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Cold steel Carbon V Rehandle or Not?

I

Icedtee84

Joined
Feb 28, 2015
Messages
31
First post here, been lurking for awhile but i finally decided to join.

Anyway, i have just gotten a hold of a cold steel carbon V without the full distal taper. The knife has been used for sure and the blade seemed to have been hand honed by the previous owner.
The handle has been chewed on by a mouse and took a chunk out of it, not too big but sure does look unpleasant, and also after i have washed the knife i still keep on getting water oozing out of the handle whenever i squeeze, and since this is a carbon blade i know that the tang would definitely rust up quick. So now i am trying to decide whether to re-handle or keep it all original to retain its value. I have recently gotten into collecting knives, but i also require each of the knives i own to be usable if i so choose to use it to gut a fish with.

If i do re-handle i am leaning towards wood, stacked birch or stacked micarta. but i am having trouble trying to decide whether or not i would put a bolster on it or not since i only have basic hand tools, no drill press (yet) just a dremil and a few hand files.

Any opinions would be much appreciated, thanks!
 
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I would get the existing handle off as soon as impossible and dry the tang!

Then make a nice handle for it yourself. Taking off the mouse chewed, leaky handle is not going to hurt the value.

Which Carbon V knife is it?
 
The knife has no particular value. Make another handle.
 
to Favorite blade, its the cold steel master hunter. the one without the full distal taper.

Anyway, what would you guys suggest i use for the bolster?

Will be posting pics soon.
 
When you remove the current molded grips you will be left with a partial tang instead of a full tang. With a full tang you could just slap on 2 scales, pretty easy. But with a partial tang you have 2 options: (1) make 2 scales but carve out ("mortise") a recess in each scale 1/2 the thickness of the tang, so the tang fits cleanly in between them with no gaps, or (2) drilling an opening in either a solid bolster or a solid full handle and then slipping that over the tang. The problem for you with #2 is going to be shaping the rectangular hole for the tang to fit through and seat perfectly against the blade. It's tricky to pull that off exactly even with a drill press and files. I guess use the dremel to carve the hole through, but leave it too small b/c you will ned a lot of slow careful file-work to get it to fit the tang perfectly. You don't want ugly glue-filled-gaps between the handle and tang.
I have done process #2 a couple times using a micarta bolster, getting that fitted and glued in place perfectly, then adding a solid handle behind it - that part is easier b/c you don't need the hole to be perfectly fit to the tang, it can be oversized then fill in the gaps with glue. BUT you still need to make sure the handle meets the bolster perfectly while aligning with the hole for the lanyard tube.

here's a post showing a 5-piece handle I did using method #2 (I've prettied it up since, but you get the idea)
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/s...-well-THAT-worked!?highlight=1311+that+worked
 
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Interesting, i have done some full tangs like the fallkniven s1 with micarta. and yes that was pretty straight forward. But like you said with a partial tang it can be a bit tricky. Though option #1 would be a bit easier but would not look as good as it can be with option #2. As i have recently put new stacked leather handles with red and white spacers on a vintage cattaraugus 225q which turned out pretty well i thought doing so with the Master hunter would not be that hard at all, but then came the problem with the bolster, as i want to put nickel silver bolster/guard on it but the problem is just like you said perfect fitment of the bolster to the tang. Drilling the hole is one thing but shaping the cross section part of the bolster where the tang meets the blade is where the challenge is. Anyway i would try to attempt option #2 and see how it works out. thanks for the help.
 
For some reason i could not find a way to upload pics of the knife and its current state, only thing i could find is adding an image from an URL but not directly from my computer. Is it because im new?
 
End of this thread. The commander claimed the entire cold steel collection. So now the master hunter would now remain untouched, there are now three master hunters in the collection 1 with the full thick spine, one with the full distal taper and the san mai. soon to have the 4th with the VG1.
Have fun everybody and keep on tinkering!
 
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