Help! Wooden sheath too tight!

Patrice Lemée

Patrice Lemée

Joined
Aug 13, 2002
Messages
5,703
The fit for my khukuri's sheath was a little tight but I thought that when I glued it, the small thickness of glue would make it perfect...WRONG! :( Made it worst and now it is not too tight. :(

I already have many hours invested in it and would like to salvage it if possible.

Any miraculous way to do that other than gluing sandpaper to a thin piece of steel to try and sand the inside?
 
Depending on the type of glue you used, you can try steaming it. should loosen the glue... again it's dependent oh the type of glue.
 
Steaming will also swell the wood.
Insted of sandpaper glued to steel, why not use a file?
 
I wouldn't put any sandpaper in there if I could help it. I would think there would be a risk of leaving grit behind that would scratch the blade in use. Then you'd really be mad.

What kind of glue did you use?
 
Don't use sandpaper as Nathan said. If you can identify where the contact is that is causing the problem you might be able to scrape a little bit of wood out using a hacksaw blade or part of an old bandsaw blade with the end ground to a chisel. This will naturally catch on any high spots. A slight bend on the end of the hacksaw/bandsaw blade will make the chisel end engage a little bit better if necessary. If the contact area(s) are too large for this you can either try to take the sheath apart or sand the blade down a fuzz. You could also take a cheap file and if necessary grind it thinner from one side to make it slim enough to reach the areas you need to adjust. Wish I had a better answer, the hacksaw blade trick has worked for me but it's a tedious problem either way.

Coating the blade with paste wax and then inserting it repeatedly into the sheath (after it dries) can help identify the areas where you have unwanted or too much contact. The wax will rub off those areas and make them somewhat visible on the blade, then use a flashlight to look into the sheath and identify the corresponding surface inside.

I have seen a couple of cases where the glue squeezes out of the joint on the inside and causes unwanted friction, if you're really lucky this might the problem in your case. Running a tool of some sort down the inside of the joint can't hurt. Make sure whatever you put into the sheath is clean though, once you get unwanted particles in there they can be damn hard to get back out.
 
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Take a piece of mild steel cut in the shape of the blade. Use the grinder to cut notches at the high points (where the real blade would tend to come into contact with the sheath) and make what amounts to a full size broach. Run it in and out of the sheath a few times. Assuming that the problem is along the lines where you glued it, that might help clear the problem.
 
See, that's why I would be in real doodoo without you guys. :o It never occurred to me about leaving grit in there to mar the blade. :(
Thanks for all the tips.

I used Titebond 3 wood glue.
 
I would use a bar of steel with a raised "bump" to "burnish" in inside of the sheath. Essentially, you are compressing the wood into submission. You may want to throw a couple clamps over the sheath so it doesn't split.
 

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Small update. I tried the burnishing idea and the wood was too hard and it was too tight for it to work. It did work a little though so it is a good option when only a small adjustment is needed.
I ended up ripping it open (it is made of plywood so it de-laminated), sanding what I needed and gluing it back together making sure there was no grit or nothing left in there.

Thanks again for your help.
 
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