Morgan will not sacrifice anyone's camera. He just needs a body to ensure the template he makes will cut pieces that fit to his high standards.
I have been unwilling to send him mine because I know the next stop will be Steven Choi for an RF alignment. (I know RichC has great DIY instructions on his site, but it appears the previous owner of my R-D1 put some fingernail polish or something on the screws, and I just don't fancy taking down the top deck myself 😱.)
What I ended up doing was to buy a whole black lizard skin from DAG and a bottle of head gasket shellac from the auto parts store. With the old covering gone and residual sticky stuff cleaned off, I cut out bits of paper to fit the body. I used these "templates" to stencil the leather, which I cut out with a metal straightedge and a new razor blade. Shellac on the body, dried to tacky, pressed the leather into place, cleaned up shellac residue with rubbing alcohol, et voila.
I learned a few things. One, there are some gaps in the body frame that need to be filled with something. I cut the corresponding nubbins off the original camera cover and glued them to the leather with cyanoacrylate before I put the new pieces on. When you pull the old covering off you will see the gaps and bits I am referring to.
Two, there is not a lot of room past the sharp bend around the body next to the SD card door hinge to stick the leather to. I have planty of lizard to do "round 2" on the covering, and when I do I will probably take sandpaper to the inside of the leather that will make this bend, to make it more pliable.
Three, the R-D1 seems to me to handle better with the thinner covering. If lizard leather is not to your taste, you could buy a sheet of Morgan's VH Pebbled or Seal Grain leatherette with the adhesive backing and try that.