Where could I look for a kit for my husband to make a leather wrapped handle for a hunting knife?

My hubby wants to re-wrap an old hunting knife that had belonged to his father. I've looked on the web but nothing for leather, only wood or bone...Where could I look for a kit for my husband to make a leather wrapped handle for a hunting knife?
I've been making and restoring knives for the better part of 25 years and I have to say, I have yet to see a real ';leather-wrapped'; grip on a knife. What most folks refer to as ';leather-wrapped'; is in fact stacked leather made up of a dozen or so leather disks.





Tell your hubby to head to Ebay and look for ';tooling leather'; and get about a square foot or so. It's not expensive. He'll then have to use one of the original spacers (leather disks) as a pattern and hand cut each one with an Xacto knife. Just cut the inside to match the old leather or the knife....leave the outside rough shaped. Once he has them stacked thick enough, use a Dremel or a sanding block to shape the outsides of the disks down. use finer and finer grits just like if you were doing wood and finish with some wax.Where could I look for a kit for my husband to make a leather wrapped handle for a hunting knife?
Find the nearest Tandy Leather / The Leather Factory store. I believe you can find a listing of store locations at the Tandy website.





Anyway, find the nearest store and give them a call. if Tandy does not have such a kit, the store manager can probably help you by supplying punched leather washers for your husband to fit over the tang of the knife and he can probably tell you how the leather should be treated for best longevity.





Good Luck,


Doc
There is actually a whole underground world of people that are involved in knife finishing where they buy blade blanks and put guards, handles and alot of other ornamentation on them. Two of the best known suppliers of material for those as well as the full knife maker are Jantz Knifemaker Supply, and Texas Knife Maker Supply. I've listed the websites in the source area.





Also, you may want to head to your local library to see if they have back copies of Blade Magazine which has a section in it devoted to something having to do with knife making in each edition, as well as take a look at Wayne Goddard's book - ';Wayne Goddard's $50 Knife Shop';, as well as Bob Loveless' book ';How to Make Knives';. Both are good references for the part having to do with putting a handle on a blade.





Thinkingblade
The simplest thing is to go to www.texasknife.com. They have everything anyone needs to make a knife or a knife handle. You can also do a Google search for Tandy Leather. They have both stores and mail order. I don't know exactly what you mean when you say a leather ';wrapped'; handle. Seldom, if ever, are knife handles leather ';wrapped';. More than likely, he wants to make a leather handle for his knife. These are traditionally made using stacked thick leather washers. The washers are stacked on the handle and tightly fastened in place with a nut to compress them. They are then rasped and sanded to the desired shape. So, with this in mind, you may be able to buy scrap shoe sole leather from your local shoe repair shop. Your husband can cut washers from the scraps to make a fine handle. The scraps should be very inexpensive or if you are in luck, they might just be free since he was just going to throw them away anyway.