On going project Colonial small lock back

[#goldpan]

I have a bunch of these as most of you know. For now I have decided to build 6 of them at one time. Should prove interesting!

This pic shows one of the frames the way they came from Bonfire Bob's shop. And one frame that I have done in Elk and another one in ebony with ivory stripe.

Here are the parts for the six frames. They have been cut apart and are ready for bolsters.

This pic shows the bolsters parts that are being cut.

This pic shows the handle materials. Starting on the left. Walnut, Oak root burl, Ebony(enough for two knives) Manzanita, and Brazilian cherry wood. The pieces in the middle are the ivory pieces that I got from Dennis after he had his piano key overlays replaced. This is an ongoing project that I will doing between other projects. Greg has dibs on the ebony knives since he provided the ebony! Your choice when they are ready Greg!

With parts laid out for six of the same frame I will hopefully get a feel for what it must be like working in a larger knife shop. Should be fun if not a bit sporadic!

[gsmith7158]

Can't wait Randy!

[XX Case XX]

Go Randy Go!!!

_________
Mike

[#goldpan]

Thanks guys! I have been side tracked the past few days. So I'm prepping to do the bolsters. They have been cut and the area on the scales where they will be soldered on have been cleaned. Going to try and get all the bolster material soldered in place later today and then prep the handle materials so that I can start mounting and shaping them.

This time around I'm going to inlay the ivory last, after the knife has been assembled and tested! That way I wont be wasting any ivory.

[TripleF]

[philco]

Randy I admire your ambitious spirit. This is a big project to take on.

[#goldpan]

Thanks guys! Yes Phil it is. But it keeps me busy between knife repairs. After these are done and Greg picks the one he wants the others are going into my store. I have plans for building other knives as well for the store. It keeps me out of mischief!

[#goldpan]

Wow we are in the middle of a heat wave that's supposed to last until after Labor Day. Its been so hot my A/C cant keep up in the shop.

So the bolsters are soldered on and I have begun to put the handle materials on. The first two pics show my soldering set up.

And I have learned a few things as well. I have been using the Bernzomatic pencil torch to solder with for a couple years. However the pressure fluctuations are hard to work with. So I picked a couple of these cheap butane torches and they work much better! I also ran into the problem of of solder bleeding through the holes in the scales and in one case the clamp was soldered to the scale. I had seen on the show Forged in Fire that they used whiteout to keep the the Box Damascus from sticking to the box. So I tried it for soldering and it works as well, or better that expected! Well my heart meds and this heat don't mix so I am retreating downstairs where its much cooler. I'll be back up here later tonight or in the morning. It even been hot all night! so maybe in the morning. The store is keeping busy, good thing I can take care of my store from the pc downstairs. I'll be back when I have more to show!

[gsmith7158]

Randy keep me updated, no hurry of course but I love to watch you work!

[#goldpan]

Randy keep me updated, no hurry of course but I love to watch you work!

I sure will Greg! I hate the heat, it did not use to mind... But anyway I plan to do some more in the morning. Its about 110 at the moment and it over 80 down stairs.... The heat gets me up early so I may take advantage and get some knife work done. The Grand daughter is here and I am supposed to helping her learn a foreign language Italiano for her University class. Maybe I'll learn some of it myself!

[gsmith7158]

Italian eh! Well that's way over my head but I wish you luck buddy.

[#goldpan]

Its over my head too! But I try to help her out as I can!

[#goldpan]

I have been working on putting the handle material on a few pieces today. At the moment its slow going due to the amount of work that has to be done to mate the handle material to the scale and bolster. Making sure that the bolster face and the handle material face meet evenly with no gaps. This takes a lot of file work.

After soldering the bolster material in place there is always some solder that forms along the base of the bolster face. In these photos most of the file work has already been done. In the lower pic you can still see were the solder flowed along the scale where it meets the bolster. I use a soldering paste with the silver and flux already in it. I apply the solder around the edge but not where the scale and bolster meet. This cuts down on the amount solder that flows along that edge. The face still needs to made flush even though I grind a nice edge on it before soldering. I do this as I fit each scale with the handle materials. Its a lot of work but it makes a nice fit on the finished knife. I start with a triangular file to remove the bulk of the over flow. Then finish with a flat file on the bolsters leading edge. The I file the handle material to mate up with bolster. I hate noticeable gaps!

[#goldpan]

Well it looks like the heat wave will be done after Monday! Yay! I can stay is shop all day pretty soon. We are supposed to drop into the mid 80's by Thursday. This is great as my A/C unit for shop is not working good at all. So continuing where I left off.

