Silversmith Work

 

             Outlaw Grips makes one of a kind custom silver and gold designs for grips, scarf slides, hat bands and pendants.

Staying true to my commitment of only the highest quality for my customers, you will find no cheap alloys or mass produced third party pieces. All of the silversmith work for Outlaw Grips is done “in house”. This means complete quality control over every piece made. Nowhere is this more important than with pieces that are cast. One of the most important aspects of this is the metallurgy.  This refers to the alloy composition. Sterling silver is 92.5% pure silver and 7.5% copper. Why is it important to understand metal composition as a grip maker? It is important because if the design is going on a grip, it has to be formed to it. It will need to be bent. Sterling silver and 14k gold will bend rather easily, if cast properly. It will crack if it is not. A few years back I learned this the hard way by having a jeweler make a set of bronze alloy steer heads for me. They cracked when forming them to the grip. Outlaw Grips has a reputation for quality. This reputation didn’t come from making things cheaply. You can find plenty of people selling reproductions to put on grips that cost $15.00 to $20.00. You are buying it from the “middle man”. What do you think the initial cost and quality of that item is?

             It took about three months, but after talking with three different metal refining companies, purchasing a dozen different alloys and testing three different casting methods, I learned what was needed to produce cast designs and have them be flexible enough to inlay on grips. This is extremely important to understand when dealing with inexpensive alloys that look like silver or gold. I have stopped using castings that were purchased from other sources as most of them are not made properly or to the quality my customers expect. If you needed to re-heal your boots, would you buy the heals from a rubber hose company because they made them cheaper and then take them to you cobbler to have him put them on your boots? The cobbler knows the rubber composition that works for your boots and their intended purpose. Some one who is not an accomplished grip maker, not to mention never shot a gun before, does not understand the importance of proportion, thickness and the metallurgy for its intended use .

             Hand of God grip; The “Hand of God” grip  I make is the closest reproduction you will find on the market today. Three versions of it were made for the movie. One version is on the gun Russell Crowe had made for himself.  This crucifix and gun did not appear in the movie.  In January of ‘08 the armorer and gun coach for the film was nice enough to send me one of the guns used in the film. The crucifix that appears in the stagecoach scene is the one I have reproduced. You can have the crucifix in four different metals. A custom formulated gold alloy, sterling silver, 14k gold and 18k gold. To see the pricing of the Hand of God grip in these metals, click here.