Video Transcript
Ragnarok Holster Overview (00:00):
The Ragnarok Holster offers an excellent combination of speed and durability. It's constructed out of 0.125" Kydex, making it quite a tank. On the back we have this nice selection of holes, allowing the use of various attachments from paddles, belt slides, the quick-detach systems such as the RTI, Blade-Tech, TMMS, Safariland, just all kinds of stuff out there. And it also makes the holster a little bit futureproof as companies release all sorts of other belt mounts and belt options out there.
Every single Ragnarok is optic cut, optic compatible for optics… Slide-mounted optics that are mounted behind the ejection port. If you're running a competition style, you know, mount attached to the frame, this holster's obviously not going to work.
Adjusting Retention (00:42):
The retention is adjustable using the screws on the edge, and it is important to note that if you do not tighten the retention on this holster, your pistol may fall out. So all you're gonna do is take a phillip's screwdriver, take your handgun, and then find your desired retention, tighten those down. And you'll be good to go. If you are running a non-light compatible weapon, so the non-light-compatible holster, same thing. You have the standard screws here, two under the trigger guard, one next to the trigger guard. You'll play with the retention on those to give you your desired retention.
Belt Mount Options (01:15):
We offer three belt mount options for the Ragnarok. We have a standard belt slide, this particular one from Safariland. The way this one works is it's going to attach to the holes using the Safariland hole pattern—so the top two here and the bottom one—And then you are going to thread your belt through the slots, 1.75", you know, 1 3/4" or 1 1/2", and you'll be good to go.
We also have a paddle option for those of you that want something a little more traditional, that you just wanna be able to slip onto your pants real easily without having to undo, you know, your belt with your belt loops and everything. And this particular paddle comes in a right hand as indicated here with the "R" and a left hand version based on the shape of how it conforms to your hip.
And then the most popular option for the Ragnarok and really the best way (in my opinion) to run this holster, really what this holster is for is running it on a UBL offset drop mount as a thigh rig, or simply just dropping the holster down so the grip is parallel with your belt. And the way we have this set up is the Safariland UBL Mid-Ride—this is not the low-ride that sits a little bit lower—with the QLS—If you want to be able to swap out your holster and, and change out models easily or also just to give you a little bit of offset from the body—and then our thigh strap with the built-in swivel attachment. This puts the pistol grip parallel with your belt and the thigh strap will also help keep the pistol nice and stable. So you can really tighten down that retention, prevent your pistol from flying away. And then when you go to draw, the thigh strap will keep the entire holster from bowing away from your leg so you can have that consistent straight draw.
Hardware Packs (02:43):
If you purchase a Ragnarok without any of the attachments shown, you will receive this small hardware pack attached to the invoice, which will get you set up with any of these mounts that are pictured. The QLS on the other hand will require our standard replacement hardware pack in order to attach that to the back of the holster.
Safariland QLS (03:00):
If you're interested in having the ability of swapping your holster out easily, without having to re-do all of your belt attachments and systems out there, we recommend the Safariland QLS. What that is is a two piece system. You have the QLS fork that attaches to the holster itself. And once that is attached, that is going to drop into a receiver plate that you can have attached to either the Safariland belt slide, the UBL mount, or even the paddle itself. So you can have that on your pants or on your belt, ready to go. And then you can drop that holster directly onto that receiver plate.
Thigh Strap (03:32):
If you're interested in running the thigh strap with a Ragnarok, such as the holster shown here, it's important to note that the thigh strap will only work with the Safariland UBL. It is not going to work with the paddle attachment or the belt attachment accessory. And we do recommend running the thigh strap with a UBL style of mount simply because when you start dropping the holster lower on a mount and you go to draw that pistol, it has a tendency of bucking away from the body and prohibiting a straight draw. The thigh strap helps keep the holster nice and tight to the leg which also, like I mentioned earlier, allows you to tighten down the retention even more to help prevent that pistol from going flying. So the configuration that you're going to wanna do, if you wanna run a thigh strap, it's going to be the Safariland UBL shown here with, or without the QLS. And then you'll have the holster right here, putting the pistol grip parallel to your belt with this particular UBL. And you'll have the thigh strap to keep the pistol nice and tight to your leg.
Installation Instructions (04:26):
So that's the three styles of belt attachment that we offer for the Ragnarok. And if you purchase any of these at the same time as buying a Ragnarok, it's going to come pre-assembled for you. But if later on, you wanna change out to a different accessory or try something, or you just got a competition belt or war belt or something like that. We're gonna go ahead and show you guys exactly how to mount each of these accessories to your Ragnarok holster.
Hardware Pack (04:46):
So what we've got here is probably the most complex way to build out a Ragnarok. We have the Safariland UBL, the QLS receiver, fork, thigh strap, and of course the Ragnarok itself. In order to put all this together, we're going to need a hardware replacement pack, which I have exploded right here. And as you could see, there's five different sizes of screws, Chicago screw posts, rubber washers, and then we have four sizes of screws to themselves.
