Saving an oldie.........
Posted: Sun Mar 02, 2008 3:16 am
Awhile back I posted some pictures of a 35 pattern Camillus trapper whose yellow celluloid handles had deteriorated to the extent that not only were the blades corroded but the brass liners had rotted though;forming a crack radiating from the spring rivet nearly through to the other side.
Having stripped away the offending scales back then,the knife sat around on my computer desk almost as a mental reminder to check my celluloid handled knives on a regular basis.
I had cleaned up the blades and liners as well as I could;leaving the rivets in place.Today I decided to see if I could do something to at least make it into a user.
Out in the shop I searched around for some suitable handle material.I passed on some plexiglass sheet as being too brittle for scales.It is difficult to drill without shattering and cracks readily if stressed too much.I had some smoke gray Lexan but didn't like the look of it.I finally came across a chunk of red oak that was a remnant of some cabinet trimming.The red oak has a pretty wide open grain which I thought would look pretty good.Didn't realize how good it would look.
I rough cut the pieces to length and centering them over the rivets,clamped them into my vise driving the rivets into the wood.Unfortunately I had a gap near the bolsters on either side but as it wasn't a show piece decided to leave them as is.Bear in mind my total time to make these was less than a half hour.
With the scales in place I scribed a line around where they met the bolsters and liners,removed them and proceeded to sand them down on my belt sander which has a 1"x30" belt and a 6" disc. Did most of the sanding on the disc and when I got close to the liners switched over to the belt. Did some finish sanding with 150 and 220 grit paper,applied JB Weld to the liners and clamped them down. After drying,finish sanded with 220 wet or dry paper and polished with Mother's Mag Wheel Polish.
The rag I was using to polish with was pretty well dirtied up from prior polishing and the black worked itself into the grain of the wood making it almost look like stag!
Anyway I now have a nice little EDC that otherwise would have eventually got thrown out.Here are some before and after pics. Not the greatest job in the world but I still have a couple more to practice on.
Having stripped away the offending scales back then,the knife sat around on my computer desk almost as a mental reminder to check my celluloid handled knives on a regular basis.
I had cleaned up the blades and liners as well as I could;leaving the rivets in place.Today I decided to see if I could do something to at least make it into a user.
Out in the shop I searched around for some suitable handle material.I passed on some plexiglass sheet as being too brittle for scales.It is difficult to drill without shattering and cracks readily if stressed too much.I had some smoke gray Lexan but didn't like the look of it.I finally came across a chunk of red oak that was a remnant of some cabinet trimming.The red oak has a pretty wide open grain which I thought would look pretty good.Didn't realize how good it would look.
I rough cut the pieces to length and centering them over the rivets,clamped them into my vise driving the rivets into the wood.Unfortunately I had a gap near the bolsters on either side but as it wasn't a show piece decided to leave them as is.Bear in mind my total time to make these was less than a half hour.
With the scales in place I scribed a line around where they met the bolsters and liners,removed them and proceeded to sand them down on my belt sander which has a 1"x30" belt and a 6" disc. Did most of the sanding on the disc and when I got close to the liners switched over to the belt. Did some finish sanding with 150 and 220 grit paper,applied JB Weld to the liners and clamped them down. After drying,finish sanded with 220 wet or dry paper and polished with Mother's Mag Wheel Polish.
The rag I was using to polish with was pretty well dirtied up from prior polishing and the black worked itself into the grain of the wood making it almost look like stag!
Anyway I now have a nice little EDC that otherwise would have eventually got thrown out.Here are some before and after pics. Not the greatest job in the world but I still have a couple more to practice on.
