Thread: Scales shrunk
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Old 04-13-2017, 12:46 AM
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TexasJack TexasJack is offline
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I think Doug brought out some good points. The handles in question are oak, and it's not particularly oily wood, so it's not surprising that it could shrink.

Woodworkers got into stabilization for turning pieces on a lathe that had beautiful but very weak spots in the wood. (A friend of mine jokes about "spalted wood", saying that he has some pieces of rust pitted iron that he refers to as "spalted".) Stabilization - which really amounts to pulling a vacuum to suck the air bubbles out of wood and letting an acrylic resin (superglue) and solvent mix soak in and harden - allows soft woods and wood with flaws to be used for a lot of different things, including knife handles. But how much stabilizer goes into something like cocobolo is really questionable - as is the necessity for that.

Likewise, the surface coating on handles "stabilizes" the wood to a certain degree, making it difficult for the wood to change water content.


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