cord wrap on Old Hickory handle

[deltablade]

has anyone modified an Old Hickory handle by using a cord wrap?

 

[666mademedoit]

I've wrapped the handles of all my Pfeil carving knives with great results. I tried both natural cord & various synthetic cord... My favourite way to wrap timber handles is with roughly 20 guage hemp cord (pretty much any craft supplies has this) and as a final step I melt beeswax onto the cord. Adding the beeswax is a little messy but I've found it binds the cord together with little to no glue required to hold it all in place. As a bonus the wax becomes really grippy when the wax warms with hand heat, even with sweaty hands it is extremely non slip.

Hope that info helps

 

[deltablade]

It does, thanks.

 

[666mademedoit]

Glad to help deltablade

Another product that looks great is thin craft leather lacing. The leather absorbs beeswax with gentle heat just like the hemp.

So I didn't destroy any knives during my experiments I used an offcut from a timber curtain rail, but anything similar would work to practice with.

If hemp cord or craft leather isn't readily available to you I found that everything from thin jute cord to butchers twine will work, the only thing that didn't work for me very well was jute cord around 5mm thick (550 paracord thickness). It had too many fuzzy strands that wouldn't stay put even once coated in wax, functionally it worked but didn't look very nice...

Happy experimenting!