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Joseph Elliot: Rough Blade-How to Proceed?
Hi All-Since I'm already building a complete knife-making workshop for my son's budding hobby (hopefully a business!), I'm also looking to get into razor restorations. With that in mind, I just acquired this "
somewhat rough" Joseph Elliott Celebrated pictured below:
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These are the Before pics. It says Universally Approved Best Silver Steel on the blade face. Hone wear is light/moderate, though the edge has a fair amount of chipping (though I don't see the rust/pitting into the edge). There is some red rust, as well as a good amount of black tarnish, "devil's spit," and pitting here and there. The horn scales have some bug bites and seem to be delaminating. After unpinning and working on it with Mother's to see what lay underneath, here is what it looks like:
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I have a few questions about it: Any information on this particular blade would be appreciated-dates, history, etc. But also:
1. Should I try to preserve the scales? I just got a whole box-full of cutoffs from a custom woodworker friend (various burls, rosewood, walnut, cherry, etc.). I may try my hand at scale-making, and will gladly get some of it stabilized if I think I can use some of this free treasure trove!
2. I'm watching the Brad Maggard/Undream restoration videos, and may just try to take this thing through the grits on the buffers. Is it too far gone, or can I get a lot of that out? I don't mind preserving some "character" if it will help me preserve the stamping.
3. The pin-hole on the tang is kinda worn. Will a 1/16" pin work? Inside washers? I am slowly practicing my peening on other razors.
My goal is to sort of learn the whole process as I go on razors like this. I never was smart enough to do one step at a time, and as I'll have my summer off (one benefit of teaching!), a workshop with all the tools, and hopefully the patience and wisdom to learn from my mistakes, any advice?
TIA for any thoughts! Aaron