Tortoise Shell How do you know it is real?

J

John R. Fraps

Joined
Mar 10, 2000
Messages
1,146
Hi Folks,
I have a concern. Am in the process of making a custom Dr. style slipjoint for a fellow who happens to be a real nice guy....and the potential of a repeat client if he likes the first one, and a repeat client is a real compliment!

You know how once in a while, you work on a knife that you would swear that "Murphy's Law Guy" was sitting on your shoulder while you work. Murphy is well acquainted with this piece, but he hasn't won, just cost more time....

Anyhow, the client sent me an obviously quite old shoe horn that sure looks like real (antique) tortoise shell. it also has very fine gold wire inlaid initials on the handle, which to me implies more likely real, but I want it to be also. But when I boiled it to flatten it, and after it had been between metal plates overnight, it started to show that it was actually 2 layers of material that thicken the part that touches a user's heel to approx. 0.125" and they started coming apart....de-laminating, if that is the right word....

While this separation was fine for making the colors show better, when I explained it to the client, he had concern that it might be faux tortoise, especially when I told him it didn't have the smell of salt water when I boiled it (but I don't have a great sense of smell) and he wanted to replace the material. He has $'s and I have time in the handle pieces so I'd rather use what I have if there is a way to verify it is real.

I haven't previously worked with real tortoise, or even faux tortoise, just with the Celluloid patterned stuff. so am not an expert of how to determin if it is real or is faux. I did a search on these forums and Google search and couldn't find the answer other than it is very difficult to see the real and the faux and determin which it is. I do have a bit I could destroy if using acid or burning or grinding to overheated would help to i.d. the material

Can anyone give me any suggestions how to determin the difference?
Please, AND Thank-You,
 
I could be wrong but I think the easiest way is to heat a needle up and poke it, if it's fake you should be able to smell the burning plastic right away. this also keeps damage to a minimum.
Steve.


edit: looks like george beat me to it
 
Thanks for the quick responses, Guys,
I do have a concern though.
I know Celluloid (sorta plastic)
The client said that faux tortoise ( or antique faux tortoise) is made, he thought, from a dairy product....and Google mentions faux being made from animal protien.....
I'll still see what happens and report back...
Thanks again,
 
You talking about Casein plastic? made from acid precipated milk and whey. one of the kids home chemistry crafts books I have shows how to make plastic buttons out of whey or milk.
 
Thank-you guys SO MUCH!
I will be back in a short bit....
I'll test and yes to the possibility of Casein plastic....
Darn, I am sitting down, or I'd be falling down in respect of your folks help....

Just to date myself a bunch....the last thing I recolect about chemistry is the Potassium Permangumate stains things real deep purple-ish....and that Salte Petre, Charcoal, and Sulfur well ground in a mortar and pestal make a powder that goes "boom!" when your contain it and light it....(smile, I loved things that went "boom" when I was a kid...and I don't intend to ever grow up...me and Peter Pan....)
Again, THANK-YOU!
Back Shortly,
 
Delaminating is the clue that it's the real thing. Plastic would be homogeneous and not delaminate.I would assume tortoise shell is made from keratin like animal horns ?
 
Meal powder? That wouldnt have made much of a boom, you should have damped it up with raw spirit, patted up into flat ckaes and left to dry in bright direct sunlight on a black painted board, then found a course 1/16" sieve and a finer 1/32" sieve, grated it through the coarse sieve onto the fine sive and then shaken the fine one to have all the dust fall through. the granules between 1/16 and 1/32 make a far better bang when tamped lightly into a cardboard box with a wired spark plug in it, dug down and buried under a stump or root.
Then stand WELL back, preferably in a ditch 100 yards away and hook the negative to a battery and brush the positive over the other terminal to get a nice fat spark in the middle of the powder. One less stump :D

And a hiding from dad if he ever caught you, luckily mine never did :D

As to dating me, I'm only 26 :D
 
Gentlemen,
Thank-You so much for your help!
I did the red hot needle thing several spots....definitely smells alot like burning hair smells. Also it smells almost indetical to ram's horn when you touch ram's horn with a red hot needle....and burn marks on the tortoise and on the ram's horn are very similar...it wasn't a melting as you'd have on celluloid, for example.
With the tests, your comment about lamination/de-lamination , the videos that Shakudo gave reference to, I believe what I have is highly probably the real thing.

Kiwi303, I'll bet you did your best to "age" your parents....mine suggested I was pretty good at doing that to them (smile).
Mete, I thought you were a metals expert....Shell too.....

Thank-You all again!
 
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