Wooden bolster length

Matt Rochester

Matt Rochester

Joined
Nov 28, 2014
Messages
1,864
I'm making my first wooden bolster. I am wondering what the rule of thumb on length is? 4:1, 4" handle and 1" bolster?
 
Are you doing anything special for the joint? Brass? Copper? Dovetail?
I think I'm going to try ironwood scales with the garage sale Macassa ebony for the bolster and see how it looks.
 
You want the bolster wood to be hard. Ebony, ironwood, bubinga, cocobolo, etc. I usually add a matching butt block. My blocks are about 3/4" normally. Some on a wa handle are about 1".
 
Brock47 said:
Are you doing anything special for the joint? Brass? Copper? Dovetail?
I think I'm going to try ironwood scales with the garage sale Macassa ebony for the bolster and see how it looks.
Click to expand...

I am gonna do a liner of some sort. I'm also going to 45 the joint so when I round the handle the joint will have a curve in it. Hard to explain but maybe you can picture it.
 
Matt R said:
I am gonna do a liner of some sort. I'm also going to 45 the joint so when I round the handle the joint will have a curve in it. Hard to explain but maybe you can picture it.
Click to expand...

I get it. Could be cool looking. You'll have to post some pics.
 
As far as the ratio, I think your pin placement is a major factor to consider. On most of my knives I use 3 pins and the ones with bolsters I normally try and stop the bolster halfway between the 1st and 2nd pin.
Matt R said:
I am gonna do a liner of some sort. I'm also going to 45 the joint so when I round the handle the joint will have a curve in it. Hard to explain but maybe you can picture it.
Click to expand...
I've only done the 1, but I'm partial to the compound 45 angle. It looks a lot more complex but it is just as easy to glue up as any other joint.
GwdFgp6.jpg


Chris
 
Personally I think bolster length is relative to how you want it to look. I have seen small bolsters look great and I have seen some with longer or bigger bolsters that looked really good to. Size of knife and handle shape and size along with some other factors come into play. Just play with your sizes till you think it looks appealing to the eye.
 
Salolan said:
As far as the ratio, I think your pin placement is a major factor to consider. On most of my knives I use 3 pins and the ones with bolsters I normally try and stop the bolster halfway between the 1st and 2nd pin.

I've only done the 1, but I'm partial to the compound 45 angle. It looks a lot more complex but it is just as easy to glue up as any other joint.
GwdFgp6.jpg


Chris
Click to expand...

That looks pretty good! Did you glue it up before mounting? I'm not sure if it should be glued up before or during mounting, but I'm leaning toward a prior glue-up, then mount the whole thing at once.

Mine is going to be much smaller, mainly because I had designed the pin layout for brass, and decided to change to wood after the fact.
I think I will try the 45 angle on the joint. My front will also be a 45 down to the blade. with a small 90 at the joint with the blade so hopefully it won't chip off. Grain on the bolster will run perpendicular more or less to that of the handle, set at the angle of my plunge line, which is roughly 45 deg.
 
Yes, Brock. I did glue the scales together prior to attaching to the knife. There is a G10 liner that runs full length of the scales and I glued the G10 bolster and wood scale to that. I then dimpled the underside of the newly assembled scale to allow the epoxy to adhere to the bolster and wood as well as the liner.

Chris
 
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