Vintage Brush/Handle Treewhale

So I was at home and on drugs last week due to an abscess tooth...and that combination led to a little treewhaling some vintage brushes. Or...more to the point, brush handles. I think all of these are going to need new knots. So here's a pic of the little collection I assembled in a week:





I haven't decided what I'm going to restore first, or what knots I'll pick...and I may need some advice from some of you on the way. I'll post pics to this thread as I make some progress.

Looks like you have some work to do! TGN Finest and boar, Whippeddog HMW and synthetic should keep you busy for a while.

Mike H said:

Looks like you have some work to do! TGN Finest and boar, Whippeddog HMW and synthetic should keep you busy for a while.

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Yeah...I'm trying to figure out which one I want to drill and clean up/out first. Do you have any idea which of these are more or less common? I should probably start with one of the more common ones in case I make a mistake...

That's a nice little gathering for only a week. Good luck with the restores.

BSAGuy said:

That's a nice little gathering for only a week. Good luck with the restores.

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Thanks, I think. It's more like a lapse in judgement when guy with AD when he has too much free time and a hefty dose of pain killers.

Very nice little collection you've got there. What is the third brush from the left? That ones pretty cool.

Most common are probably your ever readys. Like the fourth from left and the far right one.

JTillman said:

Very nice little collection you've got there. What is the third brush from the left? That ones pretty cool.

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That one is marked "Ever-Ready Guaranteed" on the side, and "Sterilized Made in USA" around the circle on the bottom, with the number 100 in the center of the bottom. I was unable to get enough contrast in a pic to post. I think it's a funky looking little handle.

jean83luc said:

Most common are probably your ever readys. Like the fourth from left and the far right one.

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Thanks for the tip! I started in on those two this morning. After spending several minutes with electric hair clippers I was able to get knots on a few of them down close to the handle...but I was surprised at how much the clippers struggled against the density of these knots. So I paused for a moment and thought of a different approach.

I went to the kitchen and grabbed a sushi knife with a deba style blade. These are the ones that have a pretty thick blade, and they're only beveled on one side. It doesn't hurt that I know how to get a knife blade wicked sharp.

The blue one is the result of several minutes of work with the clippers and cleanup with the sushi knife. I spent about 90 seconds using the sushi knife on the one with the red handle. As you can see from the top view, I'm into the glue.

So I spent a little more time with the red handled one. I'm pretty sure that I made a nice big hole in what used to be a plastic shelf in the top part of the brush....but with a little work, I think I took only epoxy from there. The hole diameter is just a touch over 20mm, and the depth is about 7mm. Does this sound about right? Here is a photo of the progress, any advice/input from you all would be appreciated:

againstthegrain said:

So I was at home and on drugs last week due to an abscess tooth...and that combination led to a little treewhaling some vintage brushes. Or...more to the point, brush handles. I think all of these are going to need new knots. So here's a pic of the little collection I assembled in a week:

(your img)



I haven't decided what I'm going to restore first, or what knots I'll pick...and I may need some advice from some of you on the way. I'll post pics to this thread as I make some progress.

Click to expand...

againstthegrain said:

So I spent a little more time with the red handled one. I'm pretty sure that I made a nice big hole in what used to be a plastic shelf in the top part of the brush....but with a little work, I think I took only epoxy from there. The hole diameter is just a touch over 20mm, and the depth is about 7mm. Does this sound about right? Here is a photo of the progress, any advice/input from you all would be appreciated:

View attachment 568128

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You'll need to go through that plastic shelf if you want to glue another knot. After that, you need to fill the handle with something; pennies, screws, etc, to be able to make your own shelf for the height you're looking for.

@Winblows: That third one from the right is a "Badger-lon" brush, which was originally made with a blend of badger and nylon bristles. If you look closely you'll see that the badger hair no longer extends to the top of the knot...only the nylon. That one will definitely need replacement. The 2nd one from the right is a Rubberset something (don't have it in front of me). The knot diameter on it huge, like 30mm. I'm not sure when I'll tackle it.

jean83luc said:

You'll need to go through that plastic shelf if you want to glue another knot. After that, you need to fill the handle with something; pennies, screws, etc, to be able to make your own shelf for the height you're looking for.

