Stacked Leather Handles

Richard338

Richard338

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May 3, 2005
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I got some of the art knives books by David Darom at Christmas.
Somehow after reading them, my inspiration went sideways and I've decided to tackle two Fairbairn designs. These are the smatchet and the F-S dagger. I can fit both on one piece of CPM 3V stock.
I haven't done any stacked leather handles before and am tentatively thinking of trying it for both of these pieces.
Reading old threads, my understanding in that the pieces of leather should be wet, and then compressed in a stack until dry (using all-thread and some washers).
Once dry, they can be stacked on the tang with a little epoxy between each.

I have a few questions in case any of you have experience with these.
1) Any reason (other than cost) not to use the pre-cut pieces sold at Jantz?
2) How much does the leather compress? Jantz claims that 8 pieces cover about 1", but no mention of compression...
3) In both knives I plan to have a spacer after the guard. Is it still a good idea to glue up the leather on a mock tang, shape it there and then put it on the knife? or can I glue it up in place on the knife?
4) The dagger handle appears axially symmetric. Do people turn these on a lathe, or wing it on the belt grinder?

Thanks!

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Im no expert but Ive done few leather handles.
I used pre cut washers from another k ifemaking supply place. They seemed fine, consistent size and shape
I did the wet and compress thing with an allthread jig I made. I dint notice a lot of compression maybe 1/4 inch or so, didnt really pay much attention though.
Once it dried I coated the tang in epoxy, coated each washer as I put it on. Cranked up the pommel screw, and shaped the rest on the grinder.
Original FS dagger handles were cut on a lathe I beleive as they are round, not a great shape for handle on a dagger IMO.
If you could jig up your washers on a mock tang, you could put the tang in a handheld power drill, run it backwards fairly quick, and put that on the belt sander to get it pretty round. Its how I do pommels and such without a lathe, good and a steady hand can it pretty darn close.
 
I can tell you how the factories installed leather handles-
Each piece was installed dry.
Periodically, the washers were compressed with a piece of pipe, hit with a hammer.
The pommel was attached, and the handle ground in ONE DIRECTION ONLY, with successive grits until smooth.
A coat of paste wax is a good idea.
 
I've used a mock up tang so I could use normal leather glue between the washers and use it as a solid block.
Epoxy shows up as black lines.
Make sure to align the flesh/grain side the same on all washers or it will show.
 
I've done several using rubber contact cement between the layers when it's on the tang. I epoxy the guard or ferrule/spacer to the blade, then rubber cement and stack the leather washers/spacers onto the handle. I put some parchment paper against the last layer and then a piece of scrap wood with a slot in it on top of the parchment paper. There is some of the tang sticking out past the wood, so I put that in a vise and push the handle down against the vise jaws and clamp it. It gives a little compression and has worked well for me. I did the wet washers, all thread and compression before and haven't noticed much difference in the final shaping. Last one I did, I used really thin super glue on the handle as I worked it down to help it harden up a bit because I used G10 spacers for some color pop on the handle. I like the way it came out.
 
Taz said:
I've done several using rubber contact cement between the layers when it's on the tang. I epoxy the guard or ferrule/spacer to the blade, then rubber cement and stack the leather washers/spacers onto the handle. I put some parchment paper against the last layer and then a piece of scrap wood with a slot in it on top of the parchment paper. There is some of the tang sticking out past the wood, so I put that in a vise and push the handle down against the vise jaws and clamp it. It gives a little compression and has worked well for me. I did the wet washers, all thread and compression before and haven't noticed much difference in the final shaping. Last one I did, I used really thin super glue on the handle as I worked it down to help it harden up a bit because I used G10 spacers for some color pop on the handle. I like the way it came out.
Click to expand...

Any pics? I've done plenty of knife mods, and a couple rehandles of various blades... I'm thinking I'd like to rehandle a leather washer blade in the near future... Thanks. I like the idea of mixing the materials too, almost Pacific style.
 
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