Tang pin material

[court jester]

What material would you guys use for a tang pin for a Balisong knife and would you heat treat it? Would you use the same as the blade material and drive in the pin then heat treat the knife blade and pin at same time, if not any concern about the distortion of the hole size not matching the pin size or would you resize the hole? Thank you.

 

[bartblade]

ive made 3 butterfly knives. the way i do it is take a brass rod and cut it just about to the size i want it to be which it about 1/2 the blade thickness over on each side of the handle. this is after heat treat by the way. taking a ball peen hammer pollish the ball and place the knife on a flat hard surface like an anvil and hit the edge of the pin with the ball end this will mushroom the pin. only do one side at a time you can sand the head if desired but i liked the hammered look on my pins. if you choose to sand it dont do it just yet wait until its all peened together. take the hammer and use the flat head and hit the pin down to fit snug on that side of the handle ;now take and flip the handle over to the unpeened side and peen it. if it isnt snug yet peen both sides until snug DO NOT USE THE FLAT SIDE OF THE HAMMER IT WILL BEND THE PIN INSIDE THE HANDLE!!!!!!!! so now you have a peened pin you can either leave it like that or file it just be carefull when doing.

 

[RUGUR]

Here is a quote from custom knife maker, Matt Cook of Pinoy Knives

here is a good way to replace the tang pin .
use a HSS drill bit . find one that will almost go in , sand it a little with sandpaper until part only goes in and force fit it the rest of the way . cut off the extra with a dremel . total cost to ya about 2-3 buck's . time 1/2 hour max .