Ebony 1911 grips, pics included.

Butcherbill

Butcherbill

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I figured this would be the right sub forum to post in, I've been making a set of 1911 grips out of some ebony I had lying around. They're shaped & fit, which turned out nicely.

I have been finishing them with BLO as I don't want a super glossy finish, I love an oiled wood finish. The gun is a Girsan 1911c which is powder coated more satin, I left the face of the grip smooth to keep the overall nice and clean. I want a raw wood finish for looks and grip in my hand, would you guys recommend a final waxing of the grips as a sealer or just leave the final BLO coat and call it quits?

I don't know if I've worked with ebony before, so I'm not sure how to aproach the final finishing. I have a second set of ebony grips for a TT-33 in the works as well, so other finishing ideas are welcome.

Here are some pics of said grips in a raw wood state, I sanded them abit more after the final fitting on the gun to thin them out, very happy overall with how they came out.


 
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I was thinking of it but I think I'll leave it simple for now, contemplating filing some finger groves in them to make it a dedicated left handed setup to fit my hands. Doubtful the wife will want to shoot this one anyway lol, what I would love is a plated 1911 to put these grips on and then a set of ivory grips to put on this one haha. A little ebony & ivory combo would be sweet!
 
That doesn't look as smooth and black as the ebony I've worked with in the past. But then there's a lot of different sorts of ebony. The fact that your grips still have a good amount of brown colour to them tells me that you've got a different variety.

There's also a lot of fake ebony out there or "ebonized" cheater wood that is pressure dyed to fill in for real ebony. Here again if the wood isn't naturally oily when you sand it so it clogs the paper really easily then it's quite possible that you've got some of this ebonized wood.

The surface texture makes me think that you stopped at too coarse a sandpaper grit. The really dense woods like ebony respond well to "polishing" with finer grits up to 600 or even 1000 grit wetordry silicon carbide sandpaper. The ebony that I've worked with is also so oily that these fine sandpapers clog easily. So I ended up using them with some mineral spirits (or low odor paint thinner) to wet sand the wood. This worked like a treat. And once done I then burnished the surface with some shavings of maple to smooth the surface and bring up a bit of the natural wood oil. At that point all that was needed was a little hard furniture wax. I just used cheap Johnson's paste wax but a primo furniture wax that has a good shot of carnuba wax would be more durable.

In the case of the ebony I had BLO would have been superfluous. The wood was naturally so oily that simply burnishing the surface brought up the deeper natural oil. But if the variety of ebony you have doesn't seem that oily then the BLO is a great idea.

You've done a really nice job of shaping the grips. But now it's time to go back and try to bring out the natural sheen of the ebony with some super fine grit polishing and burnishing. The warm glow it'll bring out is well worth the time. And if you can't make the wood generate that sort of finish then I hate to say it but I'm thinking you got some of the fake "ebonized" wood.
 
@bcrider

Awesome, thanks for the input. Yeah that's just sanded with 80grit on my orbital sander, I haven't given it a go yet with some finer grit. I've given it a few coats of BLO last night and this morning, you can't see the lighter brown grain anymore. It's darkened up considerably, my plan now is to wet sand with finer grit paper and oil to smooth out and bring out the sheen.

I'm not sure if it's real ebony, a friend had it lying around. Said it was fret board stock, it's hard as hell and while shaping with a file it would polish up easy and smooth. I'd like to keep a bit of tooth on them and not polish it to much as I won't be checkering the grips. A bit more lustre would be welcome, this is keeping me occupied till the registration shows up in the mail lol so I'm in no rush.

Ebony is a new wood for me, back in my carpentry days I was more familiar with cherry or maple & oak. Has been fun working with wood again, I miss it. Nothing like working with your hands.

Here's a look with a few coats of BLO, things have darkened up a lot. Got a bit more work to do on them before I call them finished.
 
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Yeah, you need to take it down finer. Sucks that you only have an orbital sander to do the job. You'd be better off with a bigger belt grinder. If you could get it down to 220 or 320 you would have a better finish. Then, what I would do, is to apply a product called "Shellawax" and rub it on the grips then buff them with a loose cotton wheel It will seal the pores up and give you a bit more shine. Not a ton of shine, but enough to make the grips look a lot better.

Good job so far. Keep it up. Don't quit too early.
 
