Maple Burl Handle Help

[Tim Scarlatti]

This is the knife I've got in the works. It's almost a skinner, but I'll be honest; I don't have the kind of skill to make metal do exactly what I've got in my head. The knife's not great, but it's practice. The blade is pressed in as deep as it will go for now. My questions are thus. Should I carve out the handle more to accommodate the tang? Should I shorten the tang? Should I add a spacer? What are good spacer materials. I have some antler and birch bark. I was also thinking about using a darker wood. What would you guys do?

 

[JJ Simon]

How long is that tang?

A picture of that would help.

You want to aim for some sort of squareness in all of your meeting materials.

So the shoulders of your knife should be square.

Your guard needs to be flat and flush.

and the section of your handle that meets the guard should be flat and flush.

The handle radius' in a little. so you could meet that with a spacer that radius towards it and that would be an aesthetic design element.

Or you could core out more of the inside of your handle.

One of the things you can do is use a drill bit a little thicker than the the tang and basically route out a larger channel than the tang.

Then take epoxy putty and fill the channel and slide the tang in which will make a perfect channel fit of the tang.

you might want to put some oil on the tang before you slide it in.

then once the channel is hardened you can epoxy it in

[Tim Scarlatti]

The bolster is loose fitted for trial purposes and not cut to size or filled at all yet. I'm just interested in what to do for a spacer of if I should just carve into the handle more. The more I think about it, the more I want to do a spacer, but I still don't know a good material to compliment the burl.

[R.H.Graham]

Birch bark would be nice, or something a little darker/browner, to set the grain off in the burl...imo...

[Tim Scarlatti]

Birch bark would be nice, or something a little darker/browner, to set the grain off in the burl...imo...

Ebonized oak?

[GBrackett]

I try to get a tang that is between 2/3 to 3/4 of the handle length Preferring to be closer to 3/4.

I've used black buffalo horn before as a spacer. Not too expensive and contrasts nicely, fairly easy to work with.

 

[Tim Scarlatti]

I try to get a tang that is between 2/3 to 3/4 of the handle length Preferring to be closer to 3/4.

I've used black buffalo horn before as a spacer. Not too expensive and contrasts nicely, fairly easy to work with.

 

I have it carved/filed out almost all the way, but there's about sixteenth of an inch left with the bolster and tang in place. Should I tap it in or since it's burl, just carve it out more and trust JB Weld to to the job?

[GBrackett]

I would get GFlex epoxy and not JB weld. I did not like the clean up with JB, GFlex cleans up with alcohol, and JB is not clear, so I can dye the epoxy to whatever color I like. GFlex is a marine grade epoxy. I would carefully carve it out more.

[Jason Brown]

Alternating layers of thin metal and leather can create great contrast. In the one I have up on show and tell I used some 1/4 flat bar for the thick spacers and the fins from a computer CPU heatsink for the thin metal spacers. I used black leather and the boiled linseed oil on top of danish oil, I used as a finish really darkened and shined it up nicely.