That's impressive, OR. Nice work.
Although this particular pic is not my knife, I have one exactly like it with sheath. It is a Tapio Wirkkala Puukko knife, made in Finland. They are works of art, examples are even in art museums. I inherited mine from my father. I orginally thought he got it from fishermen from the Faroe Islands when my dad when on an Arctic expedition back in 1948, but on further checking I think the knives were first produced in 1961. He may have later got it from one of his Arctic trip buddies.
Thanks gpw. I am also a traditionalist. I have a few tools with the sanding wheels which may work. I just needed some Insite of someone else. I really have a large respect for military vintage tools.Mike, this being GJ, don’t let the absence of a tool hamper you - sounds like time to buy a sander!
Those Q knives are beasts, and however you go in the restoration, it should be a great user when you’re finished. I’m a traditionalist, so I would encourage you to go back with a leather washer handle, which can (I think!) be more easily tightened down with the **** cap, than a bone or antler grip. It’s also your knife, so do what suits you. Truth in lending though, I’ve never done the work you’re describing, so wish you well, however you chose to proceed. Please post some pics when you’re done, and good luck with your project!
Thanks Bee. Mine only has the one **** plate. I am almost sure that is the way it was designed. Unless someone knows better, any help would be appreciated.
and then return it to being a user. They're handy, but that blade isn't near the strength of a Q knife, since it's long and slender. I used a repro to field dress a deer in Virginia once, and it was too much knife inside the body cavity of that deer.
Those are great knives. Around Ky they are sought after. How long do think it was out in the elements? Was it lodged in the wall? Or under ground? I would like to hear that story.So this is really the only knife that I have that's noteworthy it's a 1930s Böker Stockman made int Solingen Germany, I found it well metal detecting around a rock wall in a cigar box.
Well the cigar box I found was made in the 50s and there was a note in the box that was addressed to someone named Bill steiger in 61 but the note was crumbling in my hands so it was probably placed there somewhere in the 61 if I had to say, also the knife i have when I contacted Böker about it the records that they had were actually burned in a fire that burns down the original workshop I believe so they couldn't really tell me anything other than when it was possibly made, but I do still have the information that the lady gave me, also I should mention I found the knife in 2021, so the knife was possibly out in the elements for about 60 years buried in a rock wall
I was thinking about it. As you know, my preference is always preservation first, but these were falling apart with the mildest of handling, and they were permanently stained with what I suspect is the Gutta-percha inside the Chatterton's compound in vintage black cloth "friction" tape that a PO had wrapped around it. I had removed as much as I could, but it had become congealed with the old leather. The first and last rings, against the guard and the pommel, made of some kind of composite, micarta or the like, were also cracked and deteriorated.
www.garagejournal.com
Lugz, great idea to move this project to its own thread — thank you!With the post-factory notches carved by soldiers to give the notoriously smooth handle a little more grip! Cool photo!
I moved my project to its own thread...
WWII "Theater Knife" Recreation Project
This idea started on @gpw_42 's 'Show Your Vintage Knife' thread. Now that it's turning into a full-fledged project, I am moving it here so as not to keep bogarting or side-tracking the flow of the general interest thread. My plan is to recreate a so-called "theater knife" out of this WWII-era...
My hunch, based on the varying shape of the roughening on less-worn examples, is that the gouges were put in by freehand. After the overall shaping of the leather disks was done, somebody on the line held the handle up to a spinning abrasive disk and rotated the knife freehand (perhaps while wearing protective gloves like what meat packers wear). And thinking further about safety, the blade sharpening must have come after the handle shaping and abrasion treatment.
Clearly. The swales I'm talking about were clearly done by the factory on a sanding machine after the handle was stacked, before the gouges. The only discussion or debate has been in the context of whether it was by the factory or in the field. It's not unanimous. I don't have a strong opinion one way or the other. But if you keep reading, you'll discover it's not unanimous.
I would expect personalizing to be done by individuals to get a better & more comfortable grip if their hands were smaller than average (say). If a knife got even average field use, it would be hard to prove who-dun-it without assembling a largeish collection of obviously lightly used 225Qs.
Unless there were a few examples fresh out of the box, without any gouging, which I believe is the other side's argument. The other part of their argument is why the factory wouldn't just have a big pile of slightly narrower washers to interleave in the stack.
Well, if you're only going to have one, having the ne plus ultra one is the one to have! Wow! That thing is perfect.
I put a PAL RH-36, an EGW, and the Q I just found in a photo in post #282 for that purpose but I am glad you included a shot of the spines. That shot says it all. The EGW has always been considered the biggest WWII fighting knife, because the blade is just as wide as the Q and two inches longer, but the Q is a few centimeters thicker. That translates to weight, too, of course. It is hefty! The Ka-Bar is a welterweight compared to these bruisers.
That's a handsome knife.
Thanks! I wonder if that knife is "as issued" or if it has been polished somewhere along the way? I don't know.
Indeed! Just needed the "money shot" to demonstrate the descriptions we've used for the Q knife. And, IMO, demonstrate why they have a rep (whether factual or not!) of being used as pry bars.
I'd like to put an EGW side by side with a Springfield Randall (WW2 vintage), to do this type of comparison photos. Or maybe a Zacharias fighter Randall (even earlier production during WW2). Alas, I don't have any of these. The WW2 vintage Randalls are crazy expensive, and I think there are fewer than 4 known Zacharias fighters, so they don't even hit the open market.
I appreciate it! Wish that I'd gotten info from him about it, but I was little when he died. He was in the Navy from 44-46, and I bet was involved in mothballing the ship in '46 after making several Magic Carpet trips across the Pacific and then to the ETO. Magic Carpet was the name for the intentional movement of the millions of GIs who were all over the world, and needed to be brought back to the USA for discharge, once the war was over, and occupation was winding down. This exchange has me wondering if many of these theater knives were made up during the post-war period. Guys on a ship (like him) had time on their hands, with access to materials and shops to
