Help Me Resurrect an Old Remington

G

GLDNDomer

Joined
Apr 8, 2011
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322
Last summer, I found this broken knife, among other broken Imperials, in the attic of my grandparent's house. I didn't give this one much thought because it is missing a scale, but today I was curious as to the brand. So I used some oil and extra fine steel wool to see the tang stamp, and it turned out to be an old Remington. Since I see quite a bit of talk about these knives, I though I would try to fix it up for a user. I really don't think there is much value left to a collector? So I need some help to find out what I should do to this knife to bring it back to its glory days.

I can just barely make out a faint tang stamp on the pen blade that has "Remington UMC" inside a circle, but my camera isn't that good, so no pictures, sorry.

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So far, I was thinking somehow make a new scale for the other side (out of what??), slightly filing down the tang of the clip blade so that the point seats all the way into the handle, and oiling and using steel wool to take out the rust in the blades. I'm still not quite sure what to do with the small pen blade: leave it as is or sharpen it to a small point? Thanks for any suggestions and advice on what to do with it. Also, if anyone knows what model this is, I would be interested in hearing about its history, its steel or the scale material.
 
Others can tell you about rescaling better than I, as I have only done one. But with the pen, if you don't want to try to replace it, remove metal from the back instead of the edge, and make it a Wharncliffe. That will keep the tip under the scale.

Also, remove a bit of metal from the kick of the clip blade, careful, as it will not take much, to get the tip where you want it.

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Remington was THE premiere working knifemaker in the 20s and 30s. They made the best knives one could buy at a price where he wouldn't be afraid to use it. Their trademark was Remington UMC, or Remington Union Metallic Cartriges IIRC, and they manufactured ammunition along with knives and guns.
Congrats, you found a good knife.
 
I say get rid of the red rust (0000 steel wool), oil it up (Remoil of course), and I have an old broken walnut Remington rifle stock I can slice a bit off of for you to replace the missing scale with. Looks like the intact scale is jigged bone and since it would be difficult to match it well, I think if you went the other direction and contrasted it, it would look great.

For the broken blade, either a wharncliff or a coping blade would be easy, but another option could be a small spey blade. I think if you did a coping blade point you could preserve as much of the patina as possible.

I think it is a wonderful knife and I think it can be made into a very nice knife. If you don't want to do the work yourself, look up Seals on here, he specializes in traditionals.


-Xander
 
good call on the contrasting scales . you could never match them. i'd be interested to see the result.
 
Thank you for your responses. So far I've steel wooled the blades and backsprings, oiled everything, formed the broken pen blade into a sheepsfoot blade, and sharpened the knife. Thank you for the Remington stock offer, xander, (really cool idea by the way) but I've already started working on a new scale with very old wood. The old oak wood was used by my father's grandfather and the old Remington knife was used by my mother's grandfather, so it's going to be a mixture of both my great-grandfathers.
 
Hey GL- sounds like its gonna be back in service for many more years to come. Neat that you found a connection with the material you are using. I am a big fan of up-cycling materials for knives.

Don't forget that we all love pictures here!


-Xander
 
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