Kramer Zwilling Rehandle

Here's a Kramer Zwilling chef's knife that's had it's handle upgraded. This job was such a challenge that I hope to not have to do anymore of these, although I do have one more here waiting currently. After this next one I'll charge at least double to even think about it again.

Why was it so difficult? To start the scales are epoxied on - plus they use a really thin paper liner. When the epoxy factor is added to the wood used being so fragile that it chips apart into small pieces factor, the removal of the scales had to be done by grinding. Yes the scales, right down to the last fraction of a millimeter had to be ground/sanded off both the tang and bolsters. Then, the real challenge came into play when the scales were to be mounted because the tang has been tapered and is completely uneven from top to bottom - back to front and in every other possible direction. Flat scales will not fit up to this tang - NEVER EVER! Had I not previously done hundreds of handles in the past I don't believe I could have done this one without it fitting up like crap. Yeah this rehandle was in the top 3 worst I've had to do.

On the details....

The customer really wanted to keep the Kramer (center) pin and re-use it on the new handle and I was 99.99% sure I wouldn't be able to do this and then it became clear that I certainly couldn't as this pin isn't a pin at all, it's just a decoration, a shallow plug that doesn't run through the handle.

Since I don't care for using large pinstock (like the factory used) I opted for smaller size pins but used some Kramer-esque styled brass pins to pay respect (to Bob's design) and still give the customer a similar feel to what he wanted.

The wood was supplied by the customer, it's stabilized dyed box elder burl.

Liners are G10

The handle was shaped to be close to the stock feel but less bulbous/fat, I like this aspect of the job, I think this feels good in the hand.

On the blade, I did no blade work at all (not even sharpening) so any differences you may see in the comparison shots would be from lighting.


I hope that the customer enjoys this knife more than I did...LOL

 

Awesome work, always wanted to try one of these...but not so much anymore. Follows the contours of the original very well.

 

You should do one Matt, you'll enjoy the experience I'm sure.

 

What's the old saying about don't do a good job at something you hate?

That looks fabulous, Dave.

 

Well, you may not have liked working on it, the result is beautiful!

 

What @mark76 said.

@Lucretia, I believe the quote is "Nothing worth doing, is ever easy."

 

Some good points being made here....LOL

Thanks folks!

 

Ha, I am more than okay living vicariously right now...and I don't have a shop anymore. But seriously, I keep coming back to look at this one. Really nice work.

 

Better watch out, Dave. As good as that looks you might be getting a flood of ZKramers in the door! It would look great in redwood....

 

No!!!! 2