In order to get a flush fit I trued the edge of the bolster by laying my stiddy on its side and lay my file on the edge and working the bolster face. If done free hand the bolster face develops a radius on the corners causing gaps between the bolster and the handle material.

Here I use the edge of a utility razor to check the face of the bolster.

Here I check the fit. This one looks good!

These five pics show the progression from rough to ready to finish and drill the holes for the pins. As a surprise I had a light bulb moment and I will be adding a 7th knife to this group. Something very different and I think it will very cool looking indeed! But yall have to wait until its done!

[ea42]

Great posts Randy, love the pics!

Eric

[#goldpan]

Thanks Eric!

[#goldpan]

I gotta tell ya, the air is so bad around here you could cut it with a knife! Its been slow going in the shop. Between the triple digit weather and the smoke from all of wild land fires a burning around the state I have been feeling a bit ill. It was recommended that even folks without health issues stay inside. The air so nasty that I feel like I have the flu. So I forced myself into the shop yesterday and today and made some progress with these six knives.

I need to surface the liners and polish them. Then I can start drilling the pin holes. Today I finished shaping the handles and matching the paired frames. Whats that on the far right you ask? That's the mystery frame for this small knife and its going to be a good one! Integral liners and bolsters/handles. It almost three o'clock and I am worn down. I still need to list knives for my store so work in the shop is done for today. Stay tuned! More pics tomorrow

[#goldpan]

The liners have been ground flat and polished. Looking pretty good! However I broke my last 5/64 drill bit. So I'm off to Ace for drill bits. And its back to work!

The Delta breeze has kicked in cleaning out the dirty air and lowering the high temp for today down to 82 deg. It feels nice. The shop gonna comfortable all day! I hope to show more progress later tonight!

[glennbad]

Glad you have been able to get back into the shop, Randy. Your project is coming along nicely!

[#goldpan]

Thanks Glenn. I thought so as well until this........

I used a backing block so that it would not happen. And it did anyway. Maybe the wood was too dry, I don't really know. Even so I think there should have such big blow outs. Most are too deep the grind away. I will have to cut new pieces of ebony and start over. Perhaps on the new pieces I'll drill the holes before I shape the handles. Its never been an issue before. I still have the others to drill. But my frustration levels are telling me to walk away until I know how to stop this from happening on the others. Anyone have any suggestions? We'll see what happens when I come back upstairs to the shop on Sunday. I have to do my granddaughters back brakes Saturday and the front brakes on my motorcycle.

[ea42]

Randy that's really strange! Those are some huge blowouts, are you sure it's ebony? The only suggestions I have are use a solid backing block (as you did). Make sure your bit is sharp. Make sure it's spinning rather quickly, you don't want the drill at its slow speed. Don't drill through all at once, drill about a third of the way through, pull the bit out to clear the hole, drill another third and repeat, then complete but don't blast it through, go slow, peck at it if you have to. Also make sure you don't have any metal shavings hanging on to the end of the bit, especially if you're drilling a new hole through the scale at the same time as the handle material.

Sometimes on a lockback where you have a lot of holes near the butt of the knife, you'd be better off leaving the handle material a bit long and finish it off once the knife is together, like this (please excuse the really awful pic quality ) :

Eric

[#goldpan]

Thanks for the help Eric. I wasn't paying enough attention to my drill speed. I had slowed it down for some other work and never restored it to it normal speed. I have other ebony that looks denser and darker, so I am going to un-glue the wood and start over. I was using a new drill bit, but again I assumed it was sharp. They normally are. But its not a guarantee. Pics aren't bad at all. Nice looking horn! Came out nice too! So Sunday I'm going to cut some fresh ebony from a different source and get these done! The other wood frames should come out better. If they break I more than enough material back up to them again. With any luck I wont have to! Thanks again Eric. We will see have this comes out on Sunday!

[ea42]

Sounds good Randy, good luck!

Eric

[#goldpan]

Well I kicked up the drill speed and went a step further. I used painters tape. Between those two changes the holes came out nice! Thanks Eric! Now to replace the ebony and continue.

[#goldpan]

These three are looking good! I wont pin them together until I get the ebony replaced on the other liners. This is a nice change. The handle covers top to bottom. Manzanita, Walnut and Brazilian Cherry. These three will not get the ivory stripes. Only the ebony ones will. I'm done for the day. I even did my errands this morning before working in the shop. Its Beer:30! We will see how far we get tomorrow! Thanks again Eric. I kicked the speed up on the drill press like you suggested and used painters tape for extra insurance! They came out just like they should!