and my prior experience with that holster, I immediately picked up one of the current production Summer Special 2 holsters for a Glock 17.
Here is a picture of that holster. The detailed molding of the current production holster is still evident. This is an outstanding holster and is available very reasonably through Brownell's [MSRP is $75...Dealer Price through Brownell's is around $60].
Never being content to go the easy route, shortly after acquiring my Sparks SS-2, I found a scribbled note that appeared to be my handwriting from some years ago.
The note, at least what I could decipher, made mention of a company called 'The Leather Arsenal' and of some dude named Elmer.
'The Leather Arsenal ' is the business name of custom holster maker Elmer McEvoy. Many moons ago, McEvoy worked for Milt Sparks. About 20 years ago, he started his own company and has been troddling along, in relative obscurity. His shop is located in Middleton, ID and his main offerings are a couple of variations on the Summer Special IWB design.
An interesting aside, if you happen to watch Kelly McCann's original 4-tape Defensive Shooting series, the leather gear that McCann sports throughout, commonly thought to be Sparks, is, in actuality Elmer McEvoy's stuff.
For years, McEvoy offered his 'Surprise Special' and his 'Deep Concealment Special' IWB designs. Originally, the 'Surprise Special' was McEvoy's 'Summer Special'. Over time, interchangeable belt loops and the stabilizing tab at the muzzle end were added. The DCS was the same basic design with the addition of the sweat shield.
The most recent refinement to McEvoy's design is the Double Deep Concealment Special or DDCS. This holster features two steel reinforcing bands [one above the other] under the leather reinforcing band at the mouth of the holster. This allows the gun to ride slightly deeper inside the waist than otherwise.
When I contacted McEvoy, I was pleasantly surprised to find that he was still in business and a very personable old coot, to boot.
His prices were reasonable. The wait was short. And the quality was excellent.
His three main holsters designs are the 'Surprise Special' [interchangeable belt loops, muzzle tab, single height reinforcing band no sweat guard] for $65, the DCS [SS plus sweat guard] for $72 and the DDCS for $80.
This picture is of the Double Deep Concealment Special.
Careful observers will note that the McEvoy holster does not have the detailed molding shown on the Sparks holster. This is a trivial detail that does not effect function, but I, personally, prefer the lack of detailed molding on the holster body.
It's strictly a matter of ascetics, but much like my preference for fat pistol grips on AKs, I like a simple rough out IWB holster.
This picture is of my one-off McEvoy holster. It features the top-end of a DDCS [sweat shield, double deep reinforcing band, interchangeable belt loops] and it lacks the stabilization tab at the muzzle end [the tab didn't do anything for me...neither pro or con].
This pic shows all three holsters in line, to give a better appreciation for how each of them ride on the belt.
All three are excellant holsters and I'd have no reservations about using any of them.
Following some events with my local training group relating to kydex holsters and a visit in May of 2004 to John Benner's school, TDI, for the second offering of their ECQ course and the inaugral offering of SouthNarc's ECQC-1 class in July of 2004, I became absolutely convinced of the superiority of the leather inside the waistband holster for dealing with worse case, in-your-face, kissing distance problems.
Paul,
What was it that convinced you that a leather IWB holster was superior to Kydex?
Thank you.
I second the reccomendation for the Lether Arsenal. I have holsters for both my 5 inch 1911 and my g34/35. Waiting time was 7 weeks or 8 weeks. Quality was top notch and both are the "fastest" leather holsters I own.
Ryan,
The issues with kydex are:
1) It works as advertised. It offers a faster, smoother draw than leather. The problem is that when you are involved in a contact distance fight, if the bad guy gets on your gun, it's much easier for him to take control of your gun holstered in kydex than one holstered in leather. Once the gun begins moving in a kydex rig, it will come out. A leather rig resists gun movement except in the line of draw [ie the gun will bind or drag in a leather holster if the angle is not exactly correct].
2)Kydex, in general, doesn't hold up well to fighting over the gun. I've ripped &/or sheared kydex holsters off the belt literally dozens of times during ECQC classes.
3) A large percentage of kydex rigs, particulary IWB kydex, use some sort of kydex clip or loop to attach to the belt. Most of the 'easy on/easy off' attachment methods work as advertised. The problem arrives when you want to keep the rig on and the bad guy has other ideas. This is one of the reason behind the 'DownSide Up' loops that I had Raven Concealment Systems put on my ACR. I suspect that was one of the concerns that Todd had when he designed the Looper.
