What's new

Straighten "warped" Ivory?

I just got a nice Heljestrand that has what appear to be ivory scales which seem a bit "warped."
Such a nice razor I'm considering a "full restore" so wondering if there is any way to straighten ivory.
Another issue is that a previous owner scractched his name into the scales, so I'm wondering if I could "reverse" the scales by using them "inside out" or even gluing them to a liner of wood or metal and slightly reshaping.
 
Not 100% about straightening. Likely superheating and clamping straight would work-I have boiled in mineral oil to artificially age them.

You can't just turn them inside out, they are usually rounded on the outside. You can likely sand the name away completely or make it less prominent.
 
Not 100% about straightening. Likely superheating and clamping straight would work-I have boiled in mineral oil to artificially age them.

You can't just turn them inside out, they are usually rounded on the outside. You can likely sand the name away completely or make it less prominent.

Yeah, I figured I'd loose some size to the shaping, the ivory is so thin already by the time I get the name (deeply gouged) out, it ain't gonna work.
 
I'm wondering if reversing them and gluing to wood or maybe G10 then reshaping would be worth the effort, or just buy some more ivory?
Doc, do you or Mycarver give rough estimates on project costs so I might evaluate if it is feasible?
 
$XgX32UTh.jpg
 
Top Bottom