This Sling is too Long!

Many ready-to-use slings that you will purchase are quite long and cannot be completely secured without using tape and the tape then makes that part of the sling sticky and other issues can arise from using tape on the sling. Here is an easy way to shorten a sling ensuring safe spinning without the sling flapping around.

Before I get into cutting and adjusting pre-sewn slings, you can also use the information below to cut and use your own slings that you can buy in 50-yard rolls (without metal attachments). This website has a great selection of colors for rifle web slings which can also be used as belts.

The standard nylon sling that comes with the Daisy Drill Rifle. The sling clasp is laying next to it:

The same sling now with about 6 or 7 inches cut off the end. Now you can see the other piece of hardware, the sling retaining piece (that the sling is threaded through and then sewn down), from the cut off end. You can melt the end of nylon slings so that they will not fray. Don’t catch it on fire, just hold the flame near the end so that it slowly melts.

When cutting multiple slings, use the same sling as a measuring guide to cut the others or you will have small differences in sling lengths.

This picture is of the sling quick-change device that is always attached on the rifle’s bottom sling swivel. You can leave this hooked on the rifle, or remove it, your choice. Leaving it on gives you the ability to create sound.

Putting the sling back on the rifle. At the cut end, loop it through the sling retaining piece and through the lower sling swivel or the sling quick-change device.

Now, feed the cut end of the sling back through the sling retaining piece so that it protrudes about a half inch. Now, pull the slack of the sling through while holding onto the half inch of sling sticking out of the sling retaining piece. A standard for honor guards is to have the sling retaining piece centered on the small groove on the top of the rifle butt.

Put the sling clasp back on the sling, pinch the sling at the sides to insert the sides of the sling underneath the pins of the sling clasp. You can put the clasp on the sling so that the solid piece faces the rifle or faces away from it (also see next picture). Thanks to Melbourne (FL) High School AFJROTC Cadet Vaughn for the use of his hands in this picture.

 

Feed the sling through the upper sling swivel so that it goes toward the rifle or away from it (this depends on the way you attached the clasp). If you need to perform Sling Arms (for JROTC colors competitions only), you will want to thread the clasp and sling like the picture below. You will want the sling to extend about 4 inches from the clasp.

For all other applications, a sling and clasp setup like this will work very well. Pull the sling tight and place the clasp as close to the end of the sling (with the metal tab) as possible.