Now it can look a little intimidating what's going on here, cause you don't know what size screw and what posts and what washer goes where, but there's a very basic rule of thumb. When you're attaching two components, whether it is the UBL-QLS or the Ragnarok and a QLS, you want to have a thin rubber washer between both. So for that, you are gonna be utilizing the skinniest and smallest rubber washers that are included in the replacement hardware pack, for those particular items. The sizes of these that we have listed on our site is all in inches. We're mainly gonna be focusing on these smaller screws, posts, and washers to attach all of this.
The larger washers are more for replacements for the retention washers on the side of the Ragnarok. Over time, you know, if you have these tightened down and then you wanna loosen the holster, the rubber washers will actually be sort of crushed into place, crushed to size. So if you kind of wanna start fresh and you know, and readjust your retention you may need these big fat 500… .500" size rubber washers to, you know, re-do that process of resetting your retention and that's why those are here.
Safariland Hardware (06:20):
With all of these Safariland components Safariland includes posts to mount these accessories to their line of holsters, but they are extra long, intended to be bolted directly to the holsters themselves (Safariland makes) and they are not compatible… or not really compatible with the Ragnarok and the Chicago screws that we use. So we're gonna just put those away and not use them.
Installing Safariland QLS Fork (06:42):
To mount the QLS, we are going to use the .375" sized screws, posts, and the smallest size of washer. So these three right here. I like to start with the posts first, I'm going to hold two, just like that. Install the rubber washers. What the rubber washers allow you to do is really tighten down, have a little bit more retention to help prevent the hardware from coming loose with time. You can also thread-lock these screws, if you so desire. I would recommend using the Vibra-Tite style of threadlocker and not the blue or some of the even crazier threadlocker out there that may keep it a little too permanent. The rubber washers will also keep all the posts in place as you can see. And now we take our QLS fork. We have our .375" screws, which will have plenty of thread engagement, and I'm just gonna get those started by hand. So they're in place. You can obviously use a handheld screwdriver, but for efficiency, I'm gonna use this Bosch. And as you can see here, the rubber washer is going to get squished very nicely. So there we have QLS very firmly in place, attached. The rubber washers, again, will help really keep it in place. And the screws are not protruding through the posts once they are installed.
Note about USPSA (09:08):
So now that we have the QLS fork mounted to the Ragnarok, it's time to get into the UBL, QLS receiver, and the thigh strap. It is important to note though, if you are building out this holster to shoot USPSA—which a lot of people are running this holster for that—unfortunately thigh straps are not allowed at major matches and at a lot of club matches, it's insanely stupid. They say it's too "militaristic". And a really good configuration for that is running the UBL on its own with the Ragnarok, just screwed to that. Your retention will be a little bit looser, most likely to prevent the gun from, you know, having some of that flop issue. But again, for USPSA you don't necessarily have to have a ton of retention as you're typically drawing at the start and then commencing with the stage.
Installing UBL, Thigh Strap, QLS Plate Combo (09:59):
We will need to use the screw pack from the thigh strap as we will need some .375" sized screws and posts to finish out the system. So we're going to pull that. So I've got the screws from the thigh strap. It is important to note that that will come with a special screw size the .500" the other ones included in the replacement hardware pack are actually a .625", but we're not gonna be using those for setting up this particular type of holster. So the first thing we're gonna do is we're gonna take the UBL. We're going to be using the .375" posts that we just got with the thigh strap. We are then gonna be using two of the .188" washers. We will not be using a washer on the bottom hole because we have to leave space for our thigh strap grommet section, to be able to swivel in place. We will also be using the larger .500" Chicago post so that it can bottom out with the screw and allow that thigh strap to be able to move freely.
QLS receiver then drops on top. You'll be indexing that post through the bottom hole. First, we'll take that .500" screw that's included with the thigh strap, and we'll get that started. We'll then use the .375"s for the top two. When you're done screwing everything together, you'll probably notice that the bottom .500" post and screw holding the thigh strap to the UBL and the QLS is gonna have a little bit of play in it. That's because they're both sized perfectly to mate together seamlessly, but not so much that they're going to pull the QLS receiver plate into the UBL, which would prevent the thigh strap from being able to articulate. So it has just enough slop in there to allow everything to move freely, which is ultimately what you want for a thigh strap setup, just like this.
So now I've got the holster ready to go with my UBL, receiver plate, thigh strap combo. And that is simply going to interface–we have the two little prongs, like so, they're going to mate up to the receiver, drop down, and then they will lock into place, right here at the bottom, kind of pop right out. And then when you wanna remove the holster from the QLS, you are simply going to grab both of those little ears, push in, which will disengage them from catching on the edge of the receiver plate. And then the holster can be removed and a new one can be added.
