Metal Musings Blog

Above, I’ve transferred my detailed pattern to the sardines on the lid, ready to begin detailing.

I’ve begun detailing by engraving the eye, gill and fin details just like on the shibuichi scalpel scales.

Continuing with the detailing by using a flat graver to lower the areas behind the engraved gills, and around the fins.

Above, I’m using a small scraper to remove some of the tool marks left by my NSK micromotor grinder and carbide burs.  It is a metal scraper, the idea for which I stole from Clive Hallam (a famous netsuke carver).  You can see the start of his instructions for how to make one here:  Netsuke Knife Making Tutorial Part 1

And here is a link to a tutorial by me about pretty much the same thing, but from an engraving and metalwork viewpoint:  Clive’s “Shirley Temple” Scrapers for Contemporary Engravers

Above, I’ve used the same little circular punch I used on the shibuichi scales to texture the head area of the top sardine.  That looks a little bland to me, so I’ll add in the muscle striations you would see on a cooked and canned sardine.


Since these sardines aren’t dried, I’ve decided to use a little different method to delineate the muscle striations.  I used a round graver to carve in long depressions between the muscles (see the top sardine).

Above, I used the circular punch to retexture the area.  Much better!

The rest of the sardines carved with the round graver.

And here they all are with their finished texture, and the fins detailed with the same round graver.  I’ve also trimmed a little here and there with files and abrasive ScotchBrite™ pads.

Now it’s time to solder on the silver lid and rolled up key.  You can see my cobbled together soldering rig above.  I’ve used a ceramic fiber soldering pad

, a piece of firebrick, and a charcoal block to lift the steel top up so I can get the torch flame underneath it.  I’ve also pressed into service my little copper and lead soldering hold downs.  I’m using low temp (400 degree F) silver-bearing paste solder for this task, since it will be difficult to get this much metal up to silver soldering temperatures.

And, here’s the soldering finished.  Notice the faint oxidation colors on the stainless steel fish.  Now, I need to clean all this up.  I can’t use my normal pickling method, since the iron will cause an electrochemical reaction and plate everything with copper.  I’ll just use mechanical methods for the clean up.

Thanks for Looking!

Now it’s time to start carving and engraving the reliquary.

I’ve begun using a jeweler’s saw to partially saw out four sardines in a piece of 3/16 inch thick 416 stainless steel.  This will be part of a lid for the reliquary.

Here, I’ve finished sawing out the sardines, and completed the wooden base of the reliquary (which will store the scalpel and the stand when not assembled).  You can also see the beginnings of the rolled sterling silver lid and copper key.

Above, I’ve been starting to round over the sardines with my NSK Electer micromotor grinder and carbide burs.

It’s also time to begin detailing the sardine scalpel.  Here the scalpel is installed in Thermoloc™ on a wooden block, for holding in my engraver’s vise.  I’ve begun engraving the eye, gills and fin details.

One I engraved the gills (using a 90 degree V graver), I used a flat graver to carve back the lower edges, followed by a punch to begin sculpting and texturing the surface of the shibuichi.  You can see details of the punch in the image – I made it from an old worn out bur.  It is simply a cylinder, with slightly rounded edges.

Above, all the front portion of the fish has been textured with the punch.

Here, I’ve begun to make the little muscle striations along the back half (the blue arrows).  I’m using a “bean” shaped punch for this.  You can see it below the fish.

And , above, all the muscle striations and punch texturing is finished.  I’ve also used a round graver to finish the pectoral fins.

Thanks for looking!

Now it’s time to make some of the accessory items, including rivets and eyes for the scalpel.

Above, I’m using my Sherline lathe to turn a small piece of moose antler for the eyes.  This little cylinder will extend through the entire knife, and is an important item in the knife structure, acting as a pin as well as being decorative.

Here, I’m drilling the hole through the antler pin to install the horn pupils.

Test fitting the moose antler pin/eyes before removing the antler from the lathe.  If I remove the antler before the fit is correct, I’ll never get it reinstalled and centered if I need to trim a little more off.

Above, a small sliver of dark cow horn installed, ready to turn the tiny pupil cylinder.  This cylinder will extend all the way through from one side of the sardine to the other.

