A Drawknife restoration.
Back in 2011 I managed to get an Acorn handled drawknife from eBay for an absolute bargain of £11. One of the handles was cracked beyond repair, so I decided to use one half as the outline for a template to then turn two new ones using my Kity lathe. You may notice that I have made the handles a little rounder than the originals but this was to make for a more comfortable grip for myself. Before fitting the new handles I cleaned up the blade, removing a couple of nicks on its edge and honed it to a razor sharpness. As I needed to burr over the ends of each handles shaft, I made the new handles about an 1/8th of an inch shorter to allow for the fitting of a washer. I found it sufficient to hold the blade in an engineers vice, using some offcut wood packing, before hammering the ends of the shafts to secure the handles in place. It is important to make sure this is well done as the force of pulling the blade towards you puts a lot of strain at this point and you don't want a handle coming off mid-stroke. All in all I am happy with the restoration and look forward to trying it out when I make some Oak shingles in the Spring.
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| The finished drawknife |
Back in 2011 I managed to get an Acorn handled drawknife from eBay for an absolute bargain of £11. One of the handles was cracked beyond repair, so I decided to use one half as the outline for a template to then turn two new ones using my Kity lathe. You may notice that I have made the handles a little rounder than the originals but this was to make for a more comfortable grip for myself. Before fitting the new handles I cleaned up the blade, removing a couple of nicks on its edge and honed it to a razor sharpness. As I needed to burr over the ends of each handles shaft, I made the new handles about an 1/8th of an inch shorter to allow for the fitting of a washer. I found it sufficient to hold the blade in an engineers vice, using some offcut wood packing, before hammering the ends of the shafts to secure the handles in place. It is important to make sure this is well done as the force of pulling the blade towards you puts a lot of strain at this point and you don't want a handle coming off mid-stroke. All in all I am happy with the restoration and look forward to trying it out when I make some Oak shingles in the Spring.
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