Thanks John for that explanation.  As I have thought more about this, at
this point, I think my biggest challenge is going to be filing off the
original peening in order to remove the metal cap in order to install new
leather washers.  The trick being to fill it off without undue damage to
the knife.

Thanks,

Doc
On Jan 25, 2012 3:49 AM, "John Manners"  wrote:

> John Holladay writes:
>
>  Do you fellows have any suggestions as to the most effective method to do
>> this peening to lock in that little steel piece on the butt of the handle?
>>
>
> Just before Christmas a friend asked me to rehabilitate an old Estwing
> geologist's hammer (a la the movie "Shawshank? Redemption" but considerably
> larger than the movie version).  It was intended to be a present for my
> friend's brother.  After rust removal and cleaning off the numerous paint
> spots which bespangled the stacked leather handle came the matter of
> tightening the loose (shrunken?) leather washers forming the handle. The
> washers were relatively intact to the extent that they did not require
> replacing although they needed to be re-shaped a little, burnished and
> polished after tightening.
>
> There was the real prospect that the metal shank leading to the hammer's
> head or the tang above it would be bent or otherwise distorted if the head
> was placed on an anvil and the peened end of the tang, protruding through
> the metal end-cap, given a smack with a hammer.
>
> The most simple thing to do seemed to be to treat the peening of the
> tang's end in the same, counter-intuitive way that an axe's handle is
> driven into the axe's head.
>
> I held the hammer suspended, head down, with my hand on the lower part of
> the leather section and struck the top of the tang with a relatively light
> peening hammer.  Although my left arm (I am right-handed) gave under each
> hammer stroke, the inertia of the head of the workpiece was sufficient to
> permit the top of the tang to be peened further.  All it took was about
> half a dozen peening strokes to take up what had previously been a little
> less than 1/16"  of movement of the handle's washers.  I would caution
> against delivering a too-enthusiastic or prolonged peening in this fashion
> as it is very effective to the extent that, in the job described, a washer,
> less resilient than its fellows, was compressed beyond its alignment with
> the rest of the handle and had to be brought back into alignment before
> final burnishing and polishing could be undertaken.
>
> I am pretty sure that new leather washers can be fitted to John's knife to
> maintain a bit of a friction-hold on the tang until, with light blows, the
> top of the tang is sufficiently peened to prevent its being driven through
> the metal end-cap, whereafter the force of the blows may be increased a bit
> to speed up the tightening of the handle.
>
> Clearly, the inertia of a knife blade held suspended is less than that of
> the head of a hammer or an axe and, off the top of my head, I would suggest
> that greater inertia be imparted to the blade by  attaching a heavy set of
> Vise-Grips to it during the peening process.
>
> Regards from Brisbane,
>
> John Manners
>
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