In the Netherlands we have a saying "wat in het vat zit verzuurt niet". It was quite some years ago that I purchased a Puukko blank from Joonas Kallioniemi. I had big plans to make a traditional birch bark handle for it. No real experience making knives but ... let's just do it. I was a bit stubborn as to try and make my own bolster and end cap. This turned out to be quite hard. Any tiny gap between blade and bolster stands out like a sore thumb. After a couple a tries i put the blank in a box and almost forgot about it. Fast forward a lot of years later. I decided to have another go at it 
I managed to get a bolster to fit as well as I could. Then came the handle. I cut lost and lost of squares of birch bark. I then used the hole punch for leather belts to make a slit in every bit of bark. All the pieces were clamped together and I tried to alternate the 'grain'. The idea is that you don't need to glue the pieces but just heat the handle in an oven (low heat) and it will stick together. After the first couple of dozen pieces I gave it a try and somewhat to my surprise it actually worked, even though the bark had been in the same box with the blank for many years.
The bark I had was not that thick so it took a lot of layers (probably around 150) to build up the handle. After baking came the shaping of the handle. I wasn't sure exactly how I was going to do it but after some debate I got a cheap mini beltsander. This also took quite some time and I feared taking off more than I was intending to. Then on to making the sheath fit (it came with the kit but it seemed the handle was meant to be thinner than mine).
Long story short, this is what I ended up with. I love it. The handle feels like cork. Smooth, soft and grippy.
I learnt most from making the bolster and will be better prepared if I ever make another knife
Thanks for looking and hope someone is triggered to make a nice birch handle themselves.
I managed to get a bolster to fit as well as I could. Then came the handle. I cut lost and lost of squares of birch bark. I then used the hole punch for leather belts to make a slit in every bit of bark. All the pieces were clamped together and I tried to alternate the 'grain'. The idea is that you don't need to glue the pieces but just heat the handle in an oven (low heat) and it will stick together. After the first couple of dozen pieces I gave it a try and somewhat to my surprise it actually worked, even though the bark had been in the same box with the blank for many years.
The bark I had was not that thick so it took a lot of layers (probably around 150) to build up the handle. After baking came the shaping of the handle. I wasn't sure exactly how I was going to do it but after some debate I got a cheap mini beltsander. This also took quite some time and I feared taking off more than I was intending to. Then on to making the sheath fit (it came with the kit but it seemed the handle was meant to be thinner than mine).
Long story short, this is what I ended up with. I love it. The handle feels like cork. Smooth, soft and grippy.
I learnt most from making the bolster and will be better prepared if I ever make another knife
Thanks for looking and hope someone is triggered to make a nice birch handle themselves.
