Mortised tang w/o guard using drill press?

Chiro75

Chiro75

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Feb 4, 1999
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Time to try a mortised tang. I have Terry Primos' excellent tutorial and it all makes sense. A couple questions:
1) I;m thinking I can do a mortised tang without a guard, but just sort of take some material out of the handle toward the front and make a sort of pseudo-guard out of the handle material itself (probably Micarta). Sound okay?

2) How bad will it be for me to try this on a drill press instead of an actual mill? My drill press is el-cheapo Asian, and I assume I could just set the depth thingies and let 'er rip. What kind of bit/end mill tool would I want to use for this? I'm pretty sure I'll use linen or canvas Micarta. I figure I can rough in the shape, but depth of the mortise will be more important, then clean up the edges to get a good fit.
 
I do it on a drill press, however I always have a guard on the knife. I haven't been able to control it enough to get the clean fit that you are looking for. I have a router bit, and I clamp a piece of barstock for a fence, but the material will still jump around quite a bit. If you do have a guard on the knife, it will cover up any mess you make on the depth or width of the cut. Good luck.
 
If you drill it undersized, then hand fit it using a file, there should be no problem. Time consuming, yes.
 
I use a dremel moto tool in a contraption that dremel makes to basically try and turn it into a drill press. It clamps the dremel vertically and has a little table that you can adjust to bring the work into contact with the stationary moto tool. I use a dremel bit that is cylindrical and has teeth on the flat bottom as well as the sides. Works great.
Ed
 
Chiro75 said:
Time to try a mortised tang. I have Terry Primos' excellent tutorial and it all makes sense. A couple questions:
1) I;m thinking I can do a mortised tang without a guard, but just sort of take some material out of the handle toward the front and make a sort of pseudo-guard out of the handle material itself (probably Micarta). Sound okay?

2) How bad will it be for me to try this on a drill press instead of an actual mill? My drill press is el-cheapo Asian, and I assume I could just set the depth thingies and let 'er rip. What kind of bit/end mill tool would I want to use for this? I'm pretty sure I'll use linen or canvas Micarta. I figure I can rough in the shape, but depth of the mortise will be more important, then clean up the edges to get a good fit.
Click to expand...

Here is the way I have ben doing it and I don't use a guard.

First you need two pieces of identical width stock. The long sides must be paralell.

You need a fence on your drill press table that you can move in small incraments.

You need a center cutting end mill at least 1/2 half the width of your mortise.

You need a dremmel high speed cutter, HSS steel. The straight cutter 5/16 dia.

Scribe the tang location on one of your handle slabs
Chuck the end mill into your drill press and line up the mill just shy of the scribed line. Set your depth stop and use the end mill to just bore into the face of the handle slab. Don't try to push it like a mill.

make a row of overlapping holes down one side. Do the other piece the same way. Move your fence and bore holes along the other scribe line. Do the other handle slab the same way.

Now chuck the dremmel bit in to your press and set the speed at the highest setting.

Raise the table till the bit touches the bottom of the rough trough you just cut

Adjust your fence till the cutter is taking a small amount of material off at the scribed line.

Slowly pass each piece along the cutter before adjusting the fence. Stop when you reach the scribed line and adjust the fence to true up the other side of the mortise.

Fit the blade, remove small amounts of material till the tang will slide free without ratteling.



remember, everything you do to one handle slab must be repeated on the other before any adjustments are made to the machine.
 
Wayne Goddard's video, in addition to providing good info on forgwelding cable "damascus," has a useful section that details this very topic. He uses a Dremel, and very thoroughly outlines his process.

John Frankl
 
Based on the tutorials and this info, it should be "no problem" for me to do it if I get an end mill. Thanks for the tips! I know that my drill press table is not centered, though, and I don't think it ever will be. Plus it sounds like I need to add a sliding axis vice or whatever those things are called, which may be more of an investment than I want to mess with right now for a trial run at one of these. If I give it a shot on my equipment I will take pics and come up with a cheap man's tutorial on mortises! :D
 
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