Bianchi quality, Ground Zero

[rednichols]

From time to time I, and others, comment on today's Bianchi quality vs. 'the good old days'. There is a third, pre-Red (1970)quality period, too .

Consider this image as a 'thread starter'. It's the back cover of Bianchi's 1968 catalogue:



All looks pretty normal, I expect. 1970, I'm 20, and I'm interviewing with John to come to work at the company. He's been operating just 4 years, both Bruce Nelson and Gordon Davis have come and gone in that time. And during a break from that -- spent the day there -- I wander amongst the stock rows and glory in the 'autumn leaves' I find there: all the browns are in every shade of tan from white to red to nearly black.

Turns out, though, when I become part of the team, they're not supposed to be different colours! One can't match the various bits -- holster, belt, pouch -- into sets; orders for sets have to be made up together.

That's because, at that time, the company had no control over its processes. The pale whitish ones had been dried inside because, for example, it was raining. The reddish ones dried outside in the hot sun; this literally gives a sunburn. The really dark ones, nearly black, had been dropped into the neatsfoot oil. The 'perfect' ones; well, who knew how that was done.

So one of my jobs, over time (1970-1987) was to 'produce' the company catalogues. Not such a biggie whilst the catalogues were in b&w, but John had decided to produce the industry's first all-colour catalogues. Now the mismatches were a problem: we had to actually hand make every holster, belt, pouch, keeper for the pics. And not just for colour; for moulding, for finish, for stitching, for every kind of quality benchmark.

Over time, once I'd been given responsibility for quality assurance at the company, quality rose from there to being able to reach into any/all inventory box without looking (many were above head height) and take it to the photographer. Every product was perfect or it hadn't cleared quality assurance; and we didn't throw much away, because any/all flaws were caught long before they got to the final stage.

Today the company has lost track of what they once knew about quality, and we can't blame it on Mexico production, because I've worked in maquiladoras and the locals are proud to make the best -- when they are told what it is, and rewarded for making it happen. Here I'm not necessarily speaking about colour; I'm using that simply as a basepoint for further education about leather holster quality.

 

[rednichols]

Now a second point. One has to know what quality is, to make it happen.

So the question having come up, John being might smart, decided to commission a market study of how consumers defined quality. We see these interviews on television, where anonymous consumers drawn from the ideal set of buyers, gives their opinions about, in this case, quality.

Turns out: at the time (mid 1970s) 'quality' was thick leather. And not shiny. So we did several things. Using the original Model 19 as an example, which was made from 7 ounce leather, we bumped it to 8 ounce AND switched from a large edger on the backside, which made the leather LOOK thin, to the smallest edger to remove the least.

We also developed the hand-rubbed finish that Bianchi was once famous for. A mate of mine there, Frank Boyer, was tasked with coming up with a finish that would need no lacquer topcoat. Took him awhile, but he did it: two hand-rubbed coats of Fiebings' Harness Dressing, hand polished while damp with a sheepskin pad. Imagine the amount of hand work!

This was lavished on after a third change: to hand moulding, that today we call 'boning' though I am beginning to think that phrase, which was Chic Gaylord's, actually applied to smoothing the INSIDE of the holster. More hand work. Now, hand moulding is an art. The wetted holster is still pressed to do most of the work, and the hand work is a highlight. It's objective: to reduce wear on the pistols, about which we got plenty of complaints. Ditto adding suede linings, which Neale had popularised over at Safariland.

The boning of today's Bianchi holsters doesn't compare with the boning of old; I'll post up some pics at some point. The concept is to 'see' through the leather to the mould, and show off its details in a way that is also pleasing to the eye. Ideally, it's obvious to even a layman what pistol the holster is moulded to.

No, hand moulding was not created, not even by Chic or Paris, for retention.

 

[crazyphil]

Here are 3 of my older Bianchi's. I have several others, but they are
newer. Left to right:

Bianchi #1 Lawman for Colt's Single Action Army
Bianchi #3 for K Frames (Shown with 4" Model 19)
Bianchi #9R for 357 (shown with Colt Agent)
The Backs of the above three.

I would guess these 3 are 1970s vintage?

 

[Bat Guano]

Back around 1973 I got a Bianchi #20 mag pouch with spring clip for 1911 mags; it's still perfectly serviceable. Recently ordered another for the Glock 17/19 mags. It was too large, but a strip of Velcro hook material inside at least made it usable. Sent an e-mail with photo to the current management, but never got a response. Didn't really expect one...

I remember the simple catalogue folder Bianchi sent out in the mid-60s.

 

[THE PILGRIM]

I have one sort of old one.

 

[Texas Star]

I am really enjoying these histories of various designs and quality periods.

 

[rednichols]

As promised, an explanation about Bianchi quality

I really only brought any of this up, because I stumbled across images of a Bianchi 111 Cyclone on eBay whilst looking for Lewis & Clark (how fun is that) cross draws. And I was a bit shocked.

I not only set and maintained Bianchi's quality standards for the 70s and 80s, but I also was the company's chief of design -- so I developed the Cyclone -- and its production engineer -- so I specified all its tooling and introduced it to the production lines.

So: we can tell early Bianchi holsters (my era which is pre-1990) and late Bianchi holsters by two clues: a switch to brown thread from what is known in the trade as 'natural'; and the appearance of the 'made in Mexico' markings.

These images have the brown thread but not the Mexico mark; so an ideal comparison with the company's catalogued product because it is (should be anyway) made in USA.

