Scabbard Help!!!

[Yvsa]

For this FF sheath I'm defininitely making a pattern, and testing it first. That's a lot of leather to mess up.

Yup, and that's a good reason to use the regular thickness of cardboard. It's harder to work with but is generally about the same thickness as 8-9 ounce leather. When glued up with contact cement it gives a real accurate account of what the finished product will be like.:thumbup:
I've used about all kinds of cardboard from the thinner card stock about like poster paper to the real heavy stuff like refregerators are packed in.
I also like the plain old brown wrapping paper as it can also be used for a backing when tooling a large piece of leather. Glue it on with rubber cement and when finished just leave it on, doesn't hurt anything and keeps from having to line the leather to keep the sticky glue from getting on everything.
If you don't back a large piece of leather, even wallet sized, with paper before tooling it the leather stretches all out of proportion because of the tooling.
Some folks get away without backing the leather but their carving and tooling tends to be pretty light. Mine is always deep and well formed, just the way I was taught.

 

[Fiddleback]

So you rubber cement your brown paper form to the rough side of the leather, then when you glue the whelts on it doesn't adversely affect the bond?

 

[Yvsa]

So you rubber cement your brown paper form to the rough side of the leather, then when you glue the whelts on it doesn't adversely affect the bond?

Yes, if it is going to be heavily tooled. If it's just a row of a couple of saddle stamps like the ones on mine I don't bother.
It generally won't affect the welt or welts glued on later.