Thread: Wedge Foo

OK, I've studied up like a good boy with Bill's video and searching the archives and I'm still having trouble with the wedge. I have access to my dremel, a ggod assortment of files, and a scrollsaw a friend has lent me. I made a set of scales from 1/8" cocobolo and made a wedge from the same. The wood is just too pretty - anything looks nice in cocobolo. Anyhow, the process I went through with shaping the wedge and getting a good angle was brutal....I had to redo some sanding "hierarchy" on the scales after getting the wedge shaped....it was hard to sand the little wedge to get a slight angle,...it really kicked my butt.

Given my primitive tooling mentioned above, are there some tips to do simple wedges for a newbie razor refurb-man?

Muchos Thanks,
Steve

Steve, I've been toying with an idea of cutting out a wedge from a larger piece of wood, like a 1x4 maple and then shaping it to fit the scales. You'd need to waterproof the living you know what out of it though.

Are you talking about the 'end spacer'?

If so, I always forget about this until it's too late... What I do to get it to shape, is after all the holes are drilled, put a pin through the pivote hole and the end (with the spacer), and do not peen the pins, but tape them as if there was a razor between them.

I leave the end spacer a little wider than the scales, and then I sand it down flush with the scales so that it's a snug fit. The reason I said I leave it till it's too late, is that I usually have already put several coats of tru-oil on the scales...when I make the end spacer flush, I've boogered up the end of the scales and need to touch up the finish.

However, if we are NOT talking about the 'end spacer'..... never mind.

C utz

Yes, thanks. The end spacer - I thought you could call it the wedge too. How do get that little piece tapered with a slight angle? I keep beveling too much of an agle off the end section.

Heres an idea, i've used a few times, in guitar making though, not razor restoration!!

Get a work board like 18mm mdf or ply. This is your base. Make a sanding block from a piece of mdf, about 200mm by 40mm. The edges of this block must be square.

Put you wedge material on the board, so you got the thin edge (the edge you see when complete) on the board or facing up, doesn't matter. (vertical!) Its easier if your wood is about 300mm long so you can grab it well!!

Then, put some 150grit on the wide face of the sanding block, with glue or doublesided tape, and trim all the way around so you can slide the block along on it's edge. Then hold the work piece still, and slide the block forward and back against the wedge, at the shallow angle you need to achieve.

You can even rough cut the angle first on your saw, then finish up with the block. If your workpiece is square, and the sanding block is square, you'll get a nice even taper. Cut the taper off at the required length. Don't sneeze at this point, cos it'll fly out your hand on to the dusty workshop floor never to be seen again.

This might seem long winded, but it's a nice little jig to have around, for squaring up thin scales, or any fiddly components. You can sand quite nice curves too, because it is quite controlled, and you can see from above what your doing.

Is this totally confusing?!!

or if you're really clever you could incorporate the end spacer into one of the scales!! But this would be quite tricky and probably involve a router or some good chisel work. And cocobolo isn't the easiest stuff to work because the grain can be so interlocked. But hell, it is beauuuuuutiful stuff!!

Thanks very much for the idea on using the MDF. That could allow for creating a large piece with which to make many wedges.

I know a couple of the more 'seasoned' guys take the metal and a belt sander and just hold it there till it's just right. I've given up on the 'wedged-endspacer'. Mine are straight (squared off) and not wedged. I don't have the patience, and also with some of these wood designs I'm nervous about pinning the wedge and then the strain on the wood when I bring them together and pin at the pivot.....

C utz