Thread: Good Idea/Bad Idea?

I am new to the world of straights, but I am thinking of cheap long term products to make my cheap newbie razors fun and special. Besides Maas and a polish cloth, I think the easiest way to do this is new scales. I was looking at different woods and plastics and thinking what could I do, when I realised, what if I made something truly unique, something from my homeland in Africa? And I thought of malacite or tiger's eye scales. The rough is not so cheap: 25 or so bucks for a rock large and nice enough. The work: long and tedious. But Since this is long term and would really be unique, it's worth the time and effort to me. If it works. My question to the pro's is, is it feasible scale material? I understand that typically there is some flex to scales, to hold the blade open etc, does it matter that they are rigid? Instead of a wedge could a flat piece be used? Could thin rubber washers be used at the pin to hold the blade open? Any advice, cautions, doubts etc would be welcome. I don't want to throw hours of work into something not feasible. (btw, malacite is a green crystalling looking rock that is cut and polished into lots of different shapes with great effect, so is tiger's eye and it's blue variant, hawk's eye)

Short answer: no.

Long answer:
First, your right about flexibility of scales. Most scales flex, I don't know why, but it probably has something to do with holding the metal blade in place and not wanting the scales to shatter or the scales to damage the blade. That said, wapis and the SS dovo have metal scales. Theres always exceptions.

But thats not the real reason minerals would make a poor choice of scale material. The big reason is balance. Bill Ellis posted a nice post about this on the other forum. But think about it, Tigerseye and Malachite are rather heavy for their volume, dense. Ever shaved with a razor with SS scales? Its not as easy as shaving with a razor with plastic ones. Same will be true with scales made from minerals.

The final reason is fragility. Scales are normally pretty thin, so...if you ever drop that razor...

All that aside, it can probably be done. Just not on its own. You can probably make the scales really thin and attach them to acrylic scales. See; Max's abalone or paua scales. Sorry Max, I butchered the name of the material. If thats truly what you want to do, thats probably the best way. Really thin pieces attached to an acrylic backing.

A better route is to do inserts in wood.

hmmmm... sounds reasonable... didn't quite think about that. So with wood inserts, how does one finish wood? with laquer? and can anyone think of a bonding substance that will bond mineral to wood/acrylic/plastic?

You can use anything you want, you just can't use a solid piece of it...
lay it out in a mosaic pattern and allow for flex between the pieces and yer fine....

so that would be going along with the use a backing thing?

Originally Posted by khaos

so that would be going along with the use a backing thing?

Yes it would and normally they were done with metal liners in the past...sorta put together like a stained glass window...

Hmmmm... I could probably mill something out of aluminum or brass or whatever fits the mineral I use on the CNC mill here at school... how would I go about affixing it if it's mosaic style?

You must post pictures once your done!

That will be in a few months. I don't have rock cutting tools so I'll be hand filing/sanding it when I finally decide what I want to do....

Can someone please explain why I can't use a solid? If an expert says so I won't disagree, I'm just curious why?