Every-Ready 150B restore underway

First try at replacing a knot and all that it entails. I'll drill out the remainder of the knot today and polish it up a bit. Has anyone seen a restore of this black and cream hexagonal base 150B? I'm hoping to get a badger knot which is a little stiffer than my C&E Best Badger. Any input on knot size and hair would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

Used a single edge razor scraping tool to get rid of the majority of old knot, and I drilled through the bottom of the knot.

Looking down into the hollow upper (black) portion of the brush. The top of the cream portion is flat across. There must be a lip that the knot sits on in the black portion?

Kinda tedious opening the hole bit by bit....

Looks good so for.

Nice you're doing manually, it's so much more self satisfying ( so I keep telling myself ) .

You now need to buy an "old style" bottle of wine to get a cork. You can then build up the base/shelf to give you the exact loft you want.

Drink the wine of course, whether you do it before or after the restore depends on how well you handle your alcohol

Have a look at my wiki in my sig. There's a whole lot of stuff about The Golden Nib Badger knots. Short story, Finest is the best Bang for Buck knot on TGN ( assuming you don't want to go boar )

Thanks. I'm definitely going badger. I keep looking at other restorations to get an idea of the ideal size knot.

What you need to do now then is measure the diameter of the knot hole.

You're lucky as being completely hollow you can set the loft as high or low as you want.

The only issue is what size knot will fit into the hole at that depth.

If you want a high loft you can go with a knot that is close to the knot hole size but if you want to set deeper you'll need a smaller knot.

Of course the other option is to open up the knot hole further if you still want a "bigger" knot.


( Does that make sense ?? )




( Oh and not only is the Finest best BFB but also has nice backbone , maybe a Finest at sub 45mm would suit ? )

http://www.badgerandblade.com/vb/showthread.php?t=142947

Thanks for that ^ thread. I've got to get the remainder of the knot out first. The dremel battery is recharging!!

FL shaver said:

The dremel battery is recharging!!

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Ha !! Dremel. I take back what I said about doing it manually !!!

Went very fast after I got the hole big enough to squeeze a drum sander attachment in there!

The whole is just a shade under 23mm. I'd say a whisker under, but it isn't that much...

It looks to me as though it would take a big piece of cork to fill up to the bottom of a knot. Sound right?

FL shaver said:

The whole is just a shade under 23mm. I'd say a whisker under, but it isn't that much...


It looks to me as though it would take a big piece of cork to fill up to the bottom of a knot. Sound right?

Click to expand...

Sounds about right for that sort of brush.

Cork from a wine bottle'll be fine. You just need to cut it to the right height to give you the loft you want and then trim to fit in the hole. If the holes too deep you just stack a couple of pieces.

Use some two part epoxy around the top to make it water tight.

Don't forget the knots spread pretty quickly from the knot holder. If you want a shorter loft then a 20mm will probably suit you better you should be easily able to get a sub 45mm loft and it'll get to 22/23mm where it exits the knot hole . This will give you a denser knot.

If you want a higher loft then you can go with a 22mm finest, it'll hit 23mm pretty quick ((a 22mm ( 62( fan ) or 65 ( bulb ) mm ) will probably give you a loft of around 50-56mm ) so you'll end up with a less dense but bigger knot ......or go with a 22mm knot and widen the hole and set deeper or.............

It's all part of the fun of restoring the brush to your personal preference

Should I fill around the cork with epoxy, essentially making the entire upper compartment solid?

I plan to set the knot so that the base is about a half mm to a mm below the uppermost lip of the brush. Sound right? I want to be very exact here in how I set the knot so it lasts decades! It looks like the knot that was in there was functional for 40 or 50 years!

FL shaver said:

Should I fill around the cork with epoxy, essentially making the entire upper compartment solid?

I plan to set the knot so that the base is about a half mm to a mm below the uppermost lip of the brush. Sound right? I want to be very exact here in how I set the knot so it lasts decades! It looks like the knot that was in there was functional for 40 or 50 years!

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That's certainly an option.

See this post here.

If you do that you'll need a 22/23 mm knot and as mentioned you'll end up with around a 55mm loft, if you set another 10mm lower you'll end up with a 45mm loft.

Your other option is to set the knot lower into the handle so you get a lower loft.

See this fantastic diagram here that I've whipped up at work.

I don't know much about art and ain't very good at it

If you cut the cork lower and set the knot lower, you'll end up with a shorter and denser loft ( assuming you're using the same knot ) . So the RHS one represenents what you're mentioning. By lowering cork you can effect the loft and density.

Immense! Thanks for taking an interest! Let me see...

It'd be OK to drop the knot as low as the first two diagrams? I thought that it might cause the outermost hairs to rub against the top edge of the brush and be cut off...or something. I don't know...new at this...

And the epoxy would have wind up coming over the top of the base of the knot...?

My EJ Best has a 21mm base and a 55mm loft. I could see a very similar knot working well in this handle.
I guess your suggestion of a 22mm base with a 55mm loft sounds great! Finest. Way too many options!

Can't believe how perfectly the cork fits the diameter of the hole! I'll trim it down for the new knot...

Hope you enjoyed a good wine to get that cork

( Geez, it's 6:34 am here and I'm thinking wine )

You can set deeper but as I say then you really need to go with a smaller knot.

The measurements on TGN are the knot holder. The Finest will fan out pretty quickly from there about 2-3 mms . So for a 23mm hole you'll only get the knot probably 8-10mm into the handle.

If you want to set lower than that then you need to go for say a 20mm knot then the knot will be 23mm by the time it exits the knot hole. There's no issue with rubbing or snapping of hairs.

Most of my restores are set at around 45mm so there's normally about 15mm below the knot hole, and in my similar Fuller Brush I've gone with a 20mm knot.

If you can afford it you might like to get a 20mm and a 22mm knot. Then you have the option for both. Set your cork to where you want it and then use a small dab of silicon to set the knot. If you don't like it you can just twist the knot out and go again. I'm sure the spare knot won't go astray as most of us start one and then there's no stopping from there.

When you've finally got the knot where you want it, score the inside of the knot hole and the edges and bottom of the knot holder for grip and only use minimal two part epoxy to hold the knot in. I err on caution and would rather have to reset the knot than have glue all over the hairs or oozing out the knot hole.

You're gonna get a feeling of self satisfaction when you use this brush that you won't get with one bought off the shelf.

Geez, why isn't anyone else weighing in here, if you don't like the result you've only got me to blame

Thanks again for taking the time. I'll post a pic of the final product!

fidjit said:

Geez, why isn't anyone else weighing in here, if you don't like the result you've only got me to blame

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Well, it would be difficult to give any better advice than what you are giving fidjit.

The only statement that the OP made that gave me pause was where he said that he was going to seat the knot only 1/2mm or 1mm below the lip. That's not very deep and I might consider making it deeper. My final gauge of depth is how high the loft is. For my 1st restore, I was striving for 50mm since that seemed to be a good common ground. It was later in my career that I came to admire the shorter lofted brushes.

some good info on here and a nice start to a restore, ill have to watch this thread

Thanks for the additional input Hex. Sounds like setting the knot a bit deeper is the way to go. I hope to get back to this is a few days as I'm out of town this weekend...