I noticed this one on Ebay... it looks like the musk ox scales have shrunk compared to the knife frame.

Is musk ox horn prone to a good bit of shrink?

http://cgi.ebay.com/Randall-Knife-Knives...a#ht_500wt_1154

Mitchell,

I reviewed your post with my nephew Bill who is an accomplished knifemaker himself. He claims that both scales were most likely patterned, sanded and drilled off the knife, and later assembled with the mosaic pins. There are several clues that lead him to this conclusion looking at the photos. He does acknowledge that this material will shrink to some small degree if not properly dried and stabilized.

Tune,
I have had 4 musk ox handled Triatheletes shrink. One of them 3...count them...3 times! Musk Ox has to cure. Some of the first batches of the stuff was dried, stabilized, etc. cut properly and approved by the shop and installed. Very few problems occured...but some did occur. It's the nature of a natural material.
Gene Beal has re-handled all of mine, or reduced the blade stock slightly on others to correct the problem. I strongly recommend folks be patient with musk ox. There are quantities coming into the lower 48 that have recently been killed. Some has been sent still bloody! That musk ox needs a "long" time to cure. I am figuring a year or more to dry it out. My buddy Duke MaCaa tried a slow oven, very cool temperature...to no avail. Time cures...plain and simple. I have to disagree with "Harry" on this one. All of mine are rough cut but finished on the knife and polished out. I don't know where Jesse got his stuff. It's not one of mine. I think it just needed more time.
For what it's worth: I have not heard of complaints of "cracking" with regards to musk ox, but there have certainly been shrinkage. Caveat Emptor...You're dealing with "exotics"!!
Best, Capt. Chris

Tune, It is possible the "shrinkage" on the Ox handle shown by the excess metal exposed, could also be caused or made worse by temp. I have a slab sided pinned Ivory handled knife and each summer as the temp gets hotter the blade expands and there is more metal exposed past the handle slabs, in winter as the blade is colder it seems to contract and the handle slabs are flush with the metal tang. I have watched this occur over and over for several years as the seasons change. Perhaps this ebay knife is just going through it's summer expansion?

Yea Griff, I have a fossil ivory Griffin Drop Point that seems to move around some as well. This one looked pretty substantial.

I don't have any experience with the Musk Ox and I didn't know how much the stabilization process "stableized" it.

One of these days I am going to get a APFK handled in Musk Ox.

Hi All, I rehandled these knives for Jesse 2 or 3 years ago. He is a pretty nice guy and has not made a complaint or made me aware the knives had a problem. The material had been cured in my shop for over a year and the handles were shaped on the knife after assembly. I do everything I can to remedy shrinkage including curing and stabilizing, but you never can tell what natural materials are going to do in differing temperatures and humidities. It is the nature of the beast. As I do with all of my knives especially those I hand build from scratch these knives have a lifetime warranty, under normal use. I have let Jesse know, after I saw them on ebay, that I will fix them free of charge, I will extend the warranty to anyone who buys them from Jesse.

I personally have had 3 musk ox handle scales put on Randall knives, 2 triathletes and 1 10-3 all done by Gene Beal and all 3 have shrunk, bowed up or cracked badly.
As stated in another post this stuff really needs to dry out a LONG time before you try to use it and it must be stabalized after it is totally dried out.
I am personally advising customers, who ask about the stuff on knives that I am having done for them as a dealer, not to use it.
I have seen and heard of too many problems with it..
Stuff that is properly dried out and correctly stabalized seem to do well, but how do you know that it has been done properly?
IMO what has happened is that it came on the market about 3 years ago as the new HOT item for handles and the demand for the properly prepaired stuff far exceeded the amount available.
So dealers in the raw material started putting the stuff out there before it was ready to be used and the problems started.
That is my personal opinion.
This stuff is VERY expensive material to use on handles and it really makes me sick when I see a handle that is all shrunken up or bowed up or cracked beyond repair.
Then the material that is more expensive than ivory usually has to be replaced with another material.
I know because I had 3 of them that I had to do that with.
So, just beware if you're going to use this material.
Best, Greg Gutcher

Guys, The knives you have talked about so far are slab type handles if I am correct. My question is , do the hidden tang style handles have these problems? I was debating on buying one that I seen for sale. Thanks, Jimmy

The standard kives with musk ox have been known to shrink as well. Caveat Emptor.
Best, Capt. Chris
PS: It's the same story with snakewood or ivory...CCS

In reference to exotic knife handle material, has anyone used
oosic?

Charles
RKS #5795