Anatomy of a Shell Handled Knife

[orvet]

OK, here is a quick tutorial on the anatomy of a shell handle knife.

There are variations on the shell types, but this is the one commonly used by Imperial starting about 1936 through the close of the Schrade factory in Ireland in 2004.

These knives were cheap (price wise) even by the standards of their day, and remember they were introduced in the middle of the Great Depression. But low price did not mean low quality. I recall a conversation I had with a knife repairman who was about 85 years old; he said there was one knife company that always used good steel in their blades, even in their cheap knives, in his opinion that company was Imperial. I agree wholeheartedly. These inexpensive knives are still around today, many made in the 1930s and they still work as a knife. Many are worse for the wear, but if they have been oiled to prevent the rust that commonly plagues carbon steel they are still functional.

I personally think the shell handle knives are an excellent example of the cutlery industry using technology to lower the price of a pocketknife in response to the depressed economy to stay in business and still provide their customers with a nice-looking and more importantly a functional pocketknife.

Yes, I know they are not nearly as nice as a Case stockman or a Remington trapper but they did have something that these others did not, they were affordable to the average guy at that time.


This is the knife we are starting with. It is an Imperial Hammer Brand jackknife. The handle on the front side of the knife was long gone when I acquired the knife. You can see in this first picture the liner of the mark side of the knife. Notice the sockets or indentations at both ends of the liner. This is where the tabs on the ends of the shell handles were fitted.

In this picture you see the shell handle still intact on the pile side of the knife.
The black part of the handle is not paint, is a piece of plastic or celluloid that is stretched around the outside of the shell handle and tucked inside of the hollow shell.

In this picture we see the inside of the shell handle with the edge of the plastic wrapper folded inside of the shell.

In this picture we see the shell handle and we see the plastic wrapper or skin removed from the shell.

These next two pictures will not enlarge as much as the ones I took with my scanner. These were taken with the camera on my workbench.
Here you see the tab of the pile side shell that has been loosened from the knife by the tip of this corkscrew.

Imperial Hammer Brand -e- tab loosened.jpg (26.89 KiB) Viewed 6305 times

In this last picture you see the various parts of the knife disassembled with the exception of the mark side shell and plastic, which were missing to begin with.

Imperial Hammer Brand -f- disassembled.jpg (37.28 KiB) Viewed 6305 times

Instead of having a frame this shell handle has three liners of steel (don't let the brass color throw you, they are steel), two springs, & two blades which were held together by three rivets. This formed the functional portion of the knife. The shell handle on the outside was for the purpose of making it fit the hand better and look more like the customers expectation of a pocketknife. With the exception of comfort in the hand, the shell handle knife, (excluding any damage), is fully functional without the shell handles.

There you have a quick anatomy lesson of the shell handle.
I hope you find it helpful.

Dale

[trey]

Thanks for posting this. I learned a lot.

[singin46]

Great tutorial Dale!

[FRJ]

Dale,
I appreciate you taking the time to creat that thread and post that information.
I enjoyed it very much. I have so much to learn here.

[edgy46]

Thanks Dale and thanks to Singin for the link to this this thread.

[Edgewise]

Yup, I just decided to find out exactly what a shell handle is and now I know, thanks to Dale.
but it seems a more complicated process. Where was the cost cut?
How can I identify one without disassembly?
P.S. Actually, I just saw a picture of the tabs in twoflowersluggage post so I know how to identify them.
I suppose the tabs were the weak point of those knives.

[jerryd6818]

I suppose the tabs were the weak point of those knives.

Au contraire mon ami. An Imperial shell handle in your hand would disabuse you of this prejudice. You can't be a piece of weak crap and last for 70-80+ years/

[Jeffinn]

I suppose the tabs were the weak point of those knives.

Au contraire mon ami. An Imperial shell handle in your hand would disabuse you of this prejudice. You can't be a piece of weak crap and last for 70-80+ years/

In my experience the tabs are the weak point if you’re looking to disassemble this style of knife. The tabs are extremely thin steel/tin and they seem to break quite often during disassembly/reassembly. Once the tab is broken I’m not sure there is a way to repair it. I guess you could solder a new tab in place but the heat would likely affect the handle material.
The design itself is fairly straight forward but in my opinion it wasn’t developed with serviceability in mind. It was a cheap, inexpensive way to attach handles to a knife. It’s functional for sure but I view it as a one time use sort of thing.