Late 1980s catalogue image, annotated

Pic from closed auction, brown thread

Pic ditto, to show that it is not Mexico production.

I reckon the pics should all be self-explanatory, but in case they're not: a Threepersons holsters is naturally self-regulating in production, for the transition from 'flatwork' stitching to 'welt' stitching, which must be further in from the edge for sanding and edging and polishing. The flatwork comes across at a right angle to the welt.

But the covered guard is not self-regulating: the narrower flatwork stitching wants to be 'married' up with the wider welt stitching, yet the welt must be sanded anyway because of all the layers (up to 6) that are now misaligned with each other. So this was solved by creating an external 'notch' in the cutting die (called a clicker die in America, a cutting knife in Australia) that first aligned the two stitch lines, then could be sanded away, without leaving that sloppy undercut one sees in the copies of our designs.

I see I'll have to post that explanatory pic separately.

 

[rednichols]

This is a cut from a Bianchi catalogue, and one has to know what one is looking at to realise what it 'teaches':



This one, I think, is self-explanatory.

Now, a point: I didn't go through each and every flaw in the holster. I'm not here to pick on the company, so much as to educate forum members on how to spot 'well done' as opposed to 'done'. I often do say that the company has simply forgotten 'what' it used to do well, likely because they don't remember 'why'. And this is a case in point.

Also notice, though, the big difference in the moulding (in the auction pics; the pic in this 'reply' is very good) Be aware that the operator didn't 'see' through the leather to the underlying mould inside the holster; he/she (how much longer will we be able to say that vs a list of 12) simply went through the motions, because the 'why' was missing from his/her training. In my experience people LOVE to build impeccable quality.

And a positive word about John Bianchi: my goal for his quality standards was so high, and yet he could've said, "don't listen, just get the order out". Instead, when a shipment had to be held up because it was incomplete for one or more products failing to meet what had become the company's quality standards, he never backed down. Not once, in nearly 20 years. And employees know, when a company says "quality" or "safety" is Number 1 (in a sign on the wall) but instead 'shipping' is Number 1. And he held the line on quality.

Well, he's not there any more is he? Nor I. So no wonder the company has forgotten; no one to remind them.

 

[rednichols]

Here are 3 of my older Bianchi's. I have several others, but they are
newer. Left to right:

Bianchi #1 Lawman for Colt's Single Action Army
Bianchi #3 for K Frames (Shown with 4" Model 19)
Bianchi #9R for 357 (shown with Colt Agent)
The Backs of the above three.

I would guess these 3 are 1970s vintage?

Yes, I'd say early 1970s from the (very) fuzzy rear pic).

 

[rburg]

My favorite Bianchi item was the advertisement with Bianchi and his donkey. With the caption that Bianchi was the one on the right. Out in my side yard I have a concrete donkey. In honor of Bianchi items. And my wife took a picture of me and my donkey (really a bunch of them). Just like in the ad. Only my gun nut friends had any idea what it was or how it related. The donkey is still out there.

 

[chief38]

Many of he larger older holster makers have not kept up with the times and have been bettered by smaller boutique style holster makers. Seems that over the last decade or so holster design has changed and has improved drastically. Unless an older company is willing and savvy enough to keep up and put money into R&D, they will loose sales and hence start having to produce holsters that suffer from QC issues because they can no longer afford cutting edge equipment, supplies and labor.

Also, Bianchi is no the Company John founded a long time ago. Few Company's actually improve after they are sold - not impossible, but I rarely see it happen.

 

[bruce5781]

I don't know where or when they came about, but the cross-draw series has always been a favorite of mine. I have at least one in every size from 123 to 129. Very versatile.

Sent from my SM-S975L using Tapatalk

 

[Bakebfr480]

I have several late 70's early 80's Bianchi holsters of excellent quality. I also have a few of the newer Mexican assembled ones that are okay.

 

[rednichols]

I don't know where or when they came about, but the cross-draw series has always been a favorite of mine. I have at least one in every size from 123 to 129. Very versatile.

Sent from my SM-S975L using Tapatalk

Early '70s, the CD series is essentially the X-15 without 'ears' for the harness . Same spring, etc. Ideally one realises that the spring is a form of clamp, and the pistol is meant to be drawn up and out, not through the spring itself (single actions especially don't like this, nor the 1911!). Note that the longer one has had its second row of stitching for the spring, moved closer to the spring (there is an imprinted line where it was originally to be stitched) in an effort to keep the spring from 'falling over' inside the holster.

 

[jmclfrsh]

Having been a Bianchi customer since 1980, and ONLY a Bianchi customer, Red, I applaud you!

IMHO no one makes holsters like you guys used to. I have my original 5BHL and X15 from 1980 that held my prized Model 57 for several years of almost-daily use. When the gun was later stolen, the holsters were not and I kept them to this day.

Those two now hold my Model 29-3 6” .44 Magnum. My friends say, “you’re the only guy that bought a gun to fit your holsters, not the other way around.”

I was also fortunate to acquire another vintage 5BHL and an X15 from a large auction site that look darn near perfect, especially the X15, for my 8 3/8” Model 57 I recently acquired and sent to Ford’s Refinishing to go from marred-up blued to absolutely perfect nickle. I feel like I won the lottery.

The gun was shipped in 1978, the year I graduated high school, and as it looks brand-new now, and the holsters also, I feel like I stepped back in time.

So I have two of your X15s and two of your 5BHLs, both for nickle plated S&W N frames, and all 4 are vintage. I feel very fortunate, and in a large part thanks to your efforts!