Schrade SCHF3N project, need help with reattaching micarta scales

[Undergoose]

Hi everyone!

I've just recently started getting into camp/bushcraft/survival knives, and one of the first ones I bought was the Schrade SCHF3N.

I know the steel isn't the best, the shape isn't the best, but I wanted something cheap and big to play with while I learned the ropes, so on a whim, I ordered one from Amazon.

First thing I noticed was how ridiculously 'round' the handle felt in my hand. I have pretty large hands, but they're kinda pudgy. (the same reason I choose S&W M+P pistols over Glock).

When I got the knife, I noticed there was a tiny gap between the micarta scales and the tang on the pommel side. I could squeeze the scales by hand and watch the gap disappear. I figured that the issue could be solved by just tightening the hex bolts. WRONG! lol

It seems, that while Schrade upgraded the older 440 blades to 8Cr13MoV, they're still using an extremely shallow, odd-sized hex screw to attach the scales.

I used every SAE and metric allen wrench I have to try to tighten the bolts that go through the tang. all I managed to do was strip them without making any progress on tightening the scales.

I've since ordered at least a dozen other brands of knives, all of which had decent allen/torx bolts holding the scales on, and I've removed them with no issues at all, just to inspect the construction and get familiar with the modern day knives available.

[hitting the 'submit' button to make sure I'm not wasting a bunch of time, more to come]

 

[Undergoose]

Woohoo! Okay, so I've figured out the 'submit' button.

Back to the micarta handles with those silly grooves, the first thing I did was to file the scales down to the bolts, thinning them out and getting rid of the grooves. I did this not only to get rid of the broomstick feel of the knife, but also to rough up the factory-polished micarta. I like the feel of the roughened canvas layers vs. the buffed/shiny resin feel of the knife out of the box.

After filing the the grooves down while watching some netflix and enjoying myself, I noticed that I was starting to wear into the black finish of the stock (and stripped) scale hex bolts. The handle feels MUCH better in my hand, but the gap between the scales and the tang really bothers me.

While trying to tighten the bolts/screws holding the scales to the tang, as I mentioned before, I stripped those things without hardly any force applied to the shallow hex inserts. It felt like they were made out of lead instead of something useful, like steel.

So...I bit the bullet. I drilled out the soft pot-metal bolts holding the scales to the tang.

What I found underneath was like a 3rd-world edition of thinned epoxy not only holding one side of the micarta scales on, but also liberally applied through the bolt holes, which explains why the bolts felt sort of 'stuck'.

[again with the 'submit' button, more info to come, with pics this time.]

 

[Undergoose]

Now that I'm really familiar with this knife after disassembly, here's my plan:

1) strip the black coating off of the whole thing, which doesn't feel much more robust than black spray paint anyhow
2) shape the micarta handles even more (filing/sanding them while they were still attached to the knife sort of limited my options). I want to remove the 'edge' around the lanyard hole at the rear...that area really bites into my hand while I'm playing with holding the knife upside-down or 3-fingering it for chopping and such
3) deepen the countersink of the scale bolts (I'm not really sure what those bolts are called) by about 1/16"
4) replace the now-drilled-out stock scale bolts with something real (this is something I need help with from you knife geeks, as I have no idea where to get new ones)
5) polish the entire blade after stripping. Since mine has the stamped 'SCHRADE' logo, I think it will look great to leave that kind of rough in the letters and let it patina over time as it gathers rust/grime/blackness.
6) Adjust the gimping on the thumb ramp, since it's exposed beyond the profile of the micarta scales. The grooves are like 3/8" apart, and rounded over, so they're next to useless.
7) ream out the lanyard hole at the pommel, the edges of the hole are kind of sharp, I can see that causing issues later.
8) I might round off the 'breaker' point of the tang at the pommel. I've spent 46 years on this planet without having to bust out a tempered glass window under pressure, but I've pounded in a LOT of tent stakes and hammered walnuts open with my previous knives. A flat tang pommel extrusion seems more valuable to me than a pointed skull-crusher.

[again, more to come, this time with pics, I promise...]

 

[Undergoose]

so, here's what I currently have:

(since I couldn't get the scales off of the knife when I first got it, I still made it scary sharp. the 6 layers of blue tape allows me to do extensive work with the blade without ending up needing stitches after a couple of drinks. )

I think in the picture you can see the residual 'goop' on the tang under the scales where they wimped out and went for the cheap fix on the structure.

 

[Undergoose]

My question for the forum is where do I get some decent replacement bolts for the ones I drilled out?

The length on the 'bushing' part (the insert where you screw in the opposing hex screw) is roughly 5/8".

The holes through the tang are just shy of 7/32".

The outer hole (where the heads of the screws go) in the micarta is 3/8".

I'm looking for 1/2" length on my replacement screw inserts through the scales and tang. I don't care if they're Torx or hex.

Where can I get something like that?

Again, thanks for reading this far, and I appreciate the responses.

 

[Undergoose]

Also, of note, while the heads of both the insert side and the screw side of these scale bolts is tapered, I can easily mill out the holes in the micarta to accept a square-shouldered screw/bolt.