Finally.....another butterscotch local find (Restoration Tutorial)

As those who know me well will know 99% of my razors are local finds, but my brushes...... my first butterscotch was local and then BSSBAD took over and international ebay and international antique shops were my friend.

I've pretty much paid more for each brush in terms of handle, postage and knot than any of my razors

Went to a little town's antique and collectible market today and found this.

It's not the best looking brush around but it's kinda appealing because it's another local find and especially since it's butterscotch.

I'll try and document knot removal and knot choice as much as possible as this might be off assistance to others.

Pics are pre clean.

What type of knot are you planning to use?

Gone Gray said:

What type of knot are you planning to use?

Click to expand...

Wait for it, gonna go through restore, and my thinking when it comes to knots

Hokay

Here we go......

1. Cut down knot with scissors as close as possible



2. Using my knife, dig into the middle and then just use a circular/twisting motion to loosen up the bristles.....


3. After twisting and loosening, just use pliers to grab out the left over bristles.


4. Hopefully that's enough. Sometimes I'll use an electric drill to loosen up the bristles if the glue is really hard, but normally can manually remove them all. You can also try and soften up whatever glue there is with hot water which sometime helps.

The end plan .....


5. Quick wipe with Silvo and....


Only tool used my Leatherman Skeletool, but yes, this has been an easy one !!!!

Now it's time to choose a knot.....

So here's the measurements.

Knot hole 18mm


Depth around 19mm


So since I spent SO much time on this diagram, I'm going to use it again


You can see that you can vary the loft of the brush but lowering or raising it in the knot hole. This will result in a higher/lower loft and a looser/denser knot.

Things to note here are that the knot holder on most of The Golden Nib knots are around 7mm height and you have to remember that they bloom out pretty much straight after this to about 2-3mm bigger.

So option 1 here is to use an 18mm knot. I'd need to fill the knot hole with a cork or something to around the 10mm mark as I wouldn't get too much more depth than that so 18mm knots:

Best - 18 X 58 - Loft around 48-51mm ( 58 -7 or 10mm )
Finest - 18 X 62mm = Loft around 52-55mm ( 62 - 7 or 10 mm )
Silvertip A - 18 X 58 mm - Loft around 48-51mm ( 58-7 or 10mm )

Hopefully so far this makes sense . I'm going to end up with a brush that looks like picture 3 in my "comparison" above.

Now I'm 100% face lather and I like a shorter and denser brush. Most of my brushes are between 45- 52mm. So remember above I have 19mm of depth to play with. So the other option is to run a smaller knot and set it deeper.

Best - 16 X 55 - Lowest loft possible 36mm ( 55-19mm )

So I'll end up more like the brush in number 2. If I want higher I can put cork in and raise the loft so that it looks more like brush one. So if I use a 9mm cork I can make my loft around 45mm ( 55-10 )

The only issue is that I don't like the Best knot. It's too scrubby for me.

I'm about to shoot Tony an email and find out what other knots he has in 16 mm and I'll update when I find out.

Other than that I'm actually leaning towards the 18mm Silvertip A and end up with a 51mm loft though a bit of sanding could probably get me a couple of extra mm to get me below the 50......

Note I could also enlarge the knot hole but given that I don't have any tools ( because I'm not that good with them ) this isn't really an option

Hopefully this help how I work out what knot I'll end up using.....

It's hard to put this sort of things into words as normally I just do it on a piece of paper and in my head

Ian,

Can't wait to see it.

Mike

Nice find Ian. I really like that shape.

As an aside, do you find yourself holding your breath when you're digging out the old knots ? I sure do. Those old fibers look lethal if inhaled.

Fidgit:

Great looking handle. Thanks for sharing.

Not to hijack your thread, but I wanted to thank you and the other brush restore folks here on B&B for your willingness to share your knowledge in this area. Since I have been following these threads I have three completed restores and about 10 waiting for my PayPal account to catch up. Your explanations and pictures have been most helpful. Thank you all again for your willing assistance.

Don

Enjoying it...

Looking forward to the outcome!

fidjit said:

Best - 18 X 58 - Loft around 48-51mm ( 58 -7 or 10mm )
Finest - 18 X 62mm = Loft around 52-55mm ( 62 - 7 or 10 mm )
Silvertip A - 18 X 58 mm - Loft around 48-51mm ( 58-7 or 10mm )

Click to expand...

