Thread: The Butchered Blade

Originally Posted by UKRob

Hope you don't mind me poking my nose in here chaps - but one thought about wedges when drilling them. If you put them on a flat surface and use a pillar drill you will not be drilling at 90 degrees. Now normally this will not create a problem but just occasionally if you have a problem blade that pulls to one side - you could also be fitting the wedge in a way that will make things worse.

To avoid this I drill only when I'm happy with the wedge angle - but I drill on a wedge shaped piece of wood to get as near to 90 degrees as makes no difference.

Thanks, Rob! We welcome you and your skills here any time!

Originally Posted by RezDog

Originally I have no idea. It is super easy to just hit lead with a hammer and make it a wedge. I do a mostly shaped with a hammer and them some minor refinement on sandpaper. It is so easy to work with it is my first choice in wedge most times.

Darl (Tarkus) made a big punch, slash-cut on the bottom. He says it works well for smacking a square of lead on a flat steel surface to make tapered wedges.
I had thought about using a hydraulic press. Seems it could be controlled somewhat using stops or a die.


Rob has a cool setup to make wedges, I have seen it before. I think it was posted earlier on in this thread. Perhaps he will elaborate?

Originally Posted by sharptonn

Darl (Tarkus) made a big punch, slash-cut on the bottom. He says it works well for smacking a square of lead on a flat steel surface to make tapered wedges.
I had thought about using a hydraulic press. Seems it could be controlled somewhat using stops or a die.


Rob has a cool setup to make wedges, I have seen it before. I think it was posted earlier on in this thread. Perhaps he will elaborate?

Yep, he does & I was the one who posted it after searching. I like it myself although there are several different ways to make one. I have used the hammer method on pieces of lead that worked out just fine. I was experimenting around the other day & thought I would try to make one flat so I got my brass piece & drilled my hole first at as close to a 90 degree angle I could. I then used a DMT diamond hone & applied pressure only on one side of it more. It seems to work out pretty good. I did it on both side since I first drilled my hole when perfectly flat. It was just an idea that popped up in my head but this was one idea of making one flat. Sandpaper on a piece of glass is pretty much the same thing or very similar. I have also done like Tom & just used my eyes to do it. MikeT seems to have the right idea of how to determine the angle of the edge.


I know I already posted this pic so I deleted it. You can see it in post 973.

Originally Posted by MikeT

Okay, wedges can be a tricky one to figure out. Just takes some trial and error. That said I'll tell you what I do.
Figure out where you want your blade to sit (best done with calipers): high up then measure lower on the blade the measurement will be smaller. Sitting lower in the scales measure higher up the measurement will be greater.
Then take two measurements of the tang about equal to the length of the wedge (lets say it's half an inch).. one measurement a quarter inch in front of the pivot hole and one measurement a quarter inch behind pivot hole. This tells you your tang taper. Let's say it's a difference of 3 mm, it could be more or less depending on the blade.
This means the back of the wedge needs to be 3mm less than the front of the wedge. So when sanding, take periodic measurements often to get it right.
Next get a piece of glass. Put it on a very flat surface. Get sand paper, start with 220 and move up in grit as you get closer. Usually ending with 400 grit.
The pressure you apply is key. Put more pressure on the back end of wedge, not too much pressure. Be patient. Too much pressure will cause the surface to be not flat.
The hard surface underneath is necessary for flat surface and crisp edges.
You want the wedge to have extra space all around, and when you test fit it with a hex head nut and bolt with washers, it is then when the process of getting the edges flush begins.
Always start with a wedge of greater dimensions on every side than final product.

Edit: take care to hold the sand paper flat, masking tape works well. If the sand paper buckles or raises up then it will dull the edge of the wedge. A little ball of masking tape on top of wedge helps you hold it well.

Thanks for all that info.
The thin wedge made it so the blade couldn't sit down as far as I wanted it to.

I will order some lead (fishing tackle) , study your post until it sinks in and then re start.

On the plus side my peening has come along.

Thanks again..

Originally Posted by UKRob

To avoid this I drill only when I'm happy with the wedge angle - but I drill on a wedge shaped piece of wood to get as near to 90 degrees as makes no difference.

Thank you for bringing this up.
When I first joined I posted this same topic about wedge hole angle and though I explained well, it took me multiple posts to finally get someone to understand what I was talking about and grudgingly admit some merit BUT that drilling the hole bigger fixes the problem.
I admit that I do drill the hole bigger sometimes with a pin vise to not bother, but it's not ideal.
I also use a shim to drill the hole correct after the wedge taper is complete. That is a step in the process that is necessary otherwise the angle of the hole changes with sanding.

Originally Posted by sharptonn

Thanks, Rob! We welcome you and your skills here any time!

+1 to that.. All are welcome, just a few of us are quite chatty and prolific with our posts.

I try and keep the pin hole quite snug on the wedge - the reason being that with some material that don't flex very well, the extra effort required to make sure the scales are flush against the sides of the wedge can force it back slightly if there's some play in the pin hole. This happened to me when I'd shaped the wedge with the blade mocked up with hex pins - when I did final fitting the finished wedge was short of the scales.

You know that feeling when you're not 100% satisfied - so I started with another wedge which meant unpinning etc.etc.

Originally Posted by sharptonn

Rob has a cool setup to make wedges, I have seen it before. I think it was posted earlier on in this thread. Perhaps he will elaborate?

Thanks Tom. I use this Luthier's friend and door wedges depending on the angle I want - here's a couple of pictures showing the set up first and then more detail. Whichever door wedge I used for the razor wedge I then use in the pillar drill to make sure the pin hole runs at 90 degrees through the wedge.

That looks to be a very handy attachment, Rob. It seemingly would be the real deal for making wedge ends on 'wedgeless' scales?

Originally Posted by sharptonn

That looks to be a very handy attachment, Rob. It seemingly would be the real deal for making wedge ends on 'wedgeless' scales?

I would thank Rob for that but I gave thanks in the post I first saw it in. Thanks again Rob!
That is a handy little attachment on his vacuum cleaner though.

EDIT: Awwwww hell, I gave him thanks again anyway. He deserves it!