Hollowing out a jaw bone

[WhistlingBadger]

Kept a jaw bone off my antelope this year to make a knife handle.  I have a blade that should work great.  But there's a channel through the middle of the bone that has some flesh in it--nerves I guess--and I don't know how to clean it out.  The channel seems to curve, so I can't just drill it out.  I know some of you make jawbone handles.  How do you get the gunk out?

T

[bjrogg]

Guess I’ve never seen an antelopes jaw bone before.

I’m thinking it an internal cavity that holds bone marrow. I usually use compressed air and water. Along with a piece of wire to poke around with. After a good boil in water.

I’m trying to remember. I think I have used to jaw bones for two knife handles. If I remember correctly I cut both and shortened them. This also allowed better access to remove the marrow.

Hope that helps.

Bjrogg

[WhistlingBadger]

Guess I’ve never seen an antelopes jaw bone before.

I’m thinking it an internal cavity that holds bone marrow. I usually use compressed air and water. Along with a piece of wire to poke around with. After a good boil in water.

I’m trying to remember. I think I have used to jaw bones for two knife handles. If I remember correctly I cut both and shortened them. This also allowed better access to remove the marrow.

Hope that helps.

Bjrogg

Thanks, BJ.  The challenge with antelope is the marrow channel is really small, narrow, and curvy.  Think it's just going to take some elbow grease and a piece of stiff wire.   I'm going to have to boil this one again and soften it up.  Got some of the gunk out but only about 1/3 of the way in.  Starting to smell too, but nothing a good peroxide soak shouldn't handle.

[WhistlingBadger]

OK, updating this for anybody who needs to do the same thing.  I cut the jawbone to roughly the size and shape I wanted, dug out as much of the marrow as I could get with a stiff wire (not much), then boiled it for about an hour with peroxide in the water.  After that, I was able to run the wire all the way through, drag out the remaining gunk, then soak the hole in peroxide paste again to remove any cling-ons.  Works like a champ.

Now I just have to figure out how to carve out a channel shaped like the tang...stay tuned.

[Hawkdancer]

Well, you got this far!  Maybe boil the bone to soften and the hope a lot!
Hawkdancer

[WhistlingBadger]

I used my primitive electric drill.  Had to do some small guide holes to soften things up, and eventually worked my way up to one almost as big as the tank.  Now trying to decide whether to use pitch glue, gorilla glue, or epoxy to hold the whole thing together.  Leaning toward gorilla glue, but pitch glue would be more fun if I can figure out how to melt it and get it inside the hole.  I'm kind of depending on the glue to hold the teeth in from the inside, too.  Maybe if I shoved in a little pitch glue suppository, heated the tang up really good, and put it in to melt the glue???  Maybe.

[Pappy]

I usually use the really fine super glue for holding the teeth, I just turn the jaw where the teeth are up and drop a little thin glue on the inside side of the teeth, can't see it and will hold them good. I also just get things lined up and heat the pitch glue and let it drip in the hole around what I am wanting to glue in, if you get a little on the out side it cleans up very easily. Most time I just epoxy it in and finish the out side with pitch glue, kind of cheating but holds really well that way.
 Pappy