Thread: Adjusting loft

Originally Posted by bluesman7

This is what I'm hoping I can do. I guess since I'm making the handle I can make the fit as snug as I like. Maybe I will do a quick and dirty out of a large dowel to verify the taper of the hole. I'm thinking that as deep as I think I want to go I will want to taper the hole so that the brush can bloom a bit. Yeah the dowel sounds like the ticket.

Great minds think alike! I picked up a faux horn blank at Woodcraft yesterday.

Interesting idea that tapered hole. I don't think I have reknotted a handle that had a tapered hole from the factory.

The usual advice I have seem from knot suppliers is that the hole be drilled 1-2mm larger than the size of the knot. That is because the knot size is given as measured at the glue plug. The knot bulges out slightly above the glue plug and that needs to be accommodated. If the knot is fitted too snugly it may lead to the handle cracking over time when the knot swells a bit.

That happened to a custom reknot I had ordered with the loft reset lower than the factory brush. It was fixed at no charge by the custom maker and has not cracked since the new handle was made to fix the problem.

Faux horn should make a great looking handle.

Bob

Well, lots of ways to do it, but washing the new knot first a few times and allowing it to dry has been my best tool to determine preferred loft as test-fitting. As it has bloomed (In 2-band badgers, anyway) it gives you what you will get at a particular loft a lot closer than simply sticking a new knot in directly from the maker.
Only example I can find of what I mean....https://sharprazorpalace.com/brushma...lly-brush.html
Certainly this would not matter on synthetics I would think.

My quest does indeed pertain to a synthetic. This all started to improve my travel synthetic for travel to Texas.

You might try some masking tape around the knot to get it temporarily snug.
If you get silicone in the 'hairs' would not be good, I think?

Yeah the masking tape or even a paper shim may keep it tight enough to test.

The other problem with the dab of silicone is that silicone has a problem sticking to cured silicone.

Maybe some blue tack. You could stick varying amounts under the plug.

The temporary fir handle worked great with just a friction fit. Used a loft of 50 mm.

Full disclosure, I know next to nothing about brushes. The o-ring/tape talk got me thinking an appropriate size zip-tie might work well and let you adjust tension on the fly. Just throwing that out there.

I've heard of others using zip ties. When I first experimented I did a thread whip, like the whip on the end of laid rope. That worked but was not very permanent. Setting the brush deeper had a different and IMO better effect.

Originally Posted by bluesman7

I've heard of others using zip ties. When I first experimented I did a thread whip, like the whip on the end of laid rope. That worked but was not very permanent. Setting the brush deeper had a different and IMO better effect.

Yup, I did use a West Country Whipping to temporarily adjust the loft on a brush. It showed I was going in the right direction and worked when I reset the loft to what I had it choked to.

Bob