HELP! Pinning elephant ivory scales on a slipjoint

J

John L

Joined
Oct 28, 2004
Messages
1,330
Well.. the title says it all. I have no problem pinning mammoth, walrus, and other ivories. Elephant ivlory baffles me. It seems no matter how gentle I am with the peining I end up with tiny splits around a couple of pins. The length of the splits are only 1/16 or so, but they are infuriating and ....well. .quite expensive! Any thoughts here from ele ivory workers? I heard once that some soak in mineral oil overnight before working but this seems that it would change coloring and not allow the glue to take hold either. Hmmmmmm?Thanks
 
I've done several frame handled knives with ivory, no folders, so this is just my two cents. I soak in mineral oil for days, before and after pre grinding to shape. Do not let the ivory get even warm to the touch when grinding. I don't use glue. I will ream the hole with a tapered reamer and use pure silver wire from Rio Grande, it peins like butter. I've done two different types of pins, one is flush and the other is domed. I prefer the domed structurally and visually.
 
Take a look at Tony Bose's Backpocket Construction WIP, which has elephant ivory scales, so you can see how he deals with it: http://boseknives.com/backpocket-construction/ - basically he glues and clamps the scales for a while to give them a little more stability, taper reams the pin holes, then uses soft pins (IIRC 316, but you could also use nickel silver (easy to anneal)), and then carefully peens and looks with a magnifier several times - basically he's looking to just fill the holes and then stop.

A soak in lemon oil works very well too. And as mentioned - absolutely no heat -- you might even want to take pins down with a file to begin with to minimize grinding (pins get hot with grinding - especially stainless ones).
 
There is no reason to put oil on ivory. It does not permeate the surface.
Using domed pins similar to nails can minimize cracking, but if a piece of ivory wants to crack-it will.
 
Hengelo_77 said:
If the silver pins are that soft, are they strong enough to hold the scales in place?
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When I use the term like butter it's in comparison to NS and SS. The silver is plenty strong and so far haven't had any complaints. Understand that the knives that that I'm using these on are art knives and will most likely see little use, although I did have one customer take it gator hunting.
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/mike_quesenberry/4834809736/] DSC_0013 by Mike Quesenberry, on Flickr[/URL]

[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/mike_quesenberry/4834194517/] DSC_0002 by Mike Quesenberry, on Flickr[/URL]
 
John L said:
It seems no matter how gentle I am with the peining I end up with tiny splits around a couple of pins. The length of the splits are only 1/16 or so, but they are infuriating and ....well. .quite expensive! Hmmmmmm?Thanks
Click to expand...

John,

I am willing to bet your getting the pins hot when working them down to the surface of the Ivory. I spoke with Tony B. on the phone a few years back as I was having the same problem. He gave me a hint that helps me most of the time when halfting in Ivory. He told me that if you can not hold the pin up to your lips you have already gotten it too hot. Some makers I have talked to will file the peened pin down to the surface to keep from over heating.

heatcheck.jpg


This is a picture of what I call a "heat check", caused by heat, not the wedging affect of a pin peened to hard.
 
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Ken: That is exactly what I am getting. Heat...oh man oh man. I going to tape my lips to that sucker from now on! It is funny as a man was here at my home today and bought a few knives and I was lamenting the fact that I had 4-5 ivory hafted knives but they all had a split or two near the pins. Now I also had 4-5 that did not have any splits......so go figure. I will file flush from now on. Thanks very much and I will let you know how it goes as I have a ton of ele ivory. You duh man!
 
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