Fragility of Bone Handles???

[Col Defender]

Hey guys - thanks for all the help so far with my new knife making venture and recently my efforts to make handles out of bone.

Some of my friends and I went bear hunting in Maine this year and most of us got bear. Several of the guys have asked me to make them a knife with a bear bone handle which I am in the process of doing. It is actually going quite well - I run the tang all the way through the knife, use brass plates front and rear, fill the bone cavity with plumbers epoxy, thread the tang and put a nut on it. Several of you have coached me on this technique and it is working well.

My question is will the bone handle be fragile and likely to crack? More fragile than a wood handle? (I ask because one forum member has raised this concern a couple of times.) If this is a likely problem, I guess I could guarantee the blade against breakage but not the handle.

Any opinions will be much appreciated.

Thanks

Steve

 

[Deweyknives]

It really all depends on the bone. Some bone is hard & brittle like glass, some is more the consistancy of dense plastic. I've never worked bear bone, beef only, but i have a knife 12+ years old w/ beef bone scales. Been used hard and only small checks around the pins.

Abuse a piece of scrap and you should be able to tell if it"s brittle or plastic-like.

 

[Bailey Knives]

I have always found bone to be pretty tough. I usually work with cow bone or camel bone. No real experience with bear bone but I bet it's pretty solid.

 

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

My only question would be how dry it was and if it was degreased. I have used wolf bone, deer bone, and bear jaws for handles. All the bone I have used I had stabilized as well. It held up very well.

 

[Horsewright]

I think the drying processed really will make the difference. I've used, cattle, camel, giraffe and buffalo (from the customer's kill). All have held up very well. The buffalo bone had been processes by the taxidermist. I don't know what he did but it was like using the camel bone. It was also a couple of years old so had dried. Same in appearance too. If ya didn't know you wouldn't be able to tell the difference.

 

[Horsewright]

I was able to check with my customer real quick to see what the taxidermist had done with that buffalo bone. He'd boiled it which I guess would be the degreasing that Stacy mentioned. I ended up making three knives with this bone. We used both front shin bones for these projects.

 

[mete]

Years ago I read an article in a medical journal .Up to that time they always tested mechanical properties of DRIED bone . The article dealt with bone taken immediately from the slaughter house .That was much stronger and tougher ! BTW leg bones of deer are seven times stronger than cow bones .Makes sense as deer do a lot more jumping than cows and need the extra strength !