Handcrafted Knives

Just in time for Christmas, we have completed several handcrafted knives!  We are offering the popular skinner, drop point, spear point, and tanto designs.  All are stainless steel blades, 5/32" thick. We are including a wooden sheath with each one.  The sheath has magnets recessed into the interior sides to hold the sheath onto the knife.

Brass pins are used to hold the handles on.  The knives feel strong and powerful in your hand, and feature great fitting handles.  The handles are oversized and shaped to provide the best fit.

We offer a variety of woods to choose from.  If you don't see what you like, contact us to construct a custom knife out of the wood you prefer.

 These are not your mom's kitchen knives.  They are tools, and feel like tools in your hand.  They are not display type knives, they are intended to work and work hard.  The handles are smooth, not slick. The blades are satin finished.  If you prefer a display knife, contact us to construct it to your specifications.

We offer the knives on our Lucy Hardware Shop site and on our Etsy store.  Visit us today!

Gas Grill Refurbish

Like a lot of folks, the last grill we purchased was a big one with multiple burners, side burners, and other stuff we rarely used.  The grill was entirely too large for our normal use, which was grilling for 3 to 4 people.  Our large grill was needed only three or four times the entire period we operated it.

We don't have a sheltered area we can store our grill on, it must withstand the elements on the patio. A cover was deployed, but it seemed to compound the moisture problem by trapping water underneath.  So, after two years, most of the burners need to be replaced and many of the heat shields. What was most troubling was that the grill exterior was beginning to rust.

After checking on the cost of parts needed, we decided maybe we should go another route.  We still had our old grill, purchased in 1985, which had a cast iron body.  This grill was large enough to grill about 18 burgers easily, and this capacity would accommodate us 90% of the time.  After inspection and verifying the cooking unit was not rusty at all, we attempted to find a burner for it. 

We have used the universal type burner before.  They never cook even and were the primary reason we purchased the giant grill 2 years ago. After much searching, we finally found a source for parts.  As I stated, the old cast grill was purchased in 1985 and is a Sunbeam 300 series.  Sunbeam does not make grills any longer and does not stock parts.

We discovered that the folks at The BBQ Depot stocked parts.  The price for the burner was about the same as the price for a universal burner.  It was infinitely better!  The tubes were heavy duty and pre-bent to fit the grill.  The burner fit inside the grill and screwed to the bottom.  As far as I can tell, the burner was an exact replacement for the original burner.  We also ordered a heat deflector, which was also top quality and fit the grill perfectly.

If you are old enough, you will remember "lava rocks" came with these old grills. The rocks would absorb grease and you would battle flair ups during the entire cooking process.  The heat deflector takes care of this problem.

The real test was cooking on the old grill.  I can tell you that the grill cooked evenly front to back and side to side.  The heat deflector prevented flair ups.  I could not be happier!  We are ordering new grates for the old grill next.  By the way, they are priced comparable to other grill parts and according to the dimensions on  The BBQ Depot  website, it will fit perfectly.  Did I mention the items we already purchased were shipped promptly, were packaged well, and arrived in good condition?

If you know where you can find an old cast iron grill, grab it!  You will not be disappointed.  Get your parts from  The BBQ Depot  and refurbish the grill yourself. 

Facebook?????

We recently constructed a new website to promote our products.  After operating for some time on Etsy, Ebay, Amazon, etc., we opted for our own website.  It is at https://lucyhardwareshop.com. After reviewing all the SEO stuff, we found the option to sell on Facebook and decided to attempt to initiate this.

We have had a Facebook business page for some time.  We were not very active on it because it never did generate any traffic to our sites.  We would post when we had a new product, but we didn't post often or regularly.  It was a stand alone business page created when that was an option at Facebook.  This type of page is no longer offered at Facebook.  You must create a personal profile, then create a page from that profile.  Our existing business page was "greyed out", a term Facebook uses to politely say "you are now screwed, buddy"!

We can not access most promotional features of Facebook on this page any longer.  We had deleted our profiled pages because they were constantly hacked.  So, we created a new personal profile and followed all the steps published by Facebook and the forums, nothing worked. 

As far as I can tell, you can't contact Facebook.  Strange.  They want to sell me advertising, but I can't contact them?   In their own pages, they stress that I should promptly answer any correspondence if I want my store to be successful.  Yet they want to take my money for ads and don't provide a way for me to contact them.

I am glad I found all this out before we processed our ads purchase! 

New Website!

After kicking the idea around for quite some time, we finally took the plunge and launched our own website this week.  Lucy Hardware Shop at lucyhardwareshop.com.

