Ranger sharpening stone and holster build
Posted: Sat Jun 10, 2023 12:43 am
I figured that it was about time that I created something new for my Ranger accoutrement belt, and in this case, a sharpening stone for my sword, and other various edged implements.
I know that there has been a lot of discussion among other Rangers about Aragorn carrying one in The Lord of the Rings films, and how some people feel that it was a bit 'silly', but I believe that if you are a person who spends a lot of time in the field using your sword and/or edged implements, it only makes sense to have a stone handy for edge maintenance... so, I intend to have one, and one that is functional.
I will admit that I basically stole the design idea from the WETA workshop version that Aragon carries, except that I made a few cosmetic changes to make mine a little more personal, and less like Aragorn's.
The biggest difference between mine and the movie version is that I wanted a real whetstone that could be used, as opposed to a fancy rounded river rock, which theirs appears to be, and I have modified the holster.
I will also say that cutting the Dollar Tree whetstone was one of the hardest things that I have ever done using a grinder and cut-off wheel... that is one really hard stone!
After I had the stone shaped, the rest of the construction was relatively easy: I just wet-formed a scrap piece of veg-tanned leather around the whetstone, cut out the two backing pads from the same leather (one for the belt loop), saddle stitched both to the wet-formed holster, then dyed and antiqued the finished product.
I may eventually add some sort of decorative tooling to it, but right now I am essentially satisfied.
Rob
I know that there has been a lot of discussion among other Rangers about Aragorn carrying one in The Lord of the Rings films, and how some people feel that it was a bit 'silly', but I believe that if you are a person who spends a lot of time in the field using your sword and/or edged implements, it only makes sense to have a stone handy for edge maintenance... so, I intend to have one, and one that is functional.
I will admit that I basically stole the design idea from the WETA workshop version that Aragon carries, except that I made a few cosmetic changes to make mine a little more personal, and less like Aragorn's.
The biggest difference between mine and the movie version is that I wanted a real whetstone that could be used, as opposed to a fancy rounded river rock, which theirs appears to be, and I have modified the holster.
I will also say that cutting the Dollar Tree whetstone was one of the hardest things that I have ever done using a grinder and cut-off wheel... that is one really hard stone!
After I had the stone shaped, the rest of the construction was relatively easy: I just wet-formed a scrap piece of veg-tanned leather around the whetstone, cut out the two backing pads from the same leather (one for the belt loop), saddle stitched both to the wet-formed holster, then dyed and antiqued the finished product.
I may eventually add some sort of decorative tooling to it, but right now I am essentially satisfied.
Rob