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So...
A week or so ago my boss comes to me and informs me that I need to find a way to do something we don't usually do. At least we don't do it this way.
I was brought some Scales for one of our knives. they have a plain bolster, but it seems the customer wanted lined bolsters. A bolster is the end cap on a knife handle near the blade. You can see exactly what I'm talking about by looking at the first few pictures in the thread linked Here
I was handed this scale to work with. The thread linked previously describes the process we use to form and line bolsters. These ones have a radius of approximately .75 ", and there are only about 75 of these to be done. The lines need to be uniform, about 20-25 thou deep and must match on both the mark and pile side of the knife. (Don't ask me why there called mark and pile side, I have no idea what so ever. The mark side is (for us right handed folks) the side of the knife that is where your thumb is when holding the knife in a working position.the scale pictured below is the markside).
Anyhoo...
I'm at a loss to figure out an easy way to get this done, in a reasonable amount of time, with minimal expense. After wandering around aimlessly for a while, thinking unclearly, it dawned on me that all I really needed to do was get back to basics. I headed for the stock rack and snagged some 2 inch 1144 and lopped off a chunk. It turned into this nifty little fixture.
This fixture (as ugly as it is) allowed me to set up and machine the line in the lathe. I'll explain the rubber band as we go! I made two sliders that have pins in them that allow me to fix the position of the scale relative to the slightly angled end of the bolster so that the lines would be parallel. I also left room enough in the design to fixture both sides.
I used the rubber bands mostly because it saved me a ton of time figuring out a way to secure the scales on the fixture. It was also reasonably fast to load and unload. and with the scale being in a fixed position due to the pins I figured it would be more than enough to do the job, and it was.
to be continued in a reply.
A week or so ago my boss comes to me and informs me that I need to find a way to do something we don't usually do. At least we don't do it this way.
I was brought some Scales for one of our knives. they have a plain bolster, but it seems the customer wanted lined bolsters. A bolster is the end cap on a knife handle near the blade. You can see exactly what I'm talking about by looking at the first few pictures in the thread linked Here
I was handed this scale to work with. The thread linked previously describes the process we use to form and line bolsters. These ones have a radius of approximately .75 ", and there are only about 75 of these to be done. The lines need to be uniform, about 20-25 thou deep and must match on both the mark and pile side of the knife. (Don't ask me why there called mark and pile side, I have no idea what so ever. The mark side is (for us right handed folks) the side of the knife that is where your thumb is when holding the knife in a working position.the scale pictured below is the markside).
Anyhoo...
I'm at a loss to figure out an easy way to get this done, in a reasonable amount of time, with minimal expense. After wandering around aimlessly for a while, thinking unclearly, it dawned on me that all I really needed to do was get back to basics. I headed for the stock rack and snagged some 2 inch 1144 and lopped off a chunk. It turned into this nifty little fixture.
This fixture (as ugly as it is) allowed me to set up and machine the line in the lathe. I'll explain the rubber band as we go! I made two sliders that have pins in them that allow me to fix the position of the scale relative to the slightly angled end of the bolster so that the lines would be parallel. I also left room enough in the design to fixture both sides.
I used the rubber bands mostly because it saved me a ton of time figuring out a way to secure the scales on the fixture. It was also reasonably fast to load and unload. and with the scale being in a fixed position due to the pins I figured it would be more than enough to do the job, and it was.
to be continued in a reply.
Oh, and I am hidden away in a basement shop in an old mostly unused portion of the building, but I like to think it's because I'm such a grumpy old fart!
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