Pin placement/spacing

weo

weo

Joined
Sep 21, 2014
Messages
3,115
Hello all. What's the best way to (or how do y'all) decide where to place and how to space your pins? What makes sense to me is to start with the middle one centered in the belly of the handle, but after that I get a bit lost (and perhaps it's because I have a poor handle design).
It also makes sense to me to space the front an back pins equally.

I want to center the back pin in the belly of the heel, but if I keep the spacing equal then my front pin seems to be too close to the front of the handle.
Then when I make the distance from back pin > butt equal to the distance from the front pin > front of the handle, the middle pin is not centered between the other two, and that looks off.
I then tried moving the middle pin to make it equidistant from the two outer ones (with the back pin centered in the bulge at the butt of the knife) and the middle pin is now not centered in the belly of the grip, and that looks off.

So, how do y'all do this?

Thanks

as always
peace and love
billyO

PS - If it matters, this is on a smaller paring knife with a shorter handle than normal. Maybe that's my poor design.
 
I think that you spacing the pin at the bottom the same as the pin at the top is messing you up. I seriously just place them where it looks right and in the middle of the width of the handle.
 
I just have two things to add. Make sure your final handle profile is right where you want it, other wise if you modify after pinholes are drilled and HT'd they will look off. Ask me how I know that:>(

On a standard handle length say 4.5-5" I seem to like going in 3/4" from the back and front, then equidistant for the center one(s). I also read somewhere in the forum that they should be just above the centerline of the handle which was very helpful (thanks whoever that was), not too far down low if you see what I mean.
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These are maybe 1 pinhole diameter above the centerline. I think they said this because the widest spot of the handle is about there and the handle might normally narrow more as it gets towards the bottom. I do some crude measuring for each knife estimating where the handle front will be, mark the centerline etc.

Edit to add, I got "permission" from someone's post on the forum to drill the steel just oversize. That makes drilling the slabs and inserting the pins sooo much easier. There's more error tolerance that way.

I finish the scale to about 95% profile shape before drilling. First I epoxy one scale to the knife. The way I drill the first installed scale is to use an undersize bit from the backside of the knife (the side without the scale) to minimize splintering as the drill pushes thru the outside of the scale, then drill the full size hole from the outside in towards the steel. Works well for me.

Then when the second scale is epoxied I can drill an undersize bit thru the first scale holes, flip it over and drill the full size bit from the outside of the second scale. I have nearly eliminated the risk of wood chipping out on the outside of the scales, but if they do I've left enough material on the outside to sand out with a belt or whatever.

Caution though...the undersize bits MUST be well centered in the holes or you risk catching steel on the way thru with the full size bits.

When I'm epoxying in the pins I pre-load the oversize "void" in the steel with epoxy on a stick so it's filled up when I push the pin through.

If there's a downside to my method please reply. I'd be pleased to hear other methods on this and I hope my response can help someone. This is a very interesting and important topic to me.
 
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I think this is one of those times that just drawing it out first works best. Your eyes will tell you if it makes sense and looks pleasing or not most of the time, I bet?
 
Here's what I do... I grab my calipers and measure the tallness of the tang. Then, I divide that by two, adjust the calipers to that measurement, and use them along with the top of the tang as a scribe. I get a line going down the whole tang that is roughly in the middle (handles have contours to them, so I just try to average out and find the middle that way. Then, I determine where the front of the scales are going to be on the knife. Again, I grab the calipers, measure out how far from the front of the scales I want the front pin to be, and make an intersecting mark with the centerline. I keep the calipers at that measurement and use it on the back of the tang to scribe a mark for the back pin. This will give me two pin holes that are roughly in the center of the tang, and roughly the same distance from the front and back of the scales. If I want to put a third pin between those two, I just measure the distance between them, and put another mark at the half point between the two.

If you want to put in a hole near a corner, say for a lanyard tube... I grab the calipers, set them to about a quarter inch and then use them along with the sides of the tang to scribe two intersecting lines in the corner. This will correctly space the hole next to the corner so it looks clean.
 
So... you're saying that having an equal distance between the pins is the most important thing?
 
I’ll use calipers to check distance from front the of the scales and the tang end of the scales and mark them when they look good to the eye, then put the middle pin equal distance from both front and rear pin/bolt. If the handle has a lot of curve, I’ll move them a bit by eye. Like the others have said, if it looks good by eye, it doesn’t really matter to me if they’re equal.

Sometimes having them perfectly measured looks bad.
 
weo,

Can you post a picture of your knife/handle? Some of pin placement is practical (too close to an edge may result in cracking, etc) some of it is aesthetic taste ( should I center it between the outer pins or place it in the center of the belly?). Sometimes you have to think outside the box a little. If you have determined where you want the front and back pins to be but the center pin is giving you fits, perhaps adding a fourth or even a fifth pin may solve the problem. It may be more pins than you need to physically hold the handle in place (and more work) but by adding pins you change the spacing so that they fall where your eye wants them. Or maybe you hide one or more pins. Maybe you have the center pin going all the way through, centered in the belly, but the front and back pins are hidden, or vice versa. Play with it a bit.
 
i4Marc said:
Sometimes you have to think outside the box a little. ... It may be more pins than you need to physically hold the handle in place (and more work)
Click to expand...

Ahhh...Thank you Marc. I believe this is the solution. Being a paring knife that will not see a lot of abuse coupled with a shorter handle, I think 2 pins should be adequate.

I thank everyone for their input.

~billyO
 
I usually do my rear pin first, then front pin. I don't worry too much if they are exactly the same distance from the scale. I go with what looks right to me. I then locate the third pin in between them. I also drill holes in my more used (made of luan) templates. So I can punch pin holes with the template consistently.
 
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