The Ebony and Brass Knobs
Julian Barton made these knobs from stabilized ebony provided by the same person who provided the rest of the wood for this project, Larry Davis of Gallery Hardwoods. Here are a few shots of the making of these knobs. Julian is quoted below.
I started with some hexagonal brass stock. First I machined the outside diameter. Next I turned down the outside shaft diameter. Next I machined the recess for the nut and washer. The next step was to drill out the center and then ream it to final 1/4" size. The wedding ring shape on the outside was done by hand with a file and sandpaper While spinning of course). The ring was machine buffed and then lacquered with Nickolaus spray lacquer.
Larry Davis gave me a lovely piece of ebony for the knobs. I cut this into rectangular pieces and turned them into cylinders. I turned the whole cylinder to final outside diameter then cut the pieces to length. Next I bored out the center so I could slip it over the brass core.
The end of the knob has a small hole drilled and a small piece of brass tubing inlayed into it. The center of the hole is filled with ebony dust and superglue to form a tiny French eye.
Finally the tubing is cut flush and smoothed flat. The knobs are machine buffed with no finish on the ebony. The brass eyes have a small amount of superglue on them to keep them from oxidizing. The knobs are quite hefty and feel VERY serious! Thanks for the chance to fire up my Sherline lathe. Oh BTW the little piece of cruddy looking brass in the foreground is the tubing used for the eyes.
And the finished product....
Thank you for your work in this project, Julian!