[Thomp]

Looking at materials to make Quality carving knives, can drive you nuts
great steel can be found for a reasonable price.

but for handles the slab and block handles that are stabilized are best,
but at $41.00 each knife, acrylics and coral are high as a cats back!

so this brings me to ask,

anybody ever used the pen turning blanks,?
from $1.90 each but there only 5/8" x 5/8" x5" which makes a cigar shape handle at best,

im thinking 2 glued up togather or other material glued to each side would make the handle bigger or add enough material to make a good handle, for $5.00 it makes more sence.

of course some odd fellers will want cheetah bone or ivory, the most of us just want a good knife...

from the local woods i can get southern hardwoods and softwoods but they are all wet, and i dont want to build knives next year im itching now...

yet there is no reason even to cut down a sapling just for a knife handle.

i have some woods ive salvaged from crates looks like mahogany each board is different color hew and grain along with weight, im thinking dark handles are getting over used...
any suggesting?

[Smee]

Pallets are often oak or maple. Even walnut is found. Old furniture.

[Hi_Ho_Sliver]

There are a lot of hardwoods in pallets, I used to find teak but not sure they do that anymore, but I have a pallet I have been saving that is somekind of hardwood......I am also a saver, I save all the scraps until I am forced to get rid of them or take a load to a Good Sams Campout for the campfire LOL....so gluing up different kinds of wood for knife handles is no problem at all! I have also swapped wood with people around the country....mostly walking sticks...thats almost as much fun as the Christmas ornament swap lol So far the favorite shape handle I have for the knives I make is the Helvie...kind of a long fat oval, very comfortable in your hand....at least my hand. I haven't tried the one with the finger grips, it might be good too?

[cerndog]

Hey-

Woodcraft sells "grab boxes" of mixed exotic and domestic hardwoods, softwoods, etc. They are perfect for knife handles. Blocks are about 1x2x6-8 inches long. I bought one for around 20 bucks, there's 20-25 pieces and anything from purpleheart to curly maple to many I can't identify.

I put a purpleheart handle on an old Buck pocketknife blade and watco oiled it to purple perfection!

Mike

[Thomp]

i got some ideas lastnight from lee vally they sell some turners blanks

i guess i was hoping to find a woodswop going on or something...


it just dont make sence to spend $40- on handles for a 30- knife

still looking though

[FK]

I suggest you research "turning squares" Hut Products and Woodcraft have these available in 1.5 x 1.5 x 12" or 18" long at very reasonable prices. You can hand saw the individual pieces required for custom handles.

http://www.hutproducts.com/products.asp?dept=95

Regards,
Fred Krow

[Kenny_S]

Might try Ebay. They have all kinds of wood in various sizes.
Have you thought of antlers. Another good material for handles.

[cerndog]

If you spend $25 for 25 hardwood pieces, and get most of the blades for free (scrounge them), and glue is $5.00 you can make 25 thirty dollar knives for thirty dollars...right?

if you bought 25 thirty dollar knives it would cost $750!!!

that's scrounge logic (and math) from rural northern california.

mike

[Tom H]

Thomp, I don't think a wood swap suitable for knife handles would really work. But what would, might be just a plain ol "give-away". A lot of carvers are also woodworkers. And do not intend to be knife makers too. And as woodworkers we all have lots of small pieces of wood that we just cannot pitch. We stack it up, thinking that someday we'll use it. But we seldom use it. Why don't you put together a set of specifications describing the knife handle stock needed. I am sure that you as well as the other knife makers would find a ready and willing bunch of carvers/woodworkers that would send the wood to you all. No strings attached, or maybe for a discount on a knife. After all Elwood Troll gives us cottonwood bark. The only think he asks is that we pay the postage. Lets see some specifications! Tom H

[Capt. Bandaid]

Try Texas Knifemakers Supply in Houston. Lots of wood for handles from reasonable to ransoms.