Restoration of Antique Bowie Knife — It Took 335 Hours! Hi! Today, restoration of a rare antique 19th-century Bowie knife. This is a unique piece. Of course, the knife is in poor condition. The original handle is missing, and the one currently on it was most likely installed sometime in the 20th century. There is a lot of rust, and the sheath is missing. But now I’m going to fix all of that. I bought this piece at a flea market.

00:00 Start
01:14 Blade Cleaning
04:05 Knife Sanding
06:52 Making Blade Collar
12:55 Making Knife Guard
15:37 Knife Handle
23:06 Handle Sanding
25:08 Making Pommel
26:47 Engraving the Pommel
32:16 Leather Knife Sheath
42:42 Before and After
43:37 Test

First, I removed the old handle and discovered that the tang was broken. On top of that, it was very short for a knife of this size. I removed the surface rust, filled the knife with kerosene, and left it for two days. After two days, I took it out of the kerosene, wiped it down, applied WD-40, and then used heated machine oil. I thoroughly coated the entire knife, wrapped it in a cloth and a plastic bag, and left it for another three days.

After three days, all of the remaining rust came off very easily. Then I did some light hand sanding. I also used polishing paste, but all of the history remained on the blade. I deliberately left the nicks on the blade because they are minor, and removing them would have meant changing the geometry of the blade and, therefore, changing its history. I don’t like doing that. So the blade turned out beautifully cleaned, while still preserving all of its history on the surface.

The next step was making the brass piece that attaches to the ricasso of the blade, just in front of the guard. I used 19th-century brass, almost one millimeter thick, shaped it to fit, soldered it using food-grade tin, and then additionally secured it with two iron rivets. They gave the blade an even more authentic appearance. The next step was the guard. I made it from thick brass and shaped it accordingly. After that, I cut a leather liner to the required shape.

For the handle, I chose deer antler. But in order to mount the antler on the knife, I had to extend the tang and bend it slightly. After securely extending the tang, I started assembling the handle. I drilled the necessary hole in the antler, fitted it onto the tang, filled it with epoxy resin, and additionally secured everything with two nuts and one rubber washer.
After two days, everything had dried, and I started shaping the handle. I gave it the required shape because it was originally quite thick, while preserving its natural texture. Finally, I slightly aged the handle using ordinary instant coffee and hot water. The final aging will be done at the end of the handle-finishing process.

Next, I made the pommel for the handle from thick brass and engraved the name of the knife, the country, and the year it appeared. After aging the pommel, I moved on to making the sheath. I made the sheath from thick, high-quality genuine leather, adding a belt loop and a securing strap. As usual, I treated the entire sheath with grease to protect the leather from moisture.

And, of course, I made a great test for you. If you would like to purchase my work, contact me on social media — Instagram or Facebook. The links are here in the video description and on the main page of my channel. Also, don’t forget to like and share this video, hit the Hype button, and leave your comments. It really helps. Thank you for watching!

Sincerely, Alex. Thanks for attention!
Good luck and health to everyone! With best wishes, Alex!
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