Rehandled IKEA bread knife

Rehandled IKEA gynnsam bread knife. https://imgur.com/gallery/H8Ryk

My brother and sister in law just bought their first house. She is a fan of wooden handles so naturally i took it upon myself to handle some of knives for them. This is the first piece. Worked out well enough except my drill keeps damaging the wood around the pinholes. Drives me insane as you can only really see it when you are almost done with the whole damn thing.

Are you using a hardwood plank beneath the scales when you drill? This can help you cut down on tearout when the bit comes through the other side.

Slower speed, sharp bit and a piece of wood underneath for sure.

Wood underneath check sharp bit check slow speed ehm.... my drill doesn't do that. Also the damage is on both sides both entry and exit. What do you think would work best, getting a drill stand for the powerdrill or getting a hand drill?

What would also help is to keep the scales thicker when drilling so that the tear-out that might happen will be sanded away during shaping of the handle. Also - different woods will be more or less prone to the tear out. You could also glue a piece of paper to the surface of the wood prior to drilling.

Cheap drill press will not cost much more than a stand for a power drill and will give you more precision and control and lower speeds.

Thanks for the paper tip! Never heard of that, but makes a lot of sense. The chips are on both sides of the knife. But they are both exit wounds, both scales are drilled from the tang out (Duh, what was I thinking earlier). I actually had another idea too: I could drill a small hole from the tang outward, and then the full diameter outside in. Using thicker wood and then thin it is not that practical right now. Since I do everything (except drilling the holes) by hand at the dinner table thinning the wood later is a lot of work. I already use as much extra thickness as I can muster the patience for to remove. With my earlier knives the problem was less manifest because I used headed screws, and the heads mask the damage to the holes. Now with the straight pins everything becomes painfully visible. But with all your tips I'm sure the next one will come out much better. Thanks everyone!

I had problems with tear out using a hand drill. Using a dremel with sharp bits helped. Use sharp bits and apply less pressure when you start to get close.

lus1: for a drill press, it really upped my handle game. Also there are lettered and numbered drill bits that are just wider than the nominal size of the pin you are using. Use some google searching to find a bit that is just a skosh larger and your pins will fit more comfortably. Like for a 1/8 (0.125) inch pin hole, if you use a #30 (0.1285) the pin will fit without having to sand the pin.

It actually works the other way with me. I bought a 6mm tube and a 6mm drill but the tubes are always too loose for my liking. Won't fit a 5.5 hole though. My local shop doesn't carry anything in between. Been gluing cardboard on prior to dilling and that definitely works great.