Either no ones actually reading the post properly or no ones a mathematician but amended this so the sums actually work. That's what happens when you're trying to post a long post and are worried they wifey might catch ya doing it when you're supposed to be doing other jobs

Hex said:

As an aside, do you find yourself holding your breath when you're digging out the old knots ? I sure do. Those old fibers look lethal if inhaled.

Click to expand...

Yeppers , the amount of dust and hairs that come of while you're doing this is amazing and sometimes the smell is awful. I'd hate to think what's in the glue they use as well though given the age it's probably a lot more natural than what you'd find today. Who knows what's harboured deep inside the knot. I actually started photographing this inside but once I'd done the first few twists noted all the crap coming out and took it outside.

dfollett_98 said:

Fidgit:
Not to hijack your thread, but I wanted to thank you and the other brush restore folks here on B&B for your willingness to share your knowledge in this area. Since I have been following these threads I have three completed restores and about 10 waiting for my PayPal account to catch up. Your explanations and pictures have been most helpful. Thank you all again for your willing assistance.

Click to expand...

It's a funny old place here ain't it. I'm not sure you'd find another forum where someone would go " You beat me on that Ebay Auction...congratulations !! "

The amount of info shared here is great though I must admit I'm guessing just a little bit of it is a feeling of pride that someone considers you an "expert" and that you can answer their questions and puff out your chest

I think everyone here just loves to see these old pieces of metal, catalin, bone, bakelite and hair preserved

( And now I've gotta go and search for your restores ........... )

That's a great handle!

16mm Finests will be back in stock next week

Assuming they're the same as his old stock then they're 16X60mm

So fitting it completely in the brush ( remember 19.mm ) will give me a 41mm loft. Think I might go higher though to around a 45mm loft so will need a 4mm piece of cork. Luckily I just happen to have some cork tile already shaped and thinned.

I also don't want it to high as I reckon it might look a bit weird since it's such a small handle.

Waiting...waiting....waiting....

fidjit said:

I also don't want it to high as I reckon it might look a bit weird since it's such a small handle.

Click to expand...

Fidjit

What's the overall length of the handle?

When I did my short handled restore I thought the same thing but I ended up reaming the 18mm hole out to 20mm & sinking a 20mm xtra stuffed finest into it with a 48mm loft.

Handle size on mines was 40mm x 31mm dia but I think I got away with it overall.



Also another thing to consider is if you want to use the travel tube, mines is actually 2mm over what I should have set the loft to for it to fit.

Finally I don't know about Tony's other knots but from the few finest I've had the overall length can vary by 5-6mm so you might not even need to use a spacer.

Brush restores, the cure for razor collection disorder

Irkme

The handle is only 35mm and yes its going to be my travel brush replacing my only non vintage brush (Omega 21064 mixed boar/bristle)

All my vintage brush/soap containers (doesn't everyone have lots of them ) are around 80 mm tall so that was the other thing driving a short loft.

And 16mm Finest back in stock and ordered..........

Note that Tony advises that the knot holder is about 15mm but bulges quite quickly to 18mm. That's why if you really want some depth you need to go the knot size below.

Ane now the long wait Arizona to Tasmania

Update :

Shipping notification recieved less than 24 hours after placing my order.

Fantastic service by Tony again.

Waiting....waiting....waiting......

Knot arrived. 7 days from Arizona to Tasmania

More piccies and tutorial as I get time

Wife's out

So here's the knot and the handle



As explained higher in this thread, heres a close up of the knot holder. The knot holder is 15-16mm and quickly builds up to 17-18mm. So with an 18mm knot in an 18mm hole you're not going to get the knot very deep into the handle.



So here's the loft of the brush if I don't push the knot into the hole ( or if I'd used a 18mm knot ) loft about 50mm versus using the smaller knot and pushing into the knot hole , loft about 45mm. You can see the change in density of the knot even in these pictures.



So I scratch the knot holder with my leatherman just for a bit more hold, mix up the 2 part epoxy and dribble it into the hole using a skewer. I don't use too much as I don't want it getting all over the knot or oozing out the knot hold when I put the knot in


And.....



Nice short loft for face lathering, fits into both these holders ( there's more stuck in the cupboard )

Hopefully this helps peoples out there doing some restores

If I get up early enough hopefully I can a post-bloom pic

That's a beautiful little brush and a great restore job. Thanks for taking us along on the journey!