First Re-handle Project

Upstream

Upstream

Joined
Jul 1, 2005
Messages
760
This turned out to be more of a challenge then I had first anticipated. It's an old Presto, now with African Blackwood handles. I'm still not happy with the way that the holes around the button and lock turned out but I had gone through several pieces and was getting discouraged so I settled on this one. I think I learned some good lessons and I'm looking forward to my next project.
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I'll be on the look-out for old Schrades with busted handles.

Thanks Rick
 
It looks pretty good on my screen. But I know what you mean. I see every little flaw, every angle not rounded enough or too rounded in my own attempts. But it does look good. An eBay seller has parts knives on right now. CHeck them out!

Codger :thumbup:
 
You might consider making a template for these I have known several people who have run into the same uniformity problem however a top and even a bottom template ( which will not help in routing depth ect) will give you a consistant area and guidelines for your bottom of the face handle. Unfortunately these particular pieces really suffer in salable value when rehandled especially in materials different than the original. Still they make for really great collectors pieces. LT
 
Gentlemen,

I am new to the forum and have reading your threads for some time now. You folks have been so informative and in some cases, indispensable with your technical info on Schrades. I'm very sad that Schrade closed. I found out unfortunately in December of 2004. I had to replace the LB8 that I gave away, I never took advantage of Schrade with their loss replacement policy and am kicking myself for not supporting them when they were in business. On the west coast Schrade was not in many stores, you know what they say out of sight out of mind. Schrades were all gone, except at one hardware store, where I bought the remaining few that they had. I did manage to buy 2 LB8's and a few other beautiful Schrade knives that I couldn't do without on ebay. As of now, I am satisfied with what small Schrade collection that I do have and now plan to focus more attention on Canal Street Cutlery and support them, maybe one knife a month. I like what I see and I think and hope that they will stay in business for some time, hopefully more than 100 years. Thanks for everything and I'll continue to drop in from time to time.

Scott
 
Welcome Scott!
As you probably know this is the place to get just about any Schrade question answered.

Welcome aboard! Watch out for Schrade-itis, it is highly contagious! :D

Dale
 
Scott,
Welcome to the forum. The LB8 is near the top of the UH lockback folding line and one damn nice knife. Please do drop in often. Let us know whats in that collection and when you do start getting those Canal's let us hear from you.
Thanks for saying hello.
TTYL
Larry
 
Welcome Scott! Glad you found us. LB8 was a great knife, you are lucky to have a pair of them. And you can't do any better than a Canal Street every month or so.
Phil
 
Nice job upstream!
It looks good to me. I haven't gotten brave enough to tackle a folder yet, let alone a switch blade. So far I have stuck with fixed blades.
I like the wood you chose for the handle, it looks nice. I just found a new (to me) store that handles just exotic woods. From pen blanks to whole logs, and it is only about 70 miles from my house. In fact, it is in the same neighborhood as my doctor's office. So I can get in there often. The guy said, "the other stores are meat-&-potatoes (of exotic woods), we are the candy store."
I think the exotic woods add an element to the knives that is missing in the factory handles. I have a lots of Derlin handled Old Timers & Staglon Uncle Henry's, but my favorite is a 152OT that I re handled in Babinga.

Here is a 152OT re handled in Babinga-
[URL=http://i35.photobucket.com/albums/d178/orvet/152OTBabinga.jpg][/URL]

Keep up the good work upstream. Show us some more of your work.

Dale
 
I'm fortunate to have a place called The World of Hardwoods about ten miles from me here in MD.Thier parent company is a major supplier of hardwoods in the mid-atlantic,any spieces you can think of, if they don't have it they can get it for you. I am like a kid in a candy store in that place.
I really did not expect to increase the value of this piece and have no intention of selling it but the old handle literally crumbled im my hands and since it worked good at the time, I decided to revive it. The real disappointment came as I was sitting here flicking it open and closed last night while reading some other posts. I heard a stange "ping" that last time I closed it.The spring broke:grumpy:. So I'm on the lookout for a new spring.
BTW, nice work with that Babinga Dale.

