Payton's handles

Hey guys just made my first handle and would like to share what it did and would love to have criticism from you handle masters ok we'll here I go

 

First I got my wood from bell forest has anyone used them? And where should I get good wood at good prices? I used wenge and curly maple with black g10 liner .03" and nickle spacer .02" I wanted .04" nickle but usaknifemaker didn't have it in stock After I sized my blanks (I will give a full specs some time tomorrow) I found where my center and drilled with 1/2" brad point then I cut and drilled my spacers does anyone have any tips for drilling nickel and what bits I should use I used regular pilot bits and it bit and got all out of wack a nice hammering on my anvil and some grinding on my diamond stone took care of it

 

Then I slotted a 1/2" dowel from depot on my bandsaw Then I did a dry fit and used 30 min epoxy to glue it all up

 

I don't have many pics or vids on the shaping but basically I squared everything up then I needed to take about 1/4 inch off the top and bottom of the handle so I did that with a table saw then I just cut 45s on the belt sander and tapers as much as I could I used a friends knife to give me a judge on what size I should take it to then I used my brothers etching tool with a diamond bit the size of about a few match sticks to go thought my 1/8 inch pilot hole on the furrel and made the slot for my tang I wish I had a video but this tool was bad ass the after that used some files and rasps to even everything up then hand sanded to about 1200 then I put some thin ca glue on some the wenge because it has a lot of open pours then I hand sanded up to 1200 and a few days of toung oil and wood paste wax I don't think I sanded the ca glue enough but here is some pics I will show better ones tomorrow A dry fit then the glue up More for tomorrow with better pictures and more specs

 

Like the handle very much. One comment though--please consider removing rings, watches, etc, rolling up long sleeves, and restraining long hair (if applicable.) They can be very, very hazardous when working around power equipment. If your spouse gives you a hard time about taking off wedding rings, do a search on "degloving" and show her/him the photos. Need to keep those body parts intact to keep making nice handles!

 

Looks great!In regard to the nickel i found if i clamp it between 2 sheets of ply off cuts and then drill through it keeps it nice and flat.

 

I like it.

 

Nice job!!! :like

 

Love WIP thread. Great work!

 

Nice handle and awesome workshop

But the back side on that yanagi...

 

I

thanks, I was always shown to lay it flat towards the final polishing stones. Am I doing something wrong

 

Nice handle .

I buy my woods from Myron at Dream Burls, Mark at Burl Source, and Arizona Ironwood LLC...pretty much exclusively. I will on occasion pick some up from Craig Stevens on eBay...but that's pretty uncommon.

Hope that helps!

 

Thanks Chris your wa handle walk through got me inspired to make my first one so after 500$ in tools later I'm to late to turn back thanks and have you or anyone else have sourced from bobs exotic woods looks like good product for cheap because dream burls is a dream for my budget right now

 

Thanks my friend...glad I could be of some help!

I've honestly never heard of Bob's before. I see no mention of stabilization on his wood descriptions, nor do I see any listed sizes. When I had previously bought from suppliers that don't mention those things, its because the wood isn't in fact stabilized, and is usually pretty small...thus the pricing.

He has a block of curly koa that's nice...but I very likely would pass...because I don't want a $30 unstabilized pen blank that isn't big enough for one of my handles . That's one of the things about Mark and Myron's material that makes it worthwhile. I can often get two handles, a couple ferrules, and multiple spacers out of a $50 piece of quality stabilized wood. That makes that $30 piece of curly koa much less a bargain at that point.

 

I have used all those places Cris mentioned with good success. Also Ankrom exotics has some cool stuff. Not to mention Fine Turnage if you ever like wooly mammoths.

 

Not enough to make a drama about it. But in a longer perspective it might lead to a more serious trouble.
I also noticed - looks like that in the picture no3 from the bottom, - that you are about to get some birds beak [that kind of flattened spot at the tip ].
Again, I would not like to be a preacher about it, look at the state of knives in the movie Jiro dreams of sushi. All of them have a yanagis with carver-slicer tips to them.

If you want to retain the original shape of the blade look at your sharpening/finishing routine.
What I would try to do is:
1. The back side looks pretty polished which could suggest reasonably high grit. In turn that suggests that you are just pressing too hard on the blade when you hone the back side. You also press somewhere around the middle of the blade maybe a tad towards the edge. Next time try to just press on the blade on the outgoing stroke. If you find it difficult, just do outgoing strokes. And place your fingers as close as you can to the edge.
2. No pressure at all, just control.
3. If you used rougher stones on the bevel side, that means youve sharpened the knife already. The back side is where you hone the edges. If for some reason after honing the knife doesnt seem to be as hyper sharp as usual, or misses the "bite", go more gently. Check your angle.

 

Thanks for the tip will deff try that out

 

late pictures of it finished but in picture no 1 you can see I didn't sand off the ca glue enough didn't realize how bad it was till I was oiling it the tool I used to carve the tang slot was a master carver with a kutzall 1/8 taperd carbide burr bit thanks to all for the kind words and looking and critiquing my work I'm doing a western to wa conversion on my korin 240 slicer that I will be sharing next

 

In this picture...what I would suggest to correct that is to press each 'facet' flat against either a slow moving belt with a very flat platen, or on a piece of glass with 400g paper stuck to it. I used to finish all of my handles in that manner until I got my good variable speed grinder.

Your handle has a great shape though, and the materials you chose complement each other perfectly!

 

Thanks cris when I finish my next handle I'll go back to tht one