If it comes up looking clean like that from a file then it's likely the real thing. And the fact it was intended as fret board stock for a music instrument also suggests it's the real thing.

The 80 grit and the use of an orbital sander isn't doing you any favors. Time to pull out the stops and work through to those finer grades with the solvent wet sanding at 400 and 600. Then burnish it with some coarse hardwood shavings. You likely won't want to do anything else to it then.

I know you don't want them to become slippery. But that's what checkering or stippling is for. By leaving it with a coarse sanded finish you'll get your grip but you're not letting the wood show itself as well as it can. Not by a long shot.
 
Take BCRiders advice and put that orbital sander away in a drawer somewhere and do the rest of sanding etc. by hand. Orbital sanders are notorious for leaving circular orbit marks in the wood, especially hard woods and you can see them in your grips. Your doing a fine job thus far.
 
Haha, the orbital was just to do the final shaping after filing. It's not being used anymore, I just finshed hand wet sanding with BLO 220, 400, 600 grit. Things are looking very smooth, just about to do a coat of BLO when I'm done warming some up. I'll post pics when it's had a chance to soak in. I'm very happy with the end result, can't wait to start on the TT-33 grips next. Thanks for all the opinions by the way.
 
Here's where I'm at now, I'm getting close I think. So after hand wet sanding with 220,400,600 grit sandpaper I gave it a BLO coat and let things sit. I find this wood to be so hard the BLO doesn't really soak in a ton, I really like the shine a lot so I think I might have to grab some furniture wax and give it a go.

After a final soft cloth buff they are so smooth to the touch but not as slippery as I thought they would be, so I'm pleased. I'd just like to bring out more sheen on them, I absolutely love the darkness they have taken on. My iPhone pic does not pick up the sheen fully but I hope you get the idea.

 
buckbrush said:
the timed screw heads on your 1911 look great.
Click to expand...

Thanks, but now they don't line up haha, I put them on this morning for a look see and the pricks don't line up like that anymore. I know better than to force them, does anyone know what size the threads should be? I'd like to get some alen head screws or maybe something shiny.

Here's some shots after a paste wax polish and soft cloth buff, I'll leave it at this for now and see how it wears with some use. Happy with the level of lustre etc.

 
Looking pimp! :d

That's what ebony should look like.

Don't worry about the oil not soaking in. The ebony is a very dense yet oily wood all on its own. You'll likely find that it just gets better and better as it wears away the BLO and the natural wood oils rise up and take its place.

I've got a wood working square that belonged to my grandfather which has an ebony handle. For years as I was growing up I saw my father using it in his machine shop. It was always covered in metal dust and oil. When I got into my own wood working he gave the square to me. I cleaned it up and lightly sanded down the size and back to remove all the dings and warts from the previous two life times of rough use and found an absolutely lovely looking tool which I use regularly with respect. The ebony is so black and dense that it could be mistaken for plastic.
 
@bcrider

Cheers man, I'm pleased to say the least with the way they turned out and look on the pistol. Registration showed up today so there's a range trip happening on one of my days off that's for sure.

Here's a pic with the grip on.
 
Bonus! I see you got the screws inserted back in the order where they clock the slots at the same angle again.... :d

If you should ever get into learning to checker stocks and grips you'll find that the ebony will take a VERY shiny look to the cuts. But these are a bit special since ebony is now a controlled wood. So don't use these to learn on. You've got something special on your hands and while they would be amazing with some checkering you want to make sure you do your learning on something more disposable.

Tight groups to ya when it gets to the range.

EDIT- In the picture the top screw looks like the slot might be a little bruised by a bad screwdriver at some point in the past. A trick for fixing this is to grab the screw in a vise with soft jaws and using a small ball peen hammer LIGHTLY tap the raised metal back down. Once down and restored to shape you may need to touch up the bluing with some cold blue. Be careful though. It's pretty easy to get carried away with peening the bruise back down and make the slot too narrow for the screw driver. So watch your progress and test with the screwdriver that fits the other good condition screws with a nice no slop fit for sizing the repair as you go.

Many years ago I tripped over a small 4 or 6 oz ball peen hammer. I always considered it a bit of a joke but since I've gotten into my hobby gunsmithing it's been my weapon of choice for small things like doctoring damaged screws of this sort. You'll want to find a lighter hammer of the same sort. Don't use full size hammers on something this dainty. It's the wrong sort of force even if you try to be careful.
 
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