Thanks Rick
 
I can name that tune in no notes. Even as you said it I could not only hear that ping but could feel it in my hand. If you think that was sickening. Try it some time with an old English dirk around 200 years old AH the ping that costs thousands. I have an old Austrian hand made ( I will include a pic ) hand carved bone dyed made pre guild days before unions before guilds. A cottage industry. Uncle Hienrich ( or similar ) would do the handle Uncle Reinhart was the smitty, ect. Then they would put it all together All this in the Austrian mountains ( which by the way is where I got it ). Scroll work on the blade was actually forged into the blade when it was made. Any way. I am proudly showing this baby off to a friend when not only did I get the ping but then the whole damn mech just sort of crumbled in my hand ( and it is a weird one of a kind mech ). Now that was an interesting moment. to bad my friend did not have a camera for a picture of my face. Now you have to understand I have been called many things in my life but patient, tactful, quiet and non violent have never been used regarding me. Certainly not right then. Also I have never mentioned this but over the years among my other bad tempermental habits when a knife breaks I usually just chuck it into the nearest woods I just cannot stand to look at it. Some people never grow up and I never plan to anyway there I am with this now once unique knife which is now a 150 year old bunch of junk. My friend looked at me and said Just give it to me and I numbly handed it over. Frankly I did not even mention it again that day to him. It is difficult to talk with a mouth full of canadian whiskey which pretty much was my condition for the rest of the day. Hey you win a few you lose a few. I mean I have lost much more than the knife was worth many times in poker games so I wrote it off. A month or two past and my friend again stopped over we went in to sample some canadian wares and he handed me back the knife truly better than new. It had always had a worn point on the mech and that was what had given away. Now it was all new. Not shiny new old metal new I would have never known it was not original. I was amazed and at first could say nothing ( a truly rare situation ). I then asked how he had done it. His answer was that being a pack rat ( like myself ) he saved every thing and had some 200 year old steel from something or other that he had scrounged. He also knew a fellow who was in charge of making and repairing artifacts ect
at a place near here which does renassiance and medieval reenactment ( museum village). He went to him and the fellow took it as a challenge he actually hand made new parts from the old metal. Just amazing.

Now regarding your spring problem. Obviously you are pretty handy. So you have a few choices. first you can fabricate one out of spring steel. This can be found at any watch maker it is what is used for main springs. Or you can use any other similar steel you would be amazed at what will serve. I knew a fellow who used to follow the towns street sweeper. A rather unusual pass time and he was viewed oddly by many. Actually he was looking for the steel bristles that would break off the brush on the sweeper ( Yup ) perfect for switchblade springs. Now if you have neither the patients, mechanical inclination, or simply do not wish to follow your local street sweeper around then go to bladeauction.com usually there is someone on there selling repacements for around 10 bucks apiece. I hope this helps LT PS the cost for having my knife fixed was damn near a whole bottle of Canadian medicine. PPS I just realized that as you look at this picture you might say where is the release button if this is a switchblade. the lock back lever serves as both the release and lock release. I told you it was unusual. PPPS always store your type of knife ( fishtail ) open it will add to the life of the spring. This is true for all domestic ( american automatics). PPPPS Am I done now? Yes
 
Nice work guys.

Great knife and great story LT.

...I knew a fellow who used to follow the towns street sweeper...
Click to expand...
He he now you know two... Here's what street sweeper bristles look like.

Luis

 
Thanks for the tips and the new site, I can really get into some trouble there. I haven't seen any street sweepers around here latley but I will be on the lookout.PS I guess I better stop flicking my Edgemaster, I don't want to have to put a new sping in it.
 
I know it's not a Schrade but I don't know any other place to post this where there is a better bunch of knife nuts. I bought a puukko not to long ago and it has a birch bark handle I says to myself, I says,'why didn't I think of that'?
So I did. it's the first real re-handle i've done and I'm gonna do more this way.
I did sand off the varnish on the puukko and boy is it ever nice like this.
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There's a bit more work to be done ,but I'm pretty happy so far.
Kent
 
Nice mewolf! Good work.
I have some leather handles I need to to replace also. It is nice to see someone use that method.
 
Nice work Kent.

Here's one that I did back in the mid 60's when I was in Junior High, I cut off a bunch of squares from a piece of 3 mm plywood that was lying around, drilled, stacked and glued over the tang and shaped with saw, files and sandpaper.

Luis


Click to enlarge

P.S. This one has seen plenty of use over the years, it was my first fixed blade and the only one for a good while, I have also re-stitched the sheath, and the guard which I made from a piece of aluminum is now loose but the handle is still strong.
 
Thanks guys! it was alot of fun too. The blade is an old Olsen made in Solingen Germany. The plywood is a great idea, and it looks good too.
 
Everyone, Very nice work. Well, I might aswell throw one of mine in the mix.
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Ratman out
EDIT: whoops, got my windows mixed up, looks like I brought this one back from the dead.
 
Nice work Ratman. Nothing wrong with bringing back the dead, after all, isn't that what we're doing with some of these old knives? As a matter of fact, my next project is going to be my first project. A re-re-handle, I broke the blackwood handles on my Presto while trying to replace the spring.
Thanks Rick
 
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