loosde leather washers

[deltablade]

I have a new Cooper knife with a leather washer handle. The washers are slightly loose. Yet the pommel nut has been ground flat. Is there any treatment I could apply to the handle to tighten up the washers?

 

[CShepherd]

Any kind of treatment that would make the handles swell might work a bit. One thing to try is to wet the handle, then let it dry slowly. Sometimes this can make the leather swell a bit and it will usually not shrink that much when drying unless heat is added.

Hopefully someone else with have a better solution. One other possibility would be to treat it with some sort of epoxy, basically glue it to make it rigid.

Charles

 

[Tanguay Custom Knives]

I've refurbed alot of older knives where the handle has shrunk. Recently I had a knife with a similar situation. I was able to make a thin black kydex spacer and tap it into place where it fit in the original spacer pattern.

I made it donut shaped, then removed one third so it could slide over the tang. I roughed it up, coated it with epoxy, tapped it into place, then tapped in the remaing 1/3 piece (also coated in epoxy) and wiped it clean. The next day I sanded it down and oiled the leather with neatsfoot oil. It looked as good as new. You couldn't tell where I had spliced the spacer together. It all blended right in and tightened everything up nicely. Hope this helps,
Scott

 

[CShepherd]

I've refurbed alot of older knives where the handle has shrunk. Recently I had a knife with a similar situation. I was able to make a thin black kydex spacer and tap it into place where it fit in the original spacer pattern.

I made it donut shaped, then removed one third so it could slide over the tang. I roughed it up, coated it with epoxy, tapped it into place, then tapped in the remaing 1/3 piece (also coated in epoxy) and wiped it clean. The next day I sanded it down and oiled the leather with neatsfoot oil. It looked as good as new. You couldn't tell where I had spliced the spacer together. It all blended right in and tightened everything up nicely. Hope this helps,
Scott

That's an awesome idea. Have to remember that one.

Thanks for sharing.

Charles