Give a dog a bone? ( Knife handle )

[Baron Conal]

If I were to go to a butcher and ask for a bone
that I could then use to put bone plates on the
handle of a knife ( full tang ) what bones should
I be asking for to get the best yield of usable bone
from?

this specific knife....

[losthelm]

I would sugest the marrow bones.
If you ask nicely they may even cut them for you.

[Baron Conal]

I would sugest the marrow bones.
If you ask nicely they may even cut them for you.

Is 'morrow bone' specific enough that they will know
what I mean?

[Kel Rekuta]

Shin bones before the butcher saws them for soup bones. Have them take off the joint for convenience. Boil them up, dry them well and set to it with a saw. Wear a mask if using a power saw, bone dust isn't good for your lungs.

Messy but cheap way to make bone handle scales. Or bone folders for leather work & bookbinding!

[Thomas Powers]

Some of the big pet supply stores used to sell pre-processed cow bones with all the dirty work already done for you.

Thomas

[Destichado]

And grocery stores. Which is where I got mine. Meijer, to be precise.

You'll have to pick your butcher shop carefully. Almost all use boxed beef, and won't have many longbones around commonly. They'll almost certainly need advanced notice to set them aside for you as they get them. Do you have a particular place in mind?

Anyway. When I've worked with "live" bone, the best thing to do is saw off the ends and push out the marrow, right away. If you get to it early the marrow comes out like paste, but if you hoard your bones and wait a while (a season or two... *cough*) the marrow hardens into a honeycombed pain in the ass.
Blast the bone clean with cold water and let it dry a while before working with it.

Then do all the normal things when working with bone and toxic woods.

[Seth of Newcastle]

I have had to find bones for knife handles many times. As someone already suggested, I feel the pet store is the best place to find. Anohter way, if the handle is small enough, is to order precut bone for handles. Here is a link to an example. Look 3/4 of the way down for 4-1/4 x 1-1/8 x 1/8 White Bone Flat :

http://www.trugrit.com/knife-handle-material.htm

Doesn't cost much more than the raw bones you buy where ever you get them.


Either way, make sure you do not breath any dust from sanding bone. It is bad stuff in your lungs.


Seth

[Donal Mac Ruiseart]

.

This old man, he played one,
He played knick-knacks on his drum,
With a nick-knack, paddy-whack,
Give a dog a bone,
This old man came rolling home!

[Hrolfr]

Wear a mask if using a power saw, bone dust isn't good for your lungs.

This, in spades. It is worse than red cedar dust. Of course, take the same precautions if you use antler

[Baron Conal]

I have had to find bones for knife handles many times. As someone already suggested, I feel the pet store is the best place to find. Anohter way, if the handle is small enough, is to order precut bone for handles. Here is a link to an example. Look 3/4 of the way down for 4-1/4 x 1-1/8 x 1/8 White Bone Flat :

http://www.trugrit.com/knife-handle-material.htm

Doesn't cost much more than the raw bones you buy where ever you get them.


Either way, make sure you do not breath any dust from sanding bone. It is bad stuff in your lungs.


Seth

the flat pieces they sell.....


are they flattened through some bending/flattening process
or they cut and worked buy scraping/sanding/something
until they are flat....?

[Ernst]

Sheep bone is better for the purpose than cattle bone.

[Baron Conal]

Sheep bone is better for the purpose than cattle bone.

the purpose being....?


for making knife handles or for flattening?

Why?

[Ernst]

For making handles, as sheep bone is harder and less porous.

[Seth of Newcastle]

I have had to find bones for knife handles many times. As someone already suggested, I feel the pet store is the best place to find. Anohter way, if the handle is small enough, is to order precut bone for handles. Here is a link to an example. Look 3/4 of the way down for 4-1/4 x 1-1/8 x 1/8 White Bone Flat :

http://www.trugrit.com/knife-handle-material.htm

Doesn't cost much more than the raw bones you buy where ever you get them.


Either way, make sure you do not breath any dust from sanding bone. It is bad stuff in your lungs.


Seth

the flat pieces they sell.....


are they flattened through some bending/flattening process
or they cut and worked buy scraping/sanding/something
until they are flat....?

Cut and sanded to the size they advertise.


Seth

[Thomas Powers]

BTW Theophilus' method, (Divers Arts), of polishing bone using sifted wood ashes and a strip of woolen cloth works quite well indeed *IFF* you also add a little water to make a slurry rather than a dry gummy mess! (Like some medieval recipes some minor component that *everyone* knows about was left out...)

I've had people accuse me of having used a powered buffer on a knife handle that was actually done using T's method.

Note that un processed bone can be quite greasy; most knifemakers degrease the bone before working it.

Thomas

[Baron Conal]

Note that un processed bone can be quite greasy; most knifemakers degrease the bone before working it.

Thomas

How?

[Thomas Powers]

Lots of different ways; some boil it with a bit of TSP others use flammable solvents.

Did you search on "degreasing bone knife" ?

I'd prefer to not give details as the method I have used can be quite dangerous if mishandled---see Flammable Solvents...

Thomas

[Baron Conal]

Lots of different ways; some boil it with a bit of TSP others use flammable solvents.

Did you search on "degreasing bone knife" ?

I'd prefer to not give details as the method I have used can be quite dangerous if mishandled---see Flammable Solvents...

Thomas

TSP?

trisodium phosphate...?

[losthelm]

I know a few people that just use laundry borax.

[Ernst]

...or alum.

[Thomas Powers]

Yes, tri sodium phosphate. To dispose of it I dilute it way down and use it as fertilizer.

Thomas

[talaananthes]

Just boil it a few times and then leave it in the sun to bleach. Unless it's really old nasty bones it should clean up fine just like that. There was this one donkey in the zooarch lab at Wash U that was a 40 year old Greek labor animal, been in the collection 20 years and its bones are STILL nasty despite repeated attempts to clean them. But you shouldn't have that problem with new bones from a young meat animal.

Wear a mask if using a power saw, bone dust isn't good for your lungs.

This, in spades. It is worse than red cedar dust. Of course, take the same precautions if you use antler

For extra emphasis. You can give yourself long term respiratory injuries.