2001 to 2005, or thereabouts, I ran a weekly training group in Baton Rouge. We worked unarmed skills, knife, stick, OC, pistol and longgun. We spent a lot of time working scenarios with the participants wearing FIST helmets and carrying inert duplicates of their EDC.
Most of us were running kydex initially. As the work continued, we began to see a surprising amount of guns coming out of rigs, sometimes through the actions of the bad guys, sometimes from impact on the ground, sometimes through flukes of positioning.
I spent a week at Hocking College in Ohio attending the Applegate Point Shooting Instructor course and wrapped up the trip spending two days at Tactical Defense Institute doing their Extreme Close Quarters course in May of 2004. During that class, I payed attention to how many guns were coming out of kydex unexpected &/or without the owners knowledge. I spoke with the instructors for that particular block, and they confirmed my observations regarding OWB kydex. One of them ran IWB kydex. The other ran leather IWB.
Two months later, I convinced SouthNarc to come to south Louisiana and offer the first ECQC class. My personal experiences, observations and discussions in that class further reinforced my opinion.
Since that timeframe, I've worked as the aggressor in hundreds, if not thousands, of force-on-force iterations and have taken guns off so many guys that I really don't have an accurate count.
One class comes to mind where the average time for me to take possession of the good guy's gun was around ten seconds for the first six guys [the scenario started with the good guy on his back, me standing at his feet. Once I made contact, he was 'weapons free'.]. That par time was with guys running kydex. The next fellow was running a Sparks SSII. I got position and had my hand on his holstered gun in the same time frame as the others. However, because the holster didn't cleanly release, he managed to lock up my hand on his gun and we rolled for another 10 to 15 seconds before I established control of the gun.
Here's another older post on this topic.
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The topic of holster selection comes up frequently. There is a greater variety of holster options available now than at any point in the past. What holster makes sense for the individual will depend, to a very large extent, on the mission of that person.
For instance, if your mission profile is uniform patrol for a law enforcement agency then you will look towards duty gear such as the Safariland SLS or Raptor or SSIII/070.
If you are some high-speed, super-secret surf-ninja, running around in full battle rattle, then the Safariland 6004 would make a fair amount of sense.
If you are interested in performing well in IDPA events, until recently, you 'd probably look very hard at the Comp-Tac Locking Paddle. Nowadays, you'll still be served very well by a good kydex rig of some design.
For many years, I was a big fan of belt mounted kydex for daily carry. It concealed farily well. The gun was fast into hand, when need be. And it held up pretty well to the hot, humid, nasty & wet environment so prevalent in south Louisiana.
When I forsaked my beloved M1911 in favor of that damned Austrian whore, I switched from Milt Sparks leather to early Blade-Tech kydex. Over the years, I gained experience with most of the better kydex benders out there and there are some very talented guys out there.
However, when it comes to those truly ugly, contact distance affrays, kydex rapidly looses its appeal. As has been mentioned, I began to see recurring themes with kydex holsters allowing guns to come out much more quickly, often without the owners awareness. I saw kydex holsters being broken. I saw kydex gear fail again and again.
Additionally, in talking with guys who had spent a fair amount of time overseas, I began to hear of numerous failures of kydex in harsh environments. Tales of grommets dryrotting and screws being lost...holsters held together with 100mph tape and 550 cord wrappings...One incident where the holster actually was melted by a particularly hot Sig P226!!!
So, in light of my personal experiences and observations, coupled with numerous discussions with people more knowledgable than I, and feedback from people with "realworld" bona fides, I made the decision to go back to a leather IWB holster for my daily carry needs.
A smart man learns from other people's experiences. I may not be the coldest beer in the six pack, but I shall continue to endeavor to not be the warmest
I sold my Milt Sparks SS2 for my glock. Although a very nice holster... as with all 3 of those examples, it rode too low for my preference.
I prefer a much higher ride... even at the expense of some concealment.
I've got SS-IIs for railed and non-railed 1911s, and one for my G-19. I should probably get one for the M&Ps now. It's probably my favorite of all the IWBs I'ved used; I also like the EX also by Sparks.
I know John & Dave at TDI - good people, great facility. You're right about leather vs. kydex. Kydex is great for competition, but for daily serious use leather still gets my vote. Sparks SS2 is primary here. 'Damned Austrian Whore' - I like that. I'm working in MA this week & on standby for TX as soon as Ike blows his load. A month or two in your climate & leather looks like its been carried for years in OH.
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