Carefully turning the horn pupil cylinder to diameter.

Beginning to create the silver rivets.  This is the top side of my tiny little blacksmith’s “nail header”.

The bottom side of the nail header.  Note the larger holes partially drilled through to provide clearance so the rivet wire doesn’t bind tight and can be removed.

The 16 gauge wire with melted blob installed in the nail header

, ready to peen the rivet head.

The rivet head peened.

Test fitting a rivet in the front pin hole.

The rivet needs to be trimmed to proper length.

The rivet trimmed to length – a little more than one wire diameter above the surface of the shibuichi scale seems to work well for me.

And here are the moose antler pin, the cow horn pupil pin, and the two 16 gauge silver rivets ready to install.

All the elements ready for final assembly.



And, above, everything installed, epoxied, and peened.

Thanks for looking!

Above, I’ve started to shape the shibuichi scales.  I’ll be mainly using a my Foredom flex shaft grinder and small drum sanders.  You can see the central area where I’ve started the grinding.  Note that I’ve superglued the scales into position, and also used two pieces of 16 gauge copper wire as temporary rivets, and (very lightly!) peened them into place.  I’ll remove these when I’m ready to do the final assembly, and replace them with 16 gauge silver wire rivets.

Tapering back by the tail (blade).

Carving behind the head, and tapering the nose.

As you can see, this stage simply is a gradual tapering of both ends, and gently shaping here and there.

Above, the shaping is complete, and I’ve used a single edge razor blade as a wedge to gently pry the scales loose from the tang.  Now I’ll clean off the remaining super glue.

Above, everything cleaned up.  I’m using a larger drill bit to chamfer the holes in the tang of the knife, and the inner holes of the scales.  This generally neatens things up (every successful artist needs a little touch of OCD) and will facilitate lining things up at final assembly.

A shot of the scales together, to make certain my carving job matches up on both sides.

A view from the back end.  At this scale of tiny carving, you must pay attention to EVERY surface.  Any roughness or mismatching will be very obvious once permanently assembled, and VERY difficult to fix then.  Do yourself a favor and take care of the details as you go along.  Remember the little touch of OCD?  It will serve you well…

Now it’s time to shape the blade.  I need to taper the blade both in length and form the “flats” that taper to the sharp edge.

As you’ve seen me do before, I’m using files to cut in the “flats.”  Above is my clamp rig to help with that little chore.  You can see a little more detail about filing flats here:  Ants Miseretto Part 3

The above images show the results of filing with a standard bastard file.  You can see the rough finish left behind.

Above , I’ve used a finer cut, and almost worn out file to refine the deeper scratches left by the coarser file.

And so here we are, the scales shaped, and the knife blade and tang ready for fitting the  stand, followed by heat treating the blade.

Thanks for looking!

Well, here’s another of my crazy reliquaries, this one a tiny dried sardine scalpel, in (and on) a sardine can.  This is loosely based on Japanese netsuke and menuki that I’ve seen, carved as tiny dried fish.  My version is of 1075 carbon steel, shibuichi, 416 stainless steel, bocote wood, copper and bronze, moose antler, cow horn and a little silver.

Above, I’ve rubber-cemented my pattern on a sheet of 25% shibuichi, and begun to saw them out with a jeweler’s saw.

Here, I’ve finished cutting them out.  These are the scales (the sides) of the knife.

Above, I’m doing the same with a sheet of 1/16 inch thick (annealed) 1075 carbon steel.  This will form the full tang and blade of the knife.

Both scales and the knife, cut out.  The red area is to remind me I must eventually saw out this area of the tang, before I forget and assemble the knife.  This is where the stand portion of the reliquary will fit into the knife.

And here are the elements as they will be assembled later.

The back sides.

The above images show where I have (carefully!) drilled all of the holes in all the pieces for the silver rivets and the eyes.  To drill the holes

, I first completely drilled one scale, then carefully drilled the rear rivet hole in the other two elements.  With that rear hole lined up properly, I could install a temporary pin and drill the rest of the holes, using the previously drilled holes in the top scale as a drill guide.  That way, all the holes match up correctly, with no unpleasant surprises.

Above, top and bottom views of the knife blank and the scales, assembled with temporary pins.

Thanks for looking!