Thread: New scales help!

So i've finally decided to make my own custom set of scales for an early razor. I took an old style lead spacer and shaped it into a squarish form to fit with the general look of the scales. I used an old set of cap washers and I couldn't wait to pin the blade....and this is exactly what I did.

Pretty soon I noticed that the blade is off center, but I thought that it will be fixed as long as I will continue to adjust the pinning by hitting the opposite side pivot pin, like I did in other pinning projects....well I was wrong.

I tried and tried with no success, so I felt I have no choice and I un-pinned the blade. Luckily no damage have been done to the scales nor the washers.

First I thought it was the blade that maybe bent but after I checked with other blades I have I found that they're all off center in the same direction. My conclusion is that the scales may cause the problem, but since these are my first custom scales I really don't want to dispose them as I worked for hours on making them.

I'm adding some picture of the scales for you guys to observe and may notice something crucial that i've missed (I know that on side is slightly more curved that the other, this accrued only after I buffed them).

They are bent,perhaps from heat generated by buffing,try to get them straight,may solve the problem

OK so I straighten them up but nothing happened...

then I placed a brass rod and saw this:

I thought that drilling one hole and placing it over the other scale then mark the place and trill the second one will be effective (since I still don't have a drill stand), well, that wasn't a good idea huh?
Any thought of how can I still save the project?

Hard to tell but from the pics you may need to bush that pivot hole,looks pretty worn.Good luck.

Always best to drill with the scales together. You could try to oblong the hole slightly using the drill bit, kind of work it in a way like a file so that it brings it more in line.
Also...is it just my eyes or is your brass rod bent? If it is then there's no real way to fix that...needs to be straight.

You could use double sided tape, stick them together and dril out the holes with a 5/64 bit, it will leave some play at first but will snug down as you peen.

one of your scales is not straight and possibly the pivot pins are misaligned.
Are those made from horn?

Yes those are brown horn scales. I notice that the pivot holes are misaligned so I alined them using a 1/16 driller when one hole got slightly wider to one way and the other to the opposite direction. When placing a rod between them now, it sits straight.

My concern now is for the brass rod, can I use the same diameter rod although it's have more space around it now in the pivot holes or should I get a slightly thicker rod?

you can straighten the scales before you pin the razor:
do a search on straightening sales and centering blades, you will find a lot of good tips and info.

You could try pinning the blade first. Then when you pin the wedge end you can push lengthwise back and forth on the two scales to mess with the centering as you pin the wedge.

The technique works sometimes but not all the time.

Charlie