New Dirk

**James MacMillan** · 29th February 08, 09:13 PM

Originally Posted by ohneplo

PiobBear,
My compliments on a very handsome Dirk Sir. Wear it with pride. I really admire your carving on the handle and your sheath craftsmanship.

I took a somewhat different approach when I made my most recent dirk in oak, and carried the wood right into the sheath design to avoid the possibility of the blade coming right through.

Again my compliments.

Capt Bruce

Very, very nice work!!! Can you give us some more details please. How, what method did you use to carve it? How long did it take? Etc, etc, etc, etc.

**ohneplo** · 29th February 08, 09:47 PM

James,

My pleasure. I was given the blade in rough form years ago and filed and polished it over the course of a few years by hand for lack of power tools. I decided to craft the handle and sheath of red oak to hold the crisp details of the knot work having had other woods lose small details over the years.

I worked up a pine handle mock up to test the fit of tang, and then roughed out the two halves cut from an oak blank (horizontal cut on the flat of the blade). The rough handle was epoxied together encapsulating the tang. Took out my carving chisels and X-acto knives and jumped in. It took about four weeks working on it in my spare time to detail the handle. MacKenzie crest on the pommel.

The sheath was made the same way with a blank cut in two. Traced the blade and removed half the blade thickness from each half with chisels and then squared up with a v-gouge in the corners. Epoxy again for a watertight seal. Sketched out the pattern in pencil and started the chip carving to sink the details into the surface on the top. It took about 25 hours to complete.

I fabricated the throat for the sheath from soldered sheet brass and fitted a traditional mount on its back for a frog. Polished it within an inch of its life and then copper/nickle plated it using a 12 volt battery driven swab plating kit purchased on the net. Again, epoxy and some brass pins to mount it to the sheath.

Other than staining the wood, I've never gotten around to coating its surface and over time I've come to prefer its somewhat dull surface and the patina it has acquired just from handling. That's a quick and dirty Dirk development but hopefully it might give someone else ideas that it can be done.

Fair winds,

Capt Bruce