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I'll remove the shelf soon and start playing with ideas for handle filler. Thanks for the advice!

The 2nd one from the right is a Rubberset something (don't have it in front of me). The knot diameter on it huge, like 30mm. I'm not sure when I'll tackle it.

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Looks like a Dubl Duck to me: http://i.imgur.com/cXruT9k.png

againstthegrain said:

@Winblows: That third one from the right is a "Badger-lon" brush, which was originally made with a blend of badger and nylon bristles. If you look closely you'll see that the badger hair no longer extends to the top of the knot...only the nylon. That one will definitely need replacement. The 2nd one from the right is a Rubberset something (don't have it in front of me). The knot diameter on it huge, like 30mm. I'm not sure when I'll tackle it.

...

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I didn't recognize the "Badger-Ion" (never seen one before), but you are right, CUT IT
Your "Rubberset Something" will do well with a knot stolen from an Omega Professional Series #108 (knot at base 27mm, height 57 mm), similar to my Proraso Omega. It lives in a plastic shell with a black collar. The collar is 4 mm wider on the outside.

Or maybe a #106 (knot at base 28mm, height 65 mm) or a #248 (knot at base 28mm, height 60 mm), both with a chrome collar

... so, you can easily spend about $10 on such one, right?

jean83luc said:

Looks like a Dubl Duck to me: http://i.imgur.com/cXruT9k.png

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After a closer look, you are correct sir!

And @ Winblows, I was looking at some big bore boar knots for that one. I think I saw a 30mm one on TGN. Thinking about trying one of their synthetics out in the Badger-lon.

Here's an update on the Badger-Lon handle. I've removed the epoxy and knot, and some of the material in the handle. I did some polishing, but I need to remove a small scratch from a minor slip with the rotary tool. I've also removed all of the paint, so I've done a little work since this was taken, but here's the handle with a TGN Synthetic knot:



I know I need to set the knot a little deeper, though I'm not sure how much. As for re-painting the details (inset stripes and lettering) I wonder if I should try to match the slightly yellowed tone of the handle, or just go with white. Any thoughts/suggestions would be appreciated.

againstthegrain said:

Here's an update on the Badger-Lon handle. I've removed the epoxy and knot, and some of the material in the handle. I did some polishing, but I need to remove a small scratch from a minor slip with the rotary tool. I've also removed all of the paint, so I've done a little work since this was taken, but here's the handle with a TGN Synthetic knot:

Spoiler

View attachment 571807

I know I need to set the knot a little deeper, though I'm not sure how much. As for re-painting the details (inset stripes and lettering) I wonder if I should try to match the slightly yellowed tone of the handle, or just go with white. Any thoughts/suggestions would be appreciated.

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I did an ER 12 and set the badger TGN low. That makes [post=4831651]this[/post] brush very soft and makes a difference from the original brushes. So maybe you should try the low setting ?

Winblows said:

I did an ER 12 and set the badger TGN low. That makes [post=4831651]this[/post] brush very soft and makes a difference from the original brushes. So maybe you should try the low setting ?

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The loft is ~57mm at the moment. Do slight adjustments tend to make a big difference, or do I need to get a little aggressive with this? I know I want to get the thing at least a few mm deeper...

BTW, thank you for following this thread and giving me some help!

againstthegrain said:

The loft is ~57mm at the moment. Do slight adjustments tend to make a big difference, or do I need to get a little aggressive with this? I know I want to get the thing at least a few mm deeper...

BTW, thank you for following this thread and giving me some help!

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I wondered the same thing when I was starting.

I can't speak specifically to your knot, but on a TGN Finest 24mm knot, taking the loft from 52mm down to 48mm was a very noticeable difference.

againstthegrain said:

The loft is ~57mm at the moment. Do slight adjustments tend to make a big difference, or do I need to get a little aggressive with this? I know I want to get the thing at least a few mm deeper...

BTW, thank you for following this thread and giving me some help!

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You are welcome!
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