Renewing one of my favorite brushes

[Rivguy]

Gentlemen,

I have been wet shaving for many years and have tried to up-grade my shaving experience over those many years. In an endeavor to take this experience up a notch or two I turned to the Internet and found and joined this site. I want to thank you all for your valuable tips and reviews that have contributed to the enhancement of my shaving experience.

My favorite brush is a Col. Conk full volume badger in a pewter handle. I believe that this brush was made by Vulfix. If my memory serves me correctly, I have used this brush steadily for about ten years. (I think that is correct but they say that as we age, our memories are the second thing to go...I don't remember the first. This brush has lost some hair over the years but the amount has increased over the last few years... not unlike it's owner.

I would like to either rebuild this brush my self or have have it done by a competent person.

As a card carrying wood butcher, I like to think that I know my way around the shop and have a well equipped shop. I have thought about chucking a forstner bit in the drill press and attempting to drill out the old brush stump but my hesitation is rooted in not wanting to ruin the pewter handle.

I have seen some of the posts here on rebuilding a brush but perhaps I have not found the right one to bolster my confidence. Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. I think that I saw a post from a fellow member who does rebuilding but do not remember the thread.

 

[Boba Fett]

You are right to be a bit worried about ruining the handle. Pewter is a relatively soft alloy, especially if it is the type of pewter which contains lead--if your handle has a bluish tint, it has lead in it--though I am doubtful a product would be manufactured with lead in it, especially having that purpose. Assuming it doesn't have lead in it, it is likely a little bit less malleable, and you have the benefit of it being a solid mass, as opposed to being, say, a small figurine with thin appendages which are easily bent.

All the same, I would suggest you continue to search the site, checking the brush section of course, and hope to find someone who has refurbished brushes before. Though you may have the proper equipment and a steady hand, it may be wiser to leave the first refurbishing to someone who has done it before. The saying in medicine goes "watch one, do one, show one". If you can find some videos on the forums or online, and they give some good detail and tips, by all means, give it a shot if you are confident.

Good luck; I hope the brush continues to give you great lather.

 

[Schwert]

First welcome to the forum. There are a number of people who have done or are doing restorations here so you ought to get some great feedback.

Rudy Vey does some amazing restores for folks who have not wanted to do their own...but I think you can pull this one off easily.

I have cut off the hair close to the handle and tried drilling the remainder out with a forstner and found it not as easy as I thought it would be. The forstner wanted to essentially just grind up the hair into dust. I turned to a small standard twist drill (around a quarter inch) and used that. This rather than drilling out the hair as dust more of less pulled and cut it out...much less mess and pretty easily controlled in my hand drill.

Once you have the hair mostly out you can clean it up with either sandpaper or a sharp scraper. The pewter handle would require a careful touch but you should be able to do it fairly easily.

Golden Nib has a range of knots to use. Once you know the hole diameter and depth you can order up something that should give you many many more years.

Have fun, post photos.

 

[Rivguy]

Thank you for your thoughts, I am going to proceed cautiously.

 

[JeffE]

Yes, welcome to B&B!!

And of course this is something you can do yourself with a little practice and skill, but my advice would be that if the pewter handle is meaningful for you and you don't want to booger it up while you make some beginner's mistakes, then give the brush to Rudy Vey and he will do an awesome job for you.

Just send him a PM here and he will tell you where to send the brush and what it will cost. He's not my cousin or anything, but he just restored a brush for me and it came out awesome. Best choice I could have made, given how unique the brush handle is.

And you can always replace the badger on a few less valuable handles too!! Just read instructions on this site.

 

[Sam F]

Welcome, I have replaced the knot in a few handles. I bought a Dremmel like tool at Harbor Freight and once I cut the original knot down I used the various grinding bits to grind out the rest. There is dust and some smell. If you are going to try it I would recommend you try and pick up an inexpensive brush to do I practice run on 1st before you attempt one that has some meaning to you. Good luck whichever way you go.


Sam

 

[Rudy Vey]

When you drill out the old knot, make sure to use a good quality vise that can hold the handle on your drill press table - I use a highest quality, custom handmade pen blank drilling vise. Needless to say that the handle must be perfectly aligned with the bit and the handle is wrapped with something that allows to protect its outside while it is securely held in the vise like a piece of rubber or leather.

 

[spanx]

Welcome to B&B.A good safe way to remove that knot would be to cut the hair flush with the handle.Since you have shop tools I assume you have a drill press.Chuck up a 1/16ths drill bit and drill along the perimiter of the knot about 1/16ths apart( yes there will be lots of holes) as close to the rim as you feel comfortable. The press will make this easy.Pop out the knot with a pick> It'll come out easy. Clean out the remainder with a dremel sized drum sander chucked up in the drill press.Sand out the rest on the slowest speed setting.

 

[Rivguy]

Thanks for all the tips gents, I think that I may give it a try in the near future. This is a 22mm knot so I will be looking to up-grade from what I now have, although I have been very pleased with its performance over the years.