Thread: A method for pressing horn

Thanks for answering our questions. Im glad you got pictures of the work in progress. The scales you've made made look great and your still refining the process.
Just to clarify, I wasn't making any suggestions about chemicals. I was just curious about how it was done originally.
Seems like one of the biggest hurdles (for guys like me) would be the actual designing of the tooling, knowing who could make it, etc.
It would be amazing to see what some of you guys with design/engineering/machinist/forging experience could create if you were able to collaborate on a project together.
I always imagined them using an extremely hot press to make scales, so I'm not surprised you had to heat it up so much.
Didn't they originally use thinner more pliable cattle horn for scale making vs the thick blanks we buy now?

I don't remember reading about anyone boiling scales in neatsfoot oil instead of just soaking. Wish I could try that, especially if it makes the scales stronger.

Thanks for all the info!!

Originally Posted by JP5

Thanks for answering our questions. Im glad you got pictures of the work in progress. The scales you've made made look great and your still refining the process.
Just to clarify, I wasn't making any suggestions about chemicals. I was just curious about how it was done originally.
Seems like one of the biggest hurdles (for guys like me) would be the actual designing of the tooling, knowing who could make it, etc.
It would be amazing to see what some of you guys with design/engineering/machinist/forging experience could create if you were able to collaborate on a project together.
I always imagined them using an extremely hot press to make scales, so I'm not surprised you had to heat it up so much.
Didn't they originally use thinner more pliable cattle horn for scale making vs the thick blanks we buy now?

I don't remember reading about anyone boiling scales in neatsfoot oil instead of just soaking. Wish I could try that, especially if it makes the scales stronger.

Thanks for all the info!!

I am hoping that others will refine the process and think of things that I haven't. There is a vast area of experimentation out there to try. One advantage the old guys had was that they had tons of horn to work with, and more importantly, screw up with. Delaminating off thinner pieces is another art, and band sawing requires blades with very thin kerfs that run very true. As far as other skills out there; someone with lost wax casting experience and equipment could make a very highly detailed, contoured cast brass die which could have a follow die for pressing old style contoured designs. Each day I think of new possibilities, and where there is a will, there is a way. I made the fixture with a drill press and a hand tap. Haven't done that in years.

For boiling horn, I use a $10 hot plate, an old frying pan, some tweezers and some 100% Neatsfoot. When I try a piece treated that way before heating and pressing, I'll surely report back. Should be interesting. One of the differences in oil boiling and water boiling is that oil doesn't make the horn revert to it's curved memory. Anther feature is that like the hot pressing, it's done as soon as it cools whereas water requires slow drying while clamped.

Keep cogitatin'

The late Neil Miller probably forgot more about the old processes than most of us know, he and I had a few discussions on here about Horn and Scale making

In fact, it was from one of those where I got the idea of using the hot oil, IIRC they were actually using Whale oil back then BUT you might take a look through some of Neil's old posts and see if there are more ideas for you in there. I know I gleaned quite a few i have used in the workshop over the years


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