Thread: Stone scales

I applaud your efforts!

May I suggest trying some other, less expensiive material before you work on the Jade. Nenad has a point. The tang on the razor is tapered. Therefore you must accomadate that taper in some manner. Historically the material would bend at the time of installation or it would be bent before hand, Nickel silver shell is an example. But, Mother of pearl, abalone, ivory, sterling silver and other stiff, fragile materials have been used for razor scales. So they found a way.
A person could adjust for the tapered tang by using a thicker end wedge( not tapered) and/or increasing the thickness of the washer/bushing/shims that are between the scales and the tang on the pivot end.

Just some ideas,

I was going to work on a chunk or two of river rock before I tackle this. Great thing about jade is that it is a little flexible and it's dang tough. People used it as weapons, so I'm really not worried about it being fragile.

My apologies for what will seem like a correction. I don't want anyone to feel bad.

If you know what you are doing, stone or just about any other material can be used as a set of scales. Here are the "but's"...

A single slice of jade will probably not work because it is not flexible enough.

A thin metal liner material will need to be used to support the stone. The liner should be pre-formed to accommodate tapers, blade thickness, and spacer thickness at the butt and at the third spacer position.

I would suggest the third spacer whether the original razor had one or not. After the mirrored scales are formed, sections of the jade are attached to the liner with epoxy and flared pins and broken up with different colors at the break points. The jade or any other stone needs to be thinned to match the weight of the blade. This is usually a personal thing. The meat choppers could take a thicker piece of stone. You also need lapidery equipment to work on stone. Your files and sandpaper won't cut it. If you get it to hot while working it... can you say, "cracked"?

There will be at least one break point, or possibly two. The different color spacer material will look similar to the ones on both sides of the amber of my bowie below. This is necessary to provide expansion and so that it doesn't look like the stone is broken or cracked. Most MOP razors are done this way. The spacer material on those is usually a thin slice of sterling.



You have chosen a very challenging project. Good luck with it

Niiice work, Bill

Originally Posted by superfly

About the stone scales... The purpose of the scales is to protect the razor blade when closed, and provide balance when in use. In order to provide balance and stay fixed in upright position (270 degrees), the scales works together with their elasticity and the form of the tang of the razor (tappered a bit). That is why when you open a good quality razor in shaving position, it stays that way. The best way to see this is to look at the bottom pin at the razor. The spacer between scales is also tappered a bit. This tapper, along with blade tang tapper (or sometimes without it) provides slightly curved scale shape and necesary tension. That is how the razor work... But the new DOVO micarta i have don't have tapered spacer and tang, and the scale curve is done by sanding... Not very smart solution.

That is why your stone scales will not work, and if the razor has tappered tang, they will likely brake, from the lack of elasticity...

hope this helps,
Nenad

My bad, the DOVO has both tappered tang and spacer. I haven't noticed theese because of the thicker scales that don't flex much...

That's okay, the jade I picked up off of E-bay has yet to arrive and the guy just lives 40 miles from me. I'd be irritated, but I don't have the bits to shape it yet.

Bill,
That handle is GORGEOUS!
Rik

I was thinking about this thread today and wondered what had happened with it. I guess nothing, eh?

X

I may try something with mastodon tooth down the road, but gotta catch up on other stuff first. Remind me in 8 months...

I wouldn't say nothing's happened with it, just been splitting my time between it, new responsibilities at work and a new home I just didn't feel much like posting a work in progress when it was progressing so slowly.