Custom Micarta

JTknives

JTknives

Blade Heat Treating www.jarodtodd.com
Knifemaker / Craftsman / Service Provider
Joined
Jun 11, 2006
Messages
8,633
well i have decided that i like making Micarta allmost as much as i do making knives. i have decided to send out the word and see if there is any need for custom Micarta. i am going to be doing canves, rag, and my all time love saten. im working on some gold satin micarta that will look sweet when done. im also going to be doing so out of old denum pants. let me know what you think
 
JTknives said:
well i have decided that i like making Micarta allmost as much as i do making knives. i have decided to send out the word and see if there is any need for custom Micarta. i am going to be doing canves, rag, and my all time love saten. im working on some gold satin micarta that will look sweet when done. im also going to be doing so out of old denum pants. let me know what you think
Click to expand...

Im interested in some rag. Keep me posted.
 
Sounds interesting. I'd like to see some black (satin?) with occasional layers of gold or silver satin in a twist pattern. Just a few bright lines in all the black.

Dan Pierson
 
It seames like lots of people want the rag micarta, now the quesion is would thay be happy with my best imatation of the old style rag micarda or is the old micarda what people want. i think i have figuared out how to make it dense and solid. i think that the rag would be very cool to do with diffrent colors, like a red, white and blue.
 
I'd be very interested in some blue jean Micarta.

STR
 
I will try to keep the price of the scales down to the current prices which i think is 5-10, but if you get more i can give you a better price. also i will beable to make it thicker if you want to do a hiden tang.
 
allright, i have now figuared out how to do the reg micarta. i think best in the shower and that is where it hit me. if you think about it rag is a lot diffrint than the standated micarta in that its made from small chunks and not layers so it realy has to be packed tight but also be completley saturated with epoxy. ill do some test peces and let you know how thay turn out. the onley thing i need is to make a press and i need it out of metal, some c metal or chanel steel what ever you call it then some 1/2 plate steel and some bolts. does any one live in utah that would be wiling to help with this project? what colors should i do first?
 
Dark blue mixed with bright red would be OK in my eyes- too bad I do not live nearby- I would definately like to try my hand at custom micarta!
 
well i got my resin today and when i got home it looks like the hardner leeked and got under the cap and hardened a bunch of resin inside of the cap. i had to drill a hole throught it to get to the liquid. now the onley question is i wonder if i have lumpey liquid. man that sucks because i got it about 2 hrs away from my house and thay did not give me a recipt.
 
all right the first batch of jean micarta is done and it looks very sweet. i will post pictures tomarow. its 5 1/2" x 5 1/2" x 1/2". its a good size chunk and took 2 cups of resin to saturate. its also make from first quality jeans "Abercrombie and fitch". it takes longer to make than you would think around an hr plus to make it. the way i made it was that the top layer and bottom layer do not have resin on them so thay would not stick to the plate glass i used for the press, but now the bottom one is saturated from the press. but the top one is still not all the way saturated so it will need to be grinded off. i did not wrap it plastic wrap so you can see what your getting. i will be doing the gold satin tomarow and maybe a black canvis and gold satin twist as well.
 
I'm interested, I would like to see how it all turns out, sounds very cool.

Are you planning to do 5"x1"x1.5" blocks too, for something like a stick tang bowie?
 
I am interested in some blue jean micarta as well...Some black and white "damascus" micarta would be sweet as well
 
Jtknives, use some waxed paper on the press platens, then you won't have to waste the outside layers.
 
i have used plastic wrap around the glass, i just did not wrap it around the stack of cloth.
 
bowdude said:
I'm interested, I would like to see how it all turns out, sounds very cool.

Are you planning to do 5"x1"x1.5" blocks too, for something like a stick tang bowie?
Click to expand...

ya i can do it any thickness you want.

also i ran out of resin when i put on the last layer, but im going to put some on when i get home tonight.
 
If there is any one that would be intersited in a set of scales of this let me know i would like to give it away so other people can review it. in order for me to get the most out of this sheet i am going to be cutting it into 1" x 4" strips and that will give me 3 sets of scales. i will give away 2 sets and keep one for my self, i just ask that you pay for the shipping which i think would be 2 bucks. let me know. i want to get a review of my meterial from good knife makers that can spred the word so i can afford to make more.
 
ok the scales are now cut and look very good and have very compact layer formations. i also coated the top layer today that did not have any resin, it is not compleyley solid like a rock. i cant beleve how strong and tuff this stuff is. adammichael you can count one of the sets as yours, i hope you like it. remember i have not completed my super press yet and when its done i will be able to get unbeable compression.
 
jt how did u go about doing this ? did u read it some were or are u doing trial and error making the micarta? i have no experince with micarta as i like wood handles. but i have seen some micarta thats looks nice, plain green and black looks do nothing for me as far as looks go. can u post pic of the stuff u made ?
 
here are the pictures of a small samble chunck i had left after i cut up the slab into 3 sets of scales. rember there is one set left for a good knife maker out there.

ok this is just a small squair that i bevled the edges so you can see the layers. i put a little oil on it to simulate a super glue finish.

jeanmicarta1.jpg



and this one is with out any oil

jeanmicarta2.jpg


and this one is with out a camera flash and no oil

jeanmicarta3.jpg



now it was just sanded to a 600 grit finish and thats all there is sometimes a very small hole where a buble was but it is so small that you can berley notice it and a little super glue would completley remove it forever. I am building a vacume chamber to take care of this problem.
 
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