Repair advice request - Knife purchased about eight years ago from a forum member

[Zeno]

Hi everyone,
It’s been quite a while since I’ve participated on kitchen knife forums.

I recently found a knife which was made by a Knife Forums/ITK member about eight years ago which I've had in storage. Its handle is made from redwood burl with either a tooth or horn ferrule. Unfortunately some bugs got to the ferrule while it was in storage and nibbled away at it, leaving some pitting in the material. See attached photos.

Can anyone offer some advice on the best way to repair this? I assume by using some type of epoxy filler followed by careful sanding.

Are there any professionals who anyone can recommend who could do a good job?

I love the knife and would like to fix it properly.

Thanks in advance!

Sam

 

[cotedupy]

Epoxy and sanding should be fairly easy (ime). And on a polished ferrule like that any bit of extraneous epoxy should come off quite easily within the first few hours, before it's fully set.

You could also colour it a bit... Kintsugi-style handle restoration!

 

[drsmp]

Looks fairly shallow. Sand with a block to keep angles crisp. Sand all eight angles (or at least the top three) carry onto body of handle so it’s symetrical. Start at 400 grit finish with 1000. Then seal with a little tru oil , board butter or axe wax and buff with micro-fiber.

 

[Taz575]

That will be a lot of sanding and it's easy to mess up the crisp lines. I would either fill it with colored epoxy and sand it down or send it to someone to replace the ferrule? Or drill some extra dimples in it, use some of the casting resins and add some color to it to fill in the gaps and then sand it down. Would add a nice contrast!

Kinda like the pic of cholla cactus with the holes filled in: