Jigged bone?

[L6steel]

How do you jig bone?
I've seen some gorgeous stuff here on the forums but never known how to do and I'm working on a folder that I might need to use the technique on.

Also, anyone know how to do the nuggeting in ti like Dexter did in the knife he made while visiting Darrel Ralph?
Man that was nice!

Thanks up front guys!!
Michael

 

[peter nap]

Michael, I use two sizes of ball end cutters in my dremil. Getting the pattern right is another thing. I almost always am disappointed in my patterns!

 

[Tom Anderson]

This was done with a Dremel Tool® and a small ball end carbide bit.

I "aged" the bone with a propane torch before doing the jigging. After cutting the grooves, I filled them with a very dark brown stain.

 

[peter nap]

Tom, don't you have any fancy knives with bone on them?

Just for the sake of asking, do you have a set way to lay out the patterns or do you just go with the flow?

 

[Tom Anderson]

No set pattern. I just try to get a nice stag look.

That particular knife had stabilized giraffe bone overlays.

Sometimes, even pre-jigged bone can use a little touch-up. Here's one where I added some detail on the edges to match what figure remained after final shaping on the slack belt:

Most of what you see at the bottom edge of this overlay was white when I first sanded the profile.

The trick is to make the touch-ups blend in with the rest of the figure. You might even need to mix the stain colors a little until everything looks like it was meant to be there.

 

[peter nap]

Thanks Tom!