It's been a little slow on how- to's lately so I thought I would see if any of you want to share tips on adding silver stripping to the edge of bits and spurs.

I've never done any other than putting copper into the back of mouthbars on bits but I would like to be able to offer this option. I know there are several ways to cut the groves for the silver. On my bits I use a hacksaw to cut the grove and then use a small pointed chisel to make the dovetail to hold the copper in place.

What technique do you use to cut your groves?
How do you keep the spacing and depth even?
What gauge of silver do you use?

Larry

I do it about the same. I use a hack saw and at the bottom of the cut I move the saw from side to side to make it wider at the bottom. Then i pound in fine silver wire, and file it smooth.
Jim

Larry

I have done this pretty much the same way Jim described. I did find a saw blade that was wider/heavier than standard, I belive it was for a power hacksaw this made a wider strip that I liked better. I used silver strips cut from a sheet of fine silver this made a square edge which I thought filled the slot better. I cleaned up the edge with file and then a hard large buff with fairly coarse cutting compound. As far as layout I just went slow and eyeballed everything. I tried filing the slots but did not like the results. Probably pretty primative but seemed to work

Jim

Did you get my PM "Pictures of engraving" let me know please.

_________________
Norm Harris, Jr.
"The outside of a Horse is good for the inside of a Man"

I do most of my striping the same way. Vary the width using different types of blades. For a wider stripe, I have used a file and brazed the silver into the recessed areas. With some practice I think it may have promise, as you don't need to undercut the edges. The silver is actually bonded to the the steel. The problem I was having was the odd large pit in the silver that couldn't be worked out and would have to be redone, but then you made a mess of the inlay stripe beside it. I was using Handi flux to keep things somewhat oxide free(with limited success). On the last peice I did like this I used powdered brazing flux which, worked much better-didn't "burn" off like soldering flux did.

Charles Fields showed me a two hacksaw blades, one cut slightly shorter than the other. If you lay them side by side, teeth facing the opposite direction.
If you offset them the same distance as the depth of cut you want for your
stripe then spot weld them together. When you use it to make your cut.
The back of one will be the depth gage for the other. When the blade gets
dull, Turn it over.
Rod

Rod good idea. A friend of mine mentioned taking a hacksawblade and grinding off the kerf edge of the teeth on both sides to make a hacksaw blade to cut the dovetail at the bottom of the main cut. He had also found a wide blade like Norm mentioned.

Norm, what gauge sheet silver do you use to make your strips?

Thanks for the ideas.

Larry

Larry

It been quite some time since I was doing that work but is seems to me that at that time the thickest guage I could get in Fine Silver was 16 guage. I ordered a small piece and hand trimed the strips with hand shears. About the time I got a system down cutting the strips, Rio started carrying Fine Silver in ready made strips. I know you do a lot of damascus, could you tell me if you can inlay strips, etc. in the damascus the same way or is there a special procedure.

_________________
Norm Harris, Jr.
"The outside of a Horse is good for the inside of a Man"

Norm,

Iv'e never tried to use silver in damascus. I need to try a test piece to see how the acid will affect the silver since you need to etch after you inlay the silver and file everything smooth. Gold works fine but you have to make sure that it is in tight all the way around to keep the acid from getting under the inlay and then bleeding out later, this makes a real mess.
Damascus is some neat steel but you need to plan ahead all the time. You can overlay after you etch but you have to be real careful you don't get to much solder or it will run down into the etched pattern and you can't just sand or scrape it off without damaging the pattern.At any rate it is alot of extra work but I think the results are worth it.

Larry