I'm glad to see guys are recognizing the need to compensate for the taper. I can't tell you how many makers have posted on here and told me in person, that it doesn't matter.
I gotta say though, the trouble caused by avoiding a fixture... that is to mess around with various methods getting the centerline back to perpendicular to the spindle... sounds like a lot more headache that just making a simple fixture. Especially when you consider the fixture is something that will last until you quit making knives.
Even more importantly, the other methods pretty much require you to be using scales of uniform thickness. What the heck do you do if you want to use stag, jigged bone, sheep horn, ivory, etc. -----
that aren't flat anywhere other than on the tang side? Or even wood scales that aren't perfectly uniform and you don't want to have to make them that way prior to handle drilling/shaping?
This is my little fixture. It's dirt simple. I made it when I was about 20, and barely knew how to drill and tap a hole. It's a little taller than it needs to be, but as it turns out I'm glad--- it allows me to put bigger clamps on the scales if I need to.
Conveniently, it works just as well for drilling through hidden tang handles.
Ben, I know what you said about a small drill press, but this fixture will fit on my tiny little $50 HF drill press just as well as the bigger ones.
An alternative is to clamp a nice and heavy, STOUT square or rectangular piece of barstock to the drill press table with a few inches overhanging the edge. Then clamp the blade onto that bar at the ricasso area. Of course you have to swing the table to one side and do some maneuvering to get everything lined up, but it works.
This, to me, is a prime example of one of those things where you can stop what you're doing for an hour or two, make a jig or fixture that will forever make a step simple and repeatable instead of fighting it for years.
