Hidden tang assumtions

[huntforlife]

Gettin a little tired of full tang and want to try another hidden tang. First was a crash and burn, so I need to redeem myself.

HT and finish the blade (obviously) fit the guard to the tang, and finish the front of the guard prior to JBweld or solder.

Once the guard is fixed is where I run into a quandry.

Now. If I want a multi layered handle, should I leave it completely rough and pin and glue all the pieces parallel to the tang prior to final glue up? Or just glue all the pieces together and clamp tight to the guard and sand/finish after the fact.

My gut says the latter, but Ive been wrong before.

[VaughnT]

Were it I, I would put it together with a temporary pin and do the rough grinding of the parts. This way, if you slip and hit the guard, you can disassemble everything and try to recover the ding. Afterwards, tape the snot out of the guard and move on with a permanent mounting and finish the handle.

[Doug Lester]

Ok, when I made my stick tang knife with multiple eliments to the handle I cut the tang hole in each individual piece working from the blade back, including the guard, leaving each rough part in place as I completed it. When I had all the pieces cut and confirmed that they fit together right I started fitting them to the tang. I soldiered the piece for the guard on and then started epoxying the other handle material on. It's also a good idea to store the pieces in the same order that you fitted them onto the tang in as you are glueing up the pieces so that there is no mix up. After the glue set up over night I thin started sanding them to shape. A belt grinder is good for rough sanding but hand sanding or filing is better for the final shaping. After the handle was shaped I shaped the guard.

Doug Lester

[CWKnifeman]

Zen, one way is to drill the holes into the material place it up in a rod to clamp it up and rough grind it to a semi shape and then assemble and glue. I would drill all of th epieces and glue it all up using a medium hand press clamp or using a small pipe clamp to clamp the blade tip into a piece of rubber and the other end of the clamp onto the butt of the handle and tighten for 12 to 14 hours. Take off the clamp and rough grind the handle to shape then finish.
Curtis

[Ray Rogers]

By 'multi-layer' handle do you mean a stacked handle similar to what D'Holder does? When I do those I stack on all the pieces filling wach one with AcraGlas as I go all the way through until the butt cap is on or a pin is placed that secures the whole handle. No clamps are needed, the butt cap or pin does that job. After the glue sets I shape the handle and the guard.

If by 'multi-layer' you meant a mortised handle, I'd still glue it up as I went but would need clamps unless bolts were used and I'd still shape the whole thing after the glue set...

[ranger1]

I go with Ray. Stack and shape. Acra-glas is the only way to fly.