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- Aug 16, 2008
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It was more of an experiment. I got some Desert Camo and Desert Tan 550 cord. I also wanted to experiement with mushrooming the ends to secure the cord to the knife.
I used the Desert Camo first and it came out nice. But here is what I learned doing this:
1) I think I prefer solid 550 colors so I will re-do this wrap with the Desert Tan this week. The multi-colors of the Camo looks a little busy for me.
2) The mushrooming ends with a lighter works awesome. If you look at the pictures you'll see one bead is rough and concave while the other is rounded and shiny smooth.
The best way I found to do the mushroom is to cut the cord about 1/4" too long while pressing the cord between your thumb and knife handle on the opposite side to retain the cord tension. Then hold the knife either edge up or edge down and light the cord end with a lighter until it's burning on it's own. Watch the bead burn until it's just touching the steel then blow the flame out and don't touch the bead until it hardens. You may need to keep holding the lighter to the bead to keep it going. I even turned the knife so the bead was upside down until it was well shapped and up against the steel then blew out the flame. The result is that clean, rounded and shiny bead you see. The other bead was messed up because I experimented with pressing on the soft bead with some rounded steel. I wasn't sure how it would come out but it's impossiblke to keep the bead clean looking. I then resorted to a soldering iron to try and make it look better but it was never going to look as good as the untouched bead next to it.
I can say for sure that this is the tightest wrap job I have evern been able to obtain using the technique I just described. I can barely make the wraps move with my thumbnail right now. Super tight.
Here are some pictures:
I used the Desert Camo first and it came out nice. But here is what I learned doing this:
1) I think I prefer solid 550 colors so I will re-do this wrap with the Desert Tan this week. The multi-colors of the Camo looks a little busy for me.
2) The mushrooming ends with a lighter works awesome. If you look at the pictures you'll see one bead is rough and concave while the other is rounded and shiny smooth.
The best way I found to do the mushroom is to cut the cord about 1/4" too long while pressing the cord between your thumb and knife handle on the opposite side to retain the cord tension. Then hold the knife either edge up or edge down and light the cord end with a lighter until it's burning on it's own. Watch the bead burn until it's just touching the steel then blow the flame out and don't touch the bead until it hardens. You may need to keep holding the lighter to the bead to keep it going. I even turned the knife so the bead was upside down until it was well shapped and up against the steel then blew out the flame. The result is that clean, rounded and shiny bead you see. The other bead was messed up because I experimented with pressing on the soft bead with some rounded steel. I wasn't sure how it would come out but it's impossiblke to keep the bead clean looking. I then resorted to a soldering iron to try and make it look better but it was never going to look as good as the untouched bead next to it.
I can say for sure that this is the tightest wrap job I have evern been able to obtain using the technique I just described. I can barely make the wraps move with my thumbnail right now. Super tight.
Here are some pictures:
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My memory(or lack there of) is a constant source of amusment to those around me.
and I didn't strip the cord . . .