[KnifeSlinger#81]

Thanks for doing this Dale. Interesting information.

To me, the shell handle imperial/hammer brand have a certain allure that makes me like them. The way they were advertised is particularly interesting to me. Despite the fairly cheesy handle construction they are excellent work a day knives and are far better than the equivalent low priced (and chinese made) knives of today.

[Edgewise]

I suppose the tabs were the weak point of those knives.

Au contraire mon ami. An Imperial shell handle in your hand would disabuse you of this prejudice. You can't be a piece of weak crap and last for 70-80+ years/

You mean there's still a market for those that survived to today? and not just to send them for rehandling?

[philco]

I suppose the tabs were the weak point of those knives.

Au contraire mon ami. An Imperial shell handle in your hand would disabuse you of this prejudice. You can't be a piece of weak crap and last for 70-80+ years/

You mean there's still a market for those that survived to today? and not just to send them for rehandling?

Edgewise get one, sharpen it up, and put it in your pocket for the next three months then tell me if there's still a market for these knives. WARNING Imperial blade steel is quite addictive.

[Dinadan]

I suppose the tabs were the weak point of those knives.

Au contraire mon ami. An Imperial shell handle in your hand would disabuse you of this prejudice. You can't be a piece of weak crap and last for 70-80+ years/

You mean there's still a market for those that survived to today? and not just to send them for rehandling?

I like those old shell handled fishing knives. Imperial, Colonial, Ulster - they used carbon steel instead of stainless so they are not too good for saltwater. Other than that in no way are they inferior to current Case or other fish knives, in my opinion. I have a few that I like to use when fresh water fishing.

Thank you Dale for this thread that you posted seven years ago!

[TwoFlowersLuggage]

I think what keeps the current prices low is not low quality, it the massive number of these knives that were made. Every flea market, antique store and junk boutique that has ANY knives will have at least one old shell handled knife.

[KnifeSlinger#81]

Thank you Dale for this thread that you posted seven years ago!

If you didn't mention that I would have never noticed! I need to pay closer attention to things

[orvet]

I am out of town at the moment but I have a partially finished post on my PC at home for this topic.
I believe the shell handle is an important sidebar to cutlery history. While it may not have changed the course of cutlery history forever it certainly was a unique development in manufacturing that substantially lowered the price of a decent quality knife. It was a definite move toward automation and a move away from the old Sheffield model of one Cutler makes a knife from start to finish.
It lowered the price of a decent knife and pushed the industry toward mass production which meant faster production, lower prices, consistent quality and more affordable knives readily available to the knife buying public.
I guess in that sense it really did in change the course of cutlery history.

It was also an early example of someone thinking outside of the box of what a knife was. It could be argued that that it was a forerunner to many of the cutlery innovations we seen today.

If you're not familiar with the history of the shell handle it did not start with Imperial but with a German company, possibly as early as 1900 or slightly before. I find it a fascinating study.

[Edgewise]

And now Orvet has made me fascinated too. Imperial was like a version of the Ford (assembly line) of knives which explains twoflowersluggage's "massive number of these knives that were made".
I checked my "collection" and I only have two Imperials, a frontier small stockman which came free with a purchase, and an Imperial Ireland with plastic handles and no liners.
But no shell handles.
Both knives are strong and the little pin crack on the frontier in no way affects the knife's performance.

The lack of liners is a cost cutting measure for the Ireland company, but I was surprised that a German Kissing Krane sod buster also had no liners except at the tang, or even pins, and an enclosed spring. No shell handle there either.

I had been avoiding shell handles because I had the impression that they were hollow like shells and of poor quality.
Now I know that their history alone gives them value and that knifeslinger's comparison with modern cost equivalents is worthy of note, and philco, I always take good advice.
I suppose this Schrade Legacy forum also counts as the Imperial forum.

