Necessary to remove finish?

t1mpani

t1mpani

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Jun 6, 2002
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I'm doing a bunch of rehandling projects for some friends of mine (was doing one, made the mistake of mentioning it at a card game...) and have a quick question.

One of them is just an old beater machete that I'm pairing down a little for comfort, but there was a lot of gunk between the wooden handle scales and the tang which had rusted the screws to the point that I broke one of them trying to get it off. All of that is cleaned out now and I have new screws that will work going back in, but I wanted to go ahead and do an epoxy bond between the scales and tang so that the problem isn't repeated. The blade/tang is coated with some sort of baked-on enamel paint; largely worn off at the business end, but pretty much completely intact on the tang. Now I know that roughing a metal surface is the way to get a good epoxy bond to it, but was wondering---is there any reason to remove the coating that's already on the steel? Might the epoxy just bond easily with that instead taking it down to bare metal?

Anyway, was just a thought. If it's a stupid one, please let me know. :D
 
Not a stupid question at all. The question is : "how much faith do you have in the bond of the coating done by a third party?". Also you dont know what the material is so you dont know how well your epoxy will bond to it.

Personally I would scrape it away for peace of mind. One bonded surface is better than two.

Lang
 
I don't think your epoxy will bond as well to the coating, actually, it may scrape right off. Since you're using screws, however, the question becomes does it really matter? If you're just trying to get a good water seal I think it will do just fine, if you're trying to really add strength it may be necessary to remove the coating.

Since the coating is worn on the blade anyways, why not clean it up and re-coat with something or just put a nice even patina on the bare blade?
 
warren
grind it off then use acri glass epoxy to re attach it .use many c clamp's
if you leave the coating on it could keep the epoxy from holding properly .
 
Yeah, kind of the direction I was thinking but the lazy side of me demanded a shot at not having to actually do work. :D When I get home, I guess it'll be time to pull out the coarse belts.

Many thanks, guys. :)
 
I think you new the answer all along. You sound like me, always trying to take the easy way.:) :) :)
 
Hey, the easy way has its benefits, in some cases. Those cases tend to be few and far between, but it's still always worth checking. :D
 
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