Military slings

[Gil Martin]

One of my strong preferences is for leather military slings. The canvas and nylon varieties are functional but have no appeal to me. The local shop got in an estate sale of guns and they removed the slings from the rifles and hung them on a wall rack for sale. In the pile were several 1 1/4" leather slings made by Boyt from WWII. They were $10 each and in mint condition.

Often the used leather slings encountered for sale in gun shops are bone dry or in poor condition. For some reason folks seem to be unaware of neatsfoot oil or mink oil. Anyone prefer real leather slings? All the best...
Gil

[Adam Helmer]

Gil,

I prefer original leather military slings for my rifles. Unfortunately, as you stated, many WWII slings are dry rotted and cracked for lack of proper oiling. I notice that many civilians do not know how to properly install the U.S. M1907 military rifle sling. I found two WWI M1907 slings recently and had a local leather guy put new leather on the brass hardware. One is on a mint M1917 Winchester and the other is on my M1853 .577 Enfield rifled musket for parades. To the untrained eye, the refitted M1907 looks original on the musket.

Adam

[Aim to maim]

Nearly every rifle and two of the shotguns in my safe sport 1" or 1-1/4" leather military-style slings.