tang help

C

cory

Joined
Dec 23, 2001
Messages
63
I have a nice blade going with 5160 steel. It has about 1- 1 1/4" stub tang. I have the guard soldered on. I soldered the guard because after I weld my bolt on for the tang you get the picture. I had a heck of a time the other day. I tried brazing a bolt stub to it. did not work so I wire welded it. During the constant heatings I kept quenching the tang in water to keep guard intact. I think I inadvertently hardened the 5160 portion of the tang. It ended up breaking during the heating and bending to fit my stag and it had a fine grain. The tang was not hardened originally.So I wire welded the 5160 back together and ended up with several yucky welds that seemed fairly strong. At home I was trying one last bend for fit without the aid of a oxy torch and the 5160 weld broke. So I have a little over an inch of stub. Originally I tried submerging the blade in water while I welded to keep guard cool but I got nervous about the safety of a 220 welder grounded so close to a bucket of water. Bottom line is , what do I do, scrap the blade and make the rest with longer tangs to begin with or what. I do have a couple of sticks of silver braze and tried it one other time but it did not seem strong at all. The silver braze I got is not flux covered just silver flat sticks. Should I just save myself alot of headache and start over from scratch guys? I do not think I will ever make a short stub tang again. It is not worth it. Too much trouble. Cory
 
You can pin a split bolt on or you can silver braze. I much prefer the braze method. Try to get everything linned up like you want it before brazeing. I wrap a soaking wet rag around the gaurd to keep it cool.

You realy need eigther flux coated rods or a can of welding flux. It's availble at most welding shops. I get my silver braze from Lowes, it has a blue flux coating.

I wouldn't recomend welding any high carbon steel. The heat necisary can cause weak grain structure and in the case of 5160, 52100 and O-1, can air harden on you. Not saying it can't be done, just that it can be extreamly difficult to get a good strong weld, then you need multiple normalizing on top of that. Not worth the effort for me.

You might want to pratice on a piece of scrap to get a feel for brazeing.

You also might want to remove your gard and give the tang and ricasso area a soft back treatment to releave any stress from the welding atempts depending on how far the harding went up the tang. You can check with a file to find out if this is necasary.

From your description, it sounded like you were butting the bolt up to the tang, if so, try spliting the bolt and removing part of the center so that the bolt 'ears' can slide up on the tang.

By no means scrap the blade, if nothing else, test to destruction, then save for making damascus.;)

Good luck, I hope this helps. Maybe some of the other knife makers here can offer other suggestions.

William
 
Will has about hit it on the head for you Cory.I always taper the very end of the tang like a wedge and then make a wedge cutout on the end of the olt then silver braze,I have bent many threaded rods for tangs with this tecnique and haven't broke any except the one time I tried end butting the two together.One thing I do is slide the guard in place then attach the rod then I solder the guardin place thus I don't mess up my solder joint if I do get a little more heat at the guard than expected.Make sure you have silver braze and not just silver solder,you could brass braze but it isn't as strong.I used to weld them on with a arc welder but was afraid of the weld causing stress in the grai of the steel,I would do it before heat treat and that way I could grind it down and hoped that the heat getting to the weld would helt in its strength.Making the wedge and cuttout then drilling and inserting a pin works great for stag as if done properly the rod swivels and thus goes through the stag easier and the epoxy will strengthen the swivel joint when it cures.
Good luck and don't give up..
Bruce
 
I thought I had it today but tonight the silver braze failed after several tightenings of the brass pommel to test for stag to metal fit. I tightened the pommel on and finally after 4-5 times the weld twisted from the torque. I may try just pinning it again. I pinned it last night with a nickel silver pin but the heat of the brazing melted it so I had to just braze it. I will give it one more try. By the way is 1" of blade tang enough to make it very strong once epoxy cures. I am nervous about having such a short butt before the bolt. Cory
 
Cory: These are the events that make knife makers. I would suggest that you go ahead and finish the knife giving it your best, use a cheap handle material and test it. You have already learned a lot. I never get the tang hot enough to allow it to harden after the blade is forged normalized and annealed. 5160 and 52100 can and do air harden, this is the cause of many wrecks down the line. The trick is to learn all you can from every blade you make. Stick With It.
 
Cory,Try putting a small finish nail or piece of coat hanger through the hole then braze it and you should be good to go.How tight are you tightening the butt cap? You should only have to hand tighten it snug and not torque on the nut at all.
Bruce
 
Cory, 1" of tange is plenty if it is wide and thick enough, and the bolt large enough. with a good bond and a solid handle material, it should hold up well.

Bruce has a good point on not over torqeing the pommel nut, I hadn't thought of that even though I have twisted a few apart myself.

I have to agree with Ed on testing, if there is any thought in your mind that the tange could fail, abuse it and find out what it takes to destroy it. Not only does it insure the qality of your knives, it is a great confidence booster to realy see what a knife can take. Not to mention it can be fun!
 
Well the knife is done! It turned out nice. I believe it will hold up fine. I slotted my 5/16 bolt and pinned it with a 1/8 Nickel pin and peened it. I epoxied the stag on and threaded my pommel on. After it was finished I super glued a brass acorn nut on the remaining threads sticking through the pommel for a desired touch. I antiqued the blade as i liked the way it looked on my uncles knife. Bruce I was not overtightening the pommel. My 5/16 tap was broken so I forced a 5/16 bolt through the pommel hole to create threads. This provided for a squeaky thread that was not cleaned out enough. This is why I tweisted the tang. I took it to work the next day and fixed my tang and ran a 5/16 tap through the partial threads to make a smooth thread. Things are looking good. Cory
 
By the way my tang must not have gotten too hot cause I was able to drill through it with a standard drill bit with ease. Cory
 
If you wouldn't have tried to cut corners you would have solved the problem before it started:D ;) :D
I think we have all done things like that before.and learn not to.
OK.....Were's the picture,we want to see a picture:D
Good job on finishing it also.
Bruce
 
Bruce, Cut corners me! No! :) Had to make work with what I had at the time. Of course had I just waited 8 hours till I got to work I could have threaded it right and avoided the problem but I couldn't wait:rolleyes:. Cory
 
Just trying to give you a hard time...
Here is a udea,If you try that again use a different bolt and thread it in a vice then put it on the knife and maybe you wont twist the tang loose.:D :p :D
Bruce
 
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