In this part of the tutorial we work on the handle.

Part1 (the beginning) of this tutorial is here.

You have a whole lot of options when it comes to the wood for the handle. I am using Black Palm. It has a great look and a wonderful pattern. (Amazon: Black Palm 2" x 2" x 12" )

Our goal here is to cut ourselves two pices of wood that are just a little bit bigger than needed. We use any variety of tools to cut down the wood. Each half is going to be roughly one half inch thick in its final version. So at this point we get it just a little bit thicker so we have some leeway.

I used a variety of tools including a regular wood saw to rough cut it.

The belt sander is great for getting some of the curves and bringing it close to its final shape. It is just about ready for rasping at this point. Remember, you are making two halves and each half should be a little over one half inch thick.

Next we are going to temporarily pin the handle to the knife so we can bring it to its final shape. It needs to be on the knife so you can get it to the right shape as it will be on the knife.

One important thing at this point is that you are going to be glueing those handle halves to the knife so sand them down nice and flat. You did a lot of cutting so those edges are probably rough and uneven.

Clamp down the knife with one side of the handle right under it just as it would be when done. Then drill right through those holes and through the handle.

Do this for both handle halves.

Now put the assembly together with one handle under and one handle over. Then pin it with some quarter inch dowel pins. This is a temporary assembly. When we are done with the shaping we will take this apart.

Now let's use a variety of tools to shape the handle. You can only do a little bit with sanders.

Most of the work will be done with a rasp. You can get it curved and into a good shape with the rasp.

This is what you want to get to at this point. See how the handle is nicely shaped.

Let's continue with the tutorial and grind out the bevels

Black Palm 2" x 2" x 12"

Borassus flabellifer Black Palm from Southeast Asia has a brown background streaked with elongated dark brown and black vascular bundles. This wood is hard and heavy and the bundles can be quite stringy, so extremely sharp tools are required. The end grain exhibits an interesting spotted appearance and the elongated bundles terminate in an interesting eye that glows when polished, revealing spectacular results.

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