timcsaw
Gold Member
- Joined
- Sep 25, 2007
- Messages
- 21,442
I just finished this one the other day... It's my first try at a fixed blade build;
It's Brass, white tail deer antler, leather wrap, ironwood, and the crown coin is a Sacajawea dollar (so the knife is worth at least a buck (pun intended)).
I bought the blank which came with the brass front guard. The guard was originally cut to fit about an inch further back on the blade, thus showing about a one inch ricasso(?) forward of the guard (I think that's what it's called?).
As originally designed, the forward guard would have been at right angles to the blade, but I wanted to have it angled a bit so I re-worked it to do so.
The rear brass guard and addl. ring, believe it or not, are made from a solid brass door hinge from my local hardware. The wood is Ironwood.
I didn't want to sand down the antler at the second guard, or after the last brass ring, so I drilled and inserted a piece of dowel in front of the 2nd guard, and in front of the horn crown, and then tightly twisted some rawhide shoelace to create the wraps and make a better transition between the horn and guard/crown. I then "painted" the wraps with super-glue to firm and darken them up.
As I've built it, I can pop off the Sacajawea coin and disassemble it completely. I did this because I understand that antler can/will possible shrink some over time (even though I "stabilized" it) and I may need to tighten things up some day.
It was a fun build, other than the smell!
Yes, now my workshop smells like a dentist office (why didn't anyone tell me working with horn stinks?). Yes, I wore a respirator!
(I bought the blank... as I can't do steel myself
).
ON EDIT: I found a product in my shop that I stumbled on, which I found kind of useful. I'll find the name and edit this... Essentially, it's a liquid, black, rubber material that is designed to create rubberized, non-slip coverings on tools... such as a pair of pliers, dikes, etc. You dip the handle into the material a number of times and it creates a rubberized covering over the handle. Since my file-work on the front guard sucked... and didn't fit very tightly to the blade, I used some of this liquid rubber to fill the gaps between the guard and blade to hide my poor workmanship. It did a real nice job. I can see many uses for it in the future (I thought about filling the void inside the antler with it for example, but chose not to to ensure that I could easily disassemble the knife. Maybe there is a real "knife makers" material out there to do the same thing, but I don't know so I "Macgyver'd" it and used what I had... hence the brass door hinge and rawhide shoelace as well.
I'm new at this and just proceed by feel and intuition, so if any of you 'ol timers' can offer any advice/constructive criticisms, they would be very welcomed and appreciated!!
It's Brass, white tail deer antler, leather wrap, ironwood, and the crown coin is a Sacajawea dollar (so the knife is worth at least a buck (pun intended)).

I bought the blank which came with the brass front guard. The guard was originally cut to fit about an inch further back on the blade, thus showing about a one inch ricasso(?) forward of the guard (I think that's what it's called?).
As originally designed, the forward guard would have been at right angles to the blade, but I wanted to have it angled a bit so I re-worked it to do so.
The rear brass guard and addl. ring, believe it or not, are made from a solid brass door hinge from my local hardware. The wood is Ironwood.
I didn't want to sand down the antler at the second guard, or after the last brass ring, so I drilled and inserted a piece of dowel in front of the 2nd guard, and in front of the horn crown, and then tightly twisted some rawhide shoelace to create the wraps and make a better transition between the horn and guard/crown. I then "painted" the wraps with super-glue to firm and darken them up.
As I've built it, I can pop off the Sacajawea coin and disassemble it completely. I did this because I understand that antler can/will possible shrink some over time (even though I "stabilized" it) and I may need to tighten things up some day.
It was a fun build, other than the smell!

Yes, now my workshop smells like a dentist office (why didn't anyone tell me working with horn stinks?). Yes, I wore a respirator!

(I bought the blank... as I can't do steel myself

ON EDIT: I found a product in my shop that I stumbled on, which I found kind of useful. I'll find the name and edit this... Essentially, it's a liquid, black, rubber material that is designed to create rubberized, non-slip coverings on tools... such as a pair of pliers, dikes, etc. You dip the handle into the material a number of times and it creates a rubberized covering over the handle. Since my file-work on the front guard sucked... and didn't fit very tightly to the blade, I used some of this liquid rubber to fill the gaps between the guard and blade to hide my poor workmanship. It did a real nice job. I can see many uses for it in the future (I thought about filling the void inside the antler with it for example, but chose not to to ensure that I could easily disassemble the knife. Maybe there is a real "knife makers" material out there to do the same thing, but I don't know so I "Macgyver'd" it and used what I had... hence the brass door hinge and rawhide shoelace as well.

I'm new at this and just proceed by feel and intuition, so if any of you 'ol timers' can offer any advice/constructive criticisms, they would be very welcomed and appreciated!!
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