There are those of us that wear a sgian dubh and those who do not; those who wish to look authentic or traditional but would choose a less lethal form of sgian. For them and the air transport industry there is the safety sgian dubh, often called the sgian don't. Taken one step further is the sgian brew, a clever and witty way of having a necessary drinking tool to hand without filling up valuable sporran space.

I had it in mind to make a sgian comb. I remember from my youth aluminium combs that had a rats' tail handle. Rather like this, but metal and shiny:



I thought that the rat's tail could be anchored in a handle and the tines could be tapered to a point. Still a comb, but with a fancy handle. I discovered that the last comb like this was made in 1970 or there about and they were not to be had.

Back to the drawing board.

Then the thought struck me - this is the 21st century; we are living next door to the information superhighway. I would make a sgian dongle. (Actually it should be a sgian memory stick, but that doesn't look as good in the thread title.)

I had a brand new 2 gig memory stick, a lath of pine, some wood glue, a headless screw, tools, some wood stain and some cairngorms.

All the small images are clickable.

From an existing sgian dubh, I made a template of the handle.



The lath was cut in two and marked out.



A slot cut in each to receive the memory stick.



The two halves were glued together.

Using the template, I cut away everything that didn't look like the original handle.



More to come