Fixed Blade Spacer Question

[BKH]

I'm in the process of making my first fully custom knife. The blade is fixed full tang, and I've made some micarta scales for it, but I've run into a problem. The blade handle is perfectly flat on both sides, and the micarta scales have been sanded flat on the side where they meet the metal, but when I screw the scales on they don't fit perfectly flush. I wanted to know, are there any spacer materials that compress at all, so I can make that sliver of a gap unnoticeable?

 

[dialex]

Yes there are many options, from plastic to vulcanized fiber. Unfortunately I can't post any link to a supplier, but you can try to google "spacer material for knife making". Good luck with your project.

 

[BKH]

Vulcanized Fiber is what I've seen the most of. Does it compress?

 

[Frank Niro]

No it doesn't compress . The truth is you really DON"T have the scales and the knife tang flat. You need to lay a thick piece of glass or such on as table, glue on some 120 grit sandpaper and go to it. Take a marking pencil and cover the side you are going to flatten After a few strokes, you will see what I said was right. Now continue until all the marking pencil colour is gone. Frank

 

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

Another trick is to slightly hollow out the center of the tang and/or scales. Leave about 1/8" un-hollowed area around the perimeter. That makes fit-up easier, and provides a reservoir for the epoxy. If the scales and tang are perfectly flat, and you squeeze them together with clamps when assembling, all the epoxy will get squeezed out. This is called a "glue starved joint", and will fail sooner or later.....often sooner.
Drilling several extra holes through the tang helps with this problem, too.

 

[james terrio]

What Frank and Stacy said.

On the other hand, thin neoprene gasket material will indeed compress and fill gaps/non flat spots. I once had to use neoprene liners on a handforged kukri re-handle job. The tang was so completely whacked I had no other choice...