Made Rite knot hole depth

[pdieten]

I ground out the original knot from this Made Rite 500PB today to make sure it would take a new knot. The original knot had zero backbone and was impossible to lather with.

That hole got only 9mm deep before I hit resin. No wonder the brush was so floppy. Is this normal? I don't want more than 50mm loft from the replacement badger knot I'm getting and I suspect I'll have to grind out quite a bit of this to make it work.

Thoughts?

 

[REV579]

I have found this to be true of many older brushes. What size knot will you be using?
If you are looking for more backbone, you might consider setting the knot deeper than the glue bulge.

 

[pdieten]

I have a 21mm knot coming for it. That's how big the hole was without widening it any more than original.

 

[oldjoe]

Drill or/and grind the hole deeper than you may think you need to set your replacement knot. When you get your replacement knot you can try different depth positions to get what you are looking for. You can take a wine cork and cut different thickness spacers. That's what I do and it works out very nicely. Hopefully your replacement knot won't have a huge bulge?

 

[Borderboss]

I didn't find your issue when I reknotted a Made Rite 150 or a Made Rite 7, but they're longer handles than the one you have, or at least look to be from your photo.

 

[pdieten]

Drill or/and grind the hole deeper than you may think you need to set your replacement knot. When you get your replacement knot you can try different depth positions to get what you are looking for. You can take a wine cork and cut different thickness spacers. That's what I do and it works out very nicely. Hopefully your replacement knot won't have a huge bulge?

Good advice, thanks. The knot is a Shave Forge super badger. We'll see how it fits and behaves and I won't be afraid of grinding the handle hole down any further than it is.

I didn't find your issue when I reknotted a Made Rite 150 or a Made Rite 7, but they're longer handles than the one you have, or at least look to be from your photo.

This is a catalin handle about 50mm tall; I'm anticipating a total height no more than about 102-104mm.

 

[pdieten]

The Shave Forge 20mm super badger knot arrived and I finally decided to set it in the Made Rite 500 handle at 54mm loft using silicone adhesive. Standing here (left) all bloomed and damp after its first lather, next to its stablemate 303 cased-badger boar brush that I didn't use today.

The 500 did a great job lathering up a hard soap, had the right amount of backbone and just a tiny bit of scritch. Handle is solid and well balanced. It's a winner. I just wish the debossed lettering on the bottom of the handle was stamped more deeply; it's shallow and hard to fill with paint without pulling it back out.

The only problem with the knot was that its bottom wasn't straight. I had to grind it a little bit to get it to sit flat in the handle. Otherwise it feels like a new high quality best badger knot. Not bad for seventeen dollars shipped, I think.

I guess the 303 is going to need a knot of some sort too. I wanted to like it but the boar center is effectively only about 18mm wide at the base and it's like trying to lather with a dowel. Too much backbone. That's too nice of a handle to not use and I want it in the rotation, but now I have to decide what knot I want in it. I don't want to expand holes because I don't like altering handles, so it has to perform at 20mm. A third badger seems superfluous though, I already have my regular EJ medium best and now the 500. I guess I'll have to think about it.

 

[REV579]

Nicely done!

 

[pdieten]

Thanks I did have a bit of grinding to do in the handle. Took out about 4mm and left it there to see how the knot would perform at 54mm where my EJ badger is; I figured I could always grind more. But I was really happy with it at that height and decided not to mess with it any further. Probably won't even pull the siliconed knot out to reset with epoxy, I'll just leave the silicone unless the knot pops out on me.

I decided what to do with the 303. It's getting the Shave Forge mixed badger-boar which is now on order for $10. That will give me an option between my vintage Stanhome 213 (23mm cased boar) and my two badgers. I'm not actually a fan of big, soft, or overly dense brushes, so this ought to work out I think.

 

[REV579]

The Silicone does provide you with a couple of options. And unless the handles are substantially different in feel, a little diversity never hurts. Of my restored brushes, I have more than a few 16mm-20mm, but the duplicate knots do vary either in handle material or length.