So I've been eyeing many of rifle sling choices available out there with their plethora of cool nick-knacks and have busting my head trying to decide which one would better suit my needs. For sure I wanted an arm loop and a quick adjust buckle to help with unsupported shooting. But then I also wanted a bungee cord (you know just because... plus it would probably help with the rifle weight). There are several nice options out there that provide different combinations of these features but just not exactly how I wanted them. Since the main use for the sling would be hunting it needed to be compact (short) enough for proper "sling" carry in the field (without much webbing hanging off). I wanted the quick adjust for tightening my arm position to the stock (in combination with the arm loop). And then the bungee had to be on the barrel end of the rifle instead of the buttstock (again mainly because most of the time I'd be carrying the rifle barrel-up). So I said heck, let me take what I like from what's available out there and see if I can make me a sling... and this is my humble shot at it:
Here you can see the arm loop and quick adjust.
To maintain the length of the sling short the arm loop pull tongue has a g-hook that connects to the upper part of the sling. This prevents it from closing down (and adding length)
Here's a view from the inside (back) of the sling
While making the bungee pieces I started thinking whether I wanted it to be permanent. What if later I need a stronger bungee or didn't want a bungee at all? So instead of sewing the bungee and the quick adjust webbing together I decided to make the bungee detachable by using 2 more g-hooks. Here you can see a picture of the sling detached from the hook. At first I was concerned it would be too easy to detach the bungee from the g-hook, but the thickness of the webbing proved good enough to prevent that (plus I sew the loops a bit tight too to help a bit).
I actually ended up making another bungee with thicker webbing and more strings (stiffer bungee). I also plan to make a third one but instead of a bungee use a neoprene pad (let's see how that goes).
(rear view picture with bungee fully disconnected)
What would I have liked to make different? First I wish I would have been able to use the same width of webbing all across the sling. 1.5" would have been ideal but finding spring-loaded cam buckles of that side was pretty hard (found only one place that sold them and it required a minimum order of 50$ which I wasn't willing to make). The other thing would have been using matching colors of webbing. That's what you get for ordering online where not all tans are made equal. Finally I wished my sewing skills were a bit better. Hopefully this thing won't brake down on me on the first run.
(front view with bungeees )
Here you can see the arm loop and quick adjust.
To maintain the length of the sling short the arm loop pull tongue has a g-hook that connects to the upper part of the sling. This prevents it from closing down (and adding length)
Here's a view from the inside (back) of the sling
While making the bungee pieces I started thinking whether I wanted it to be permanent. What if later I need a stronger bungee or didn't want a bungee at all? So instead of sewing the bungee and the quick adjust webbing together I decided to make the bungee detachable by using 2 more g-hooks. Here you can see a picture of the sling detached from the hook. At first I was concerned it would be too easy to detach the bungee from the g-hook, but the thickness of the webbing proved good enough to prevent that (plus I sew the loops a bit tight too to help a bit).
I actually ended up making another bungee with thicker webbing and more strings (stiffer bungee). I also plan to make a third one but instead of a bungee use a neoprene pad (let's see how that goes).
(rear view picture with bungee fully disconnected)
What would I have liked to make different? First I wish I would have been able to use the same width of webbing all across the sling. 1.5" would have been ideal but finding spring-loaded cam buckles of that side was pretty hard (found only one place that sold them and it required a minimum order of 50$ which I wasn't willing to make). The other thing would have been using matching colors of webbing. That's what you get for ordering online where not all tans are made equal. Finally I wished my sewing skills were a bit better. Hopefully this thing won't brake down on me on the first run.
(front view with bungeees )
