Thread: Ox Horn

I had no idea..

Funny we don't see more scales made with Ox. I class Ox horn as superior to buffalo , it feels like glass to me. The colours are amazing, i have just discovered red..
Drawbacks are that it is less available than buffalo and you are not guaranteed even one set of scales per slab due to the nature of it but i would still advise everyone to a buy a piece .

I made some scales for a guy from Reindeer antler a few years ago. He gave me a few pieces of antler, his brother raised them for meat in Alaska.

After cutting and sanding the antler took on different colors, one came out pink, another green and a third brown. He told me that it depended on what was in their diet just before they shed or were harvested.

Once cut and polished they looked like marble. Reindeer was very hard and polished well on a buffer but was sharp as a knife when cut.

Originally Posted by Euclid440

I made some scales for a guy from Reindeer antler a few years ago. He gave me a few pieces of antler, his brother raised them for meat in Alaska.

After cutting and sanding the antler took on different colors, one came out pink, another green and a third brown. He told me that it depended on what was in their diet just before they shed or were harvested.

Once cut and polished they looked like marble. Reindeer was very hard and polished well on a buffer but was sharp as a knife when cut.

Sounds like it looks great if that makes sense...reminded me of some stag horn i have , rock solid and heavy it feels rock ..
Cheers

Are the reindeer and stag horns too rigid for razor scales? I have some deer antler that we give the dogs as a chew and they are like pieces of petrified wood.

“Are the reindeer and stag horns too rigid for razor scales?”

No, because they are so tuff, they can be thinned down enough to make them flexible, yet strong.

They cut and sand like a hard wood, I cut them on a bandsaw and shaped with a belt sander. You will not be shaping them with a scraper like horn. The guy’s brother collected all the shed and the antlers from harvest, cut them up and sold them as dog chews.

I have bought some antler from a local Home Outlet store, Home Goods, that sells discontinued items. They sell packaged antler dog chews and I have bought some for a few dollars. They are pricy in Pet Supply stores selling for about $15-20 per piece, most are cut to 5” but occasionally you can get a 6 or 7 inch piece thick enough to get a pair of scales from.

I got them down to a fat 16th and used the natural arc for the face side. They started out about ¾ - 1 inch diameter. The dense outer part with color can vary depending on the thickness of the piece, but you can’t go deeper than about a ¼ to 3/8th inch, so plan accordingly.

On one of the scales the inside was a bit punky, so I flooded it with CA and it dried hard and sanded smooth. It is not as attractive as the outside piece, but you don’t really see between the scales.

Because the color varies so wildly, I get both sides from the same piece. At a 1/16 they flex a bit more than wood, but not like horn. They finish like glass with a buffer and stainless compound. I have some photos, I will see if I can find them, it has been a few years.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJZmnYc6mNo

Recently i started restoring a Greaves Boston Razor , what a quality piece.. Its scales are soaking in neatsfoot for restoration but after cleaning up the blade i decided to make some special scales from some rare (really rare, not ebay rare) white Ox horn.
Whilst sanding the backsides or the insides of the scales it revealed orange with what looks like white writing inside.
Obviously some kind of code :/