Question for Wood Handled Knife Lovers - Does this bother you?

My wood handled ones do tend to get a get oil rub now and again. I think it is mostly because that little coat of mineral oil or vegetable oil really makes that handle shine up nicely. Also, while I'm at it might as well coat the blade too.

Mind you, I'm not doing this constantly, but routine maintenance on my knives are pretty regular. I'm always fiddling and sharpening the darn things so putting a light oil coat isn't much of a hassle.

Hey - a little bit of an aside - but I just picked up a tube of Flitz metal polisher at the hardware store. Holy crap - that stuff works beautiful at shining up a blade. Won't remove scratches, but takes the dull (or will easily remove patina if you want to) and turns it bright and shiny. Also the water beads off of the blade after you soap wash the polish off of it. Great product for the facetious folks out there!
 
This is an age-old problem. One customer of mine years ago (like... 1980) related an incident in which he was in a bad place (like... a jungle getting shot at) and his knife handle broke and he was left with a full tang with razor sharp edges that could scarcely even be used til he was able to wrap a rag and some tape around it. Therefore he insisted that all the knives I made for him had the tangs rounded off UNDER the scales. Took me a while to figure this one out! But I started profiling the handle with the scales just held on by bolts, then I'd take it apart, slack-belt the edges of the tang, finish the scale separately, and then finally glue them up. This left a little seam or groove at the junction of the tang and scale, but it was not at all unsightly and it allowed for some wood shrinkage and movement to take place without becoming a problem. I ended up doing it that way on all my full tang knives, even the ones with micarta. It's something I probably never would have thought of if the customer had not encountered the sharp-tang problem.
 
Get the moisture down to around 9% before you glue up the knife will help a lot.
use wood that has been stored in a dry environment for a year or so will help get the moisture down.
 
I think this is common and happens to more or less any wood that isn't stabilized.

Most materials will behave differently to heat, cold and moisture so unless the knife is a one piece steel knife you will see some movement.

Wood does shrink and swell a bit so this will happen to a larger or smaller extent with any wood handled knife.

This isn't saying I like it;) I really dislike it:grumpy:, but my only full tang knives with unstabilized wood handles are lignum vitae and that moves very little.

Sverre
 
tmaring said:
...he insisted that all the knives I made for him had the tangs rounded off UNDER the scales...
Click to expand...

That's an interesting solution!

I asked about this in the maker's forum and so far they've all said "just use stabilized wood."
 
Tom, I do a similar thing with all of my full tang knives. I profile with temporary pins or bolts then I hit all the edges of the tang and handle slabs on the buffer to soften the edges. It works real nice. I've found that having a little bit of a line show all the time is way better than a gap and sharp edge that show up every winter.


I've noticed shrinkage in micarta and g10 both. It's not nearly as much as with wood and it mostly depends on temperature instead of humidity but it is there all the same.

There is nothing you can do to stop wood from shrinking and swelling with changes in humidity. You can slow it down with oils or stabilization but you will never stop it completely. You just have to learn to design around the material you use. In my cabinet shop I have sample boards hanging on the wall that I measure at different times of the year. If the board is 12 inches wide in December and 12 1/8 in July and 12 1/16 now I know I need to account for 1/16 movement in either direction when I design my furniture.
 
Significant scale shrinkage bothers me quite a bit. All non stabilized wood will move over time but the movement can be minimized by properly seasoning the wood prior to shaping it into scales. When a maker or company does not take the appropriate measures to ensure that the moisture content of the wood is acceptable it makes me question the thought and time that went into the rest of the knife. I am well aware that things happen and I don't hold it against a maker if the occasional problem knife slips by, but when it becomes a frequent problem I stop buying their products and warn my friends to do so as well.
 
One thing that I don't think has been mentioned yet is that the right moisture content for your environment might be totally different than the right content at the makers shop. If a guy in Georgia makes a knife and sends it to a guy in Colorado that knife is going to have problems. While the wood might never get below 8% in the humid area it was made, no matter how long it is seasoned, after a couple of months in the dry air of the rockies it will drop down to 3-4% and shrinkage will result.
 
Jason Magruder said:
Tom, I do a similar thing with all of my full tang knives. I profile with temporary pins or bolts then I hit all the edges of the tang and handle slabs on the buffer to soften the edges. It works real nice. I've found that having a little bit of a line show all the time is way better than a gap and sharp edge that show up every winter.....
Click to expand...

Yes, personally I think the design solution is best. As Jason noted you'll never EVER get perfect stability in wood or any porous substance. So you use a design solution to accommodate the instability. PROBLEM SOLVED. We didn't invent this by the way... I've seen it on early Loveless pieces, and even on 19th century French knives so it's nothing really new. I think the main thing is that most people don't want to bother... they just want to slap some scales on there and profile it down and ship it out and be done with it! It takes more time and more thought and more effort to deal with such issues. If buyers don't care then makers won't care either. I was dragged into this kicking and screaming (well... moaning anyway)... but it's been worth it.
 
tmaring said:
As Jason noted you'll never EVER get perfect stability in wood or any porous substance. So you use a design solution to accommodate the instability. PROBLEM SOLVED.
Click to expand...

Well said, sir. To my mind, the issue is put to rest... if you insist on an oiled-wood finish, be willing to deal with the inherent characteristics of the material, or utilize the design techniques Tom and Jason explained, to minimize the effects. If you prefer a more stable substance, ask for it. If you want a perfect knife that will never ever shrink, corrode, or "fail" in any conceivable way, get off your butt and build it... the world will beat a path to your door :D

Not to open a can of worms, but the more I think about it, the more it reminds me of the stainless-vs-carbon steel argument. Different strokes for different folks.
 
There should NEVER be an issue of rust underneath the handle. It's just not that difficult to prevent.

The tang MUST be sealed with some sort of water-resistant adhesive or coating. On a permanent-scale full-tang knife, the scales should be affixed with a water-resistant adhesive, regardless of the pins/bolts used. On a knife with removeable/replaceable scales, the tang should be coated somehow or else be made of a highly corrosion-resistant steel to begin with. On a hidden-tang, it must still be coated or "glued" somehow to prevent moisture building up inside the handle and affecting the steel. "Take-down" handles must address this issue as well.

This is a very basic thing you should be able to count on from any reputable maker or manufacturer. In this day and age, with the vast array of quality materials available, there's NO excuse for a tang rusting away. None.
 
My father was an engineer and I grew up to be really bothered by things like that. That said, unless the shrinkage impacted comfort and function, I would probably just continue using it.

DancesWithKnives
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top