[orvet]

Your Imperial Ireland appears to be part of the Apex line of Knives and Tools that Schrade made. If you check the Schrade research section I have both Apex and Tradesman tools listed there. They are very similar although I think the Tradesman maybe slightly higher quality. I have a number of Apex and Tradesman Knives and Tools that I will be listing in my store before long as I found a whole plastic tote full of them and other knives when cleaning out an our guest room closet. Apex and Tradesmen are not really expensive but some of them are quite innovative like a putty knife with a large sheepsfoot blade that folds out from the handle. How handy is that! I have a couple that I use at home and if you're doing a little patch on a wall repair or or working with sheetrock , a putty knife handle with a knife blade in it is very practical tool! I also have some Anvil cutters which are a type of Gardner's pruning shear that were quite nicely. I was pruning roses with a pair of them this week. They also made multi tools as well as the number of knives including a hawkbill pruner, fillet knives, a drop point Hunter and other patterns. I have a hawkbill pruner from the Apex line that Rivals my 4 line Camillus Hawkbill primer for sharpness. It's what I usually have in my pocket when I'm in the yard doing weeding or pruning.

[whitebuffalo58]

But I also think it's worth noting...the advent of the shell handled knife was never because Imperial was incapable of making a high quality knife. It was just a heck of a business move at just the right time. These two earlier knives were as high quality as any being produced during the same era.

WB

[orvet]

In my experience the tabs are the weak point if you’re looking to disassemble this style of knife. The tabs are extremely thin steel/tin and they seem to break quite often during disassembly/reassembly. Once the tab is broken I’m not sure there is a way to repair it. I guess you could solder a new tab in place but the heat would likely affect the handle material.
The design itself is fairly straight forward but in my opinion it wasn’t developed with serviceability in mind. It was a cheap, inexpensive way to attach handles to a knife. It’s functional for sure but I view it as a one time use sort of thing.

The tabs are a weak point if you are trying to repair the knife, especially if you take it apart more than once and try to reassemble it. You are also correct that it was not developed with serviceability in mind. The same is true of the Swinden key system that Schrade used. They were not easy to repair, but the manufacturing process was so cost-effective they could easily afford to give customer a new knife. Replacing the knife was far cheaper than paying someone to repair it; that would be true of a shell handle Imperial as well as a Swinden construction 34OT.
Maybe it is sort of a one time use knife that cannot be repaired, but if the knife lasts for 40 years or more, who can really complain about that?

But I also think it's worth noting...the advent of the shell handled knife was never because Imperial was incapable of making a high quality knife. It was just a heck of a business move at just the right time.

You're absolutely correct Rob!
The old solid handle Imperial knives will stand up in quality to any other knife made during that time period.

As I see it, the genius of the Imperial shell handle knives is that they were inexpensive to manufacture yet with quality materials they lasted for decades. The other half of the equation was the timing! Introduced during the Great Depression they were a great innovation in providing a low cost decent quality cutting tools for people who used cutting tools far more than we use them today.
In a time when some of the finest cutlery companies ever, such as New York Knife Company, were going out of business, Imperial found a way to make a quality product at a far more affordable price. Not only did they survive the depression but they came out strong and were in a great position to be a major supplier to the US government during World War II.

[whitebuffalo58]

Wasn't their slogan, "A chicken in every pot...a knife in every pocket"?


WB

[eveled]

Great thread. Thanks Dale.

One question. Did shell handle knives ever have rivets on the scales?

Or in other words. Does the shell handle refer to the metal with the wrap? Or the general construction with the tabs?

[Reverand]

I have never seen an Imperial shell handle that had rivets in the handles.
I have seen a couple of lower-cost German and Japanese knives that had a hollow bolster, and it was pinned through that. But they did not have true shell handles, just a shell-like bolster with solid handles.

But, as I am relearning ever day, there is probably an exception to every rule.

[eveled]

These are the Imperials I was curious about. I thought they might be a plastic slab riveted on. But I’ve been told they are wrapped in celluloid like the one in Dales post.

[Dinadan]

One question. Did shell handle knives ever have rivets on the scales?

I have a couple of shell handle knives that have rivets in the scales. I think the rivets are just ornamental. Here is one with the wrap missing from one side.

Or in other words. Does the shell handle refer to the metal with the wrap? Or the general construction with the tabs?

A shell handle knife, by definition, is going to have the tab construction. I have never seen one without the wrap, but if it were bare metal it would still be a shell handle knife. I think.

[TripleF]

Great info. First time I've seen this post.