Why the QLS, UBL, Thigh Strap Combo? (13:07):
There's a few reasons why this is our preferred setup for the Ragnarok. And the first one is this holster isn't really meant to be a concealment option. So it's already a robust holster for outside-the-waistband. So if I'm going to be wearing it, maybe with kit, I'm already gonna be wearing it outside the waistband and people are gonna see it. Then I'm gonna wear it in the most optimal way possible for efficiency and to clear whatever kit I might be wearing. The UBL offset puts it at a height where the grip is parallel to your belt, which is typically speaking the most efficient way to be running a handgun on your belt. It's at a height that's very easy to grab whether you're starting with your hands on a rifle, or whether you are simply drawing with your hands relaxed at sides and it also drops the pistol low enough that it's not going to interfere with very much or certain styles of kit out there. If you're wearing a massive IOTV plate carrier, you have other issues, obviously. But most modern plate carriers and chest rigs, this right here is going to get the pistol away from all that kit. So you're not gonna have any problems on the draw.
The QLS allows us to swap out for other holsters or other weapon lights, if that's what we wanna run. But it also gives you that offset to also help with some of that equipment you might be wearing—plate cares, chest rig, side plates and all that good stuff. So this is really the preferred setup that we like to run here at T.REX for this particular holster out there. And it's also one of the most popular that we end up selling and building out for customers is this right here: QLS, UBL, thigh strap. You're good to go. And don't forget to tighten these screws after you get this all done to your preferred retention for the handgun.
Installing Other Attachments (14:33):
So what I've got here is two Ragnaroks without their attachments—so as if you were purchasing one without anything—and then I have the Safariland paddle and belt slide, and the hardware packets that will typically come with these holsters stapled to your invoice.
Safariland Hi-Ride Belt Slide (14:46):
So let's start with the belt slide. Included with the hardware pack are three .375" sized posts, screws, and skinny washers. What we're gonna do is we're going to install the posts first into the Ragnarok, using the Safariland hole pattern, which is going to be two screws here at the top, and one here at the bottom. And we're going to use the rubber washer to help hold the Chicago post in place, like so. All right, so we have our three posts ready to go with their respective washers. Then we take our belt slide. It's going to be curved inwards with the body. I'm just gonna get all these started, hand tight (hand tightened), and then we will use the Bosch. And as you can see with this particular belt slide, there is some play with the slots in the mount itself. So you can actually set a little bit of cant. So that's the belt slide for the Ragnarok setup.
Safariland Attachments Accept the QLS (16:16):
Now, it is important to note that all the Safariland accessories can accept the QLS. So if you want to have that attached to your belt already, maybe your holster's in your bag or somewhere else. I've even seen airline pilots wearing the paddle and/or this guy with the QLS installed. And then once they get into the aircraft, they retrieve their pistol, put it on and they're squared away. So if that's something you wanna do, cool. But again, this is all personal preference, whether you're running the paddle, the belt slide, putting a QLS on top and exactly how you're using these.
Safariland Paddle (16:45):
So let's go ahead and talk about mounting the Safariland paddle to this Ragnarok right here. So once again, we have a hardware pack. We are gonna go ahead and install our female Chicago posts. And once again, we are going to be doing the Safariland hole pattern, which is both on the top and the one at the bottom. And once again, like most Safariland equipment, they have some cant built in, if that's something that you want. So you can position this a little bit lower or higher. I like to run my stuff exactly 12 o'clock straight up and down. So that is what I'm gonna do. Now, it's important to note that you do not lose the tooth that goes with the paddle as this is what's going to be catching your belt and preventing the entire thing from flying off when you go to draw. And that's going to be positioned down here, slanted upwards. So there we go. We have the tooth angled upwards to catch onto your belt. The paddle is installed.
You'll probably have noticed that this particular paddle has a giant R indicated right here at the top. That is to show that this is a right hand paddle, because they do have some mold built into this for your pelvis and your hip and all that good stuff going on. So if you're a lefty, you are going to need the L paddle like on this Ragnarok right here. So that that can curve in the front and be nice and comfortable.
It Comes Down to Personal Preference (18:55):
Once again, running the paddle or the belt slide really comes down to personal preference. One of the advantages to the paddle is you can put it on without unthreading your belt, depending on what kind of belt you have, or maybe you have pants that you're just not wearing a belt. But once again, I would highly recommend having a belt so that this tooth has something to actually engage with. And that will also be dependent some on the retention of the holster itself. If you have really firm retention to keep your pistol in the holster, then you definitely need that tooth catching, so when you go to draw the entire holster, doesn't, you know, fly off with the pistol still inside. So it all comes down to personal preference. These all have advantages and disadvantages, but if you're looking at wearing the Ragnarok a little bit higher on the belt versus dropping it down with UBL these are two solid options for that.
As you can see with this video, it could be a little bit complicated, which screws, which posts to use. So we highly recommend when you're purchasing a Ragnarok, go ahead, buy your intended mount at the same time so that we can set it up for you. If you have any other questions about all these parts, the holster itself, compatibility, go ahead and email us [email protected].