Fostarene

[tongueriver]

I was always curious about the pre-Delrin plastics used in the late 1950s to replace the lost access to bone covers on Schrade knives. Recently, it has been mentioned by a member that one of those materials may have been Fostarene. This is a proprietary trade name for one version of polystyrene plastic. I found this link to be interesting and possibly good info for enthusiasts of 1950s Schrade pocket knives.
https://www.plasticsinsight.com/resin-intelligence/resin-prices/polystyrene/

 

[JustinR]

Thanks for the info, after recently learning about it with my 343, I think I have several in fostarene.

 

[koldgold]

Thanks for the info, after recently learning about it with my 343, I think I have several in fostarene.

Could this be the plastic some of the early 8OTs used - Black with colour specks in it.
I have often wondered about Schrade's "MEERSCHAUM BONE" ... Ken

 

[jxr1197]

Could this be the plastic some of the early 8OTs used - Black with colour specks in it.
I have often wondered about Schrade's "MEERSCHAUM BONE" ... Ken

Those aren't Fostarene and figuring out what it was is a question I struggled with for years, lol. The smooth plastic with gold and copper flake in it (dark brown base) was a single batch plastic made by Crown Plastics c1961. They ordered large quantities of materials from DuPont and then would mix and create their own blends which were then mixed with special plastic beads, melted and injected. The vat would have made enough material for thousands of knives but there's very little chance Schrade/Ulster made thousands of those knives so I'm guessing there's another brand out there with a mystery batch of sparkly handles too. There was never a trade name for this material and Crown did not keep any production records from back then. It's also impossible to duplicate the material at this point because even if you had a plastics engineer analyze it, DuPont no longer makes many of the ingredients that went into that batch. I've got 6 knives from that vat now; 3 58OTs, a Primble 934, a 50OT and an 8OT. Fostarene was a trademarked name used for the version of polystyrene plastic that was manufactured by Foster Grant. Foster Grant was a major vendor for Schrade and all of IKAC.