So I am experimenting with this new handle material I made up that I call Impregg. It's sanitized and crushed egg shell, mica powder, and G-Flex epoxy. It's got some really neat depth to it, you can see through the gaps between shells to the swirls of mica powder inside. The tang is left rough and the material is "cast" directly onto it. I feel it will work really well for my integrals especially.
Please let me know what you think, I plan on using it in a little upcoming series.

Hand forged S7 high carbon steel camp knife with integral guard. Impregg handle and wenge insert. This knife features a forged thumb rest that gives you wonderful control over the blade for most tasks.




Hand forged W2 high carbon steel camp knife with integral finger rest. Impregg handle and 3D printed cast bronze medallion with my logo incorporated.

That handle material is interesting and i am really surprised to learn that you used actual egg shells for the white bits. What does the texture feel like? Can you feel all the bumps of the shells as you run your fingers over it? My only issue is the distribution of the egg shell in comparisson to the resin material. Some parts look like they have very tight packed clusters of shells vs the other areas almost devoid of the shells for example pictures 5 and 6 near the decorative bit on the handle and along the spine of picture 5. Very cool idea though, i look forward to seeing how you develop it.

Nice knives Theo. interesting idea but why egg shell? 

Hmm.. How about green egg shells? Some of my chickens lay green eggs.  

another idea could be sea shell bits. Those would look awesome in there if some of the ridges and stuff showed. 

Cool idea. I'm curious if this stems back from a thread I saw that was about possibly incorporating loved ones ashes into handle material. 

Dustin: It's a perfectly smooth surface - the shells are porous and soak up the epoxy and pretty much become stabilized. I did put a final thin coat of epoxy over it to give it a sheen. I did struggle to get the shells to become uniform in the epoxy, I think I finally got a handle on it (lol, get it?).

Daswulf: The inspiration comes from my father who creates sculptures from egg shells http://jamesnazz.net/ I have been looking into different shells and mediums - chips of mother of pearl have captured my attention recently. I had been thinking the same thing, that this would work really well for mixing in ashes - with the eggshells it would be a great death and rebirth piece.

9 minutes ago, TheoRockNazz said:

 I think I finally got a handle on it (lol, get it?).

Ba dum tsh!

Very cool. I've never seen egg sculpture like that. 

Keep up the great work. 

I can't really say if I like it I really can't see it closely enough.

I think the idea is well worth exploring though, egg shell is so able to take treatments: from food coloring to impregnation with all sorts of interesting pigments, resins sparkly things, etc. 

Frosty The Lucky.

This reminds me of a piece we did in the art restoration studio, where we had to replace a section of white-veined black marble. My coworker Ed cast a thin slab of epoxy mixed with white pigment, smashed it into shards, and then mixed those shards into epoxy tinted with black pigment. Carefully ground to shape and polished, it looked great. One could easily use other colors of pigment as well.

 

I do the same thing with resin. Permeable materials are better than solids in my experience. When I do something like wood chips or even coffee grounds I have to do it in a vacuum to get the saturation of resin. Other materials like shredded felt and construction paper work fine though with just a few tons of pressure and are easier to achieve an abuse-withstanding bond.

-J

One way to get saturation with resins is to thin them with their solvent, when the solvent evaporates out the resin breaks and sets. The resin won't break till the solvent is evaporated clear. Polyester resins likes acetone and epoxy resins like xylene. A 50% cut will saturate an inch with about a 5 min soak. That's to the center of 2" rd in about a 5 min soak. The resins won't break till the solvent is clear. (evaporated out completely)

The trick is determining how much to cut the resin to get the saturation you want AND the resin density you want. Speed the saturation and lower the density.

Funny how many things you pick up working in a rubber plant and repairing your surfboard, family boat and dings in your vette. I discovered cutting resins cleaning my brushes. The boards I beat the brushes on after rinsing were becoming bullet proof in no time so I started playing around. I'd clean a brush a few times and cut the board to see how far it'd penetrated. Then I switched to 1" boards and was really surprised when the cut resins were showing up on the far side after beating 2 brushes out.

Then I read that cutting/thinning resin is how you prime wood if you don't want fiberglass to delaminate. It works a treat.

Anywho, that's how I stabilize: wood, bone, horn, antler, moose turds, etc.

Frosty The Lucky.

12 hours ago, Frosty said:

...stabilize: wood, bone, horn, antler, moose turds, etc.

on a forged blade with impregnated manure from the neighbor bull..

Would that be a real BS blade?