We have been pleased with the Etsy store, also Lucy Hardware Shop, and will keep it operating as well.  The store on Amazon will continue also.  But, with our own website, we now have the freedom to do a few things a little differently and we are in control of changes in policy and design.

The recent changes at Etsy finally pushed us to this point.  After having a very good year last year and a tremendous start this year, all of a sudden, sales dropped off.  This coincided with the many changes Etsy pushed on it's sellers, and they have announced more changes are coming. From what I can tell from my friends who also operate Etsy stores, one change that is happening is that many sellers are establishing their own sites. 

It took us about 10 days to get the site constructed and populated with products.  We still have many products to add and will work on this during the next two weeks. We are excited about the ability to name our own categories and we get to decide how many photos an item needs.  We don't have to link an item to an event or holiday, and many more little things that really annoyed us at Etsy.

Next week we will be adding our canoe outriggers to our site.  They will not be added to the other stores.  They are canoe floats that attach to a canoe to add stability.  With these, you can safely move around freely in the canoe without worrying about capsizing.  You can even stand! 

Wooden Putter

In our last post we talked about the new mini discs we added to the site and hinted to the addition of wooden putters. Well, after testing several different models, we opted to keep two of them.

The first we will talk about is a blunt nosed disc which is modeled much like the Innova Birdie or Polecat. Our model starts out as a 21.2 cm disc, however, after sanding it may be slightly less. This disc, in oak, weighs approximately 208 grams.

And a view of the rear:

Our other putter is modeled with a rounded nose much like the Innova Aero or Aviar. Our model starts out as a 21.7 cm disc, however, after sanding it may be slightly less. This disc, in oak, weighs approximately 188 grams.

 And the bottom of this disc:

These discs are great as a trophy for your disc golf events as well as a gift for your favorite disc golfer. We can carve text or graphic images to the disc.

How do they throw? 

When I show the discs to my disc golfing friends, this is the first question asked.  My answer is, I don't know.  Certainly, you could throw them.  However, my research indicates a wooden disc golf disc has a very short lifespan when actively used on the disc golf course.  I threw the prototype, and it flew about like expected. 

I believe that if thrown with some power directly at a tree, the disc will likely break.  I also know that if actively used as a putter, constant banging of the chains and basket will scuff up the edge rather quickly.

Additionally, according to the PDGA guidelines for discs, the wooden putter is not legal for play.  According to these guidelines, the disc must be made of plastic and cannot exceed 200 grams. 

So the disc can't be used for tournament play.  Maybe your buddies would object if you used it for casual play. You may be playing with a group that tends to play all rounds like a PDGA event, and adhering strictly to all rules.  There is nothing wrong with that, I play with a group like that occasionally.  But my regular group is a lot more casual.  When my buddies ask me if it is legal, I reply no, but it is cool.

Disc Golf Mini Discs

Many of our friends have asked us to make mini discs for disc golf.  It took us quite a while to come up with a design we were happy with.  But after wasting a lot of wood, I think we got it!

According to the PDGA guidelines, the disc diameter had to be between 2 3/4 inches and  5 7/8 inches.  The height of the disc could be no more than 1 3/16 inches.  The disc could be made of many material types including wood.

We originally refined a model that produced a disc approximately 4 1/2 inches in diameter and 1/2 inches high.  We recessed the back of the disc, like a real disc.  The leading edge is not as blunt as a putter, more like an Aero.

The discs are made from strips of wood and finished with our penetrating oil finish.  Discs with painted inlays are sprayed with lacquer.

On our first trip to the course, one of our friends had a bag made by a company that also makes discs.  The pocket for the marker disc was sized to fit that company's marker disc, our 4 1/2 inch model was too large.

Back to the drawing board for development of a smaller mini disc.  This smaller version is about 3 9/16 inches in diameter.  A standard Innova mini disc is about 3 7/8 inches.

We like the 4 1/2 inch model because it allows more area for graphics, and it flies better!  Kind of on the stable side.  Of course, we don't recommend throwing them in the vicinity of trees and other obstructions.

We are presently working on a full size putter.  Stay tuned!

Wood

The most important consideration in planning a new project has to be wood(s) selection.  You can start with the greatest design ever, construct it like an expert with 20 years experience, and finish it exactly by the book, and still end up with a flop if you use the wrong wood.  To select the correct wood for a project several things must be considered.  Serious woodworkers weigh the look against the performance when selecting woods.  It is a sad day when an item looks great but fails to stand the test of time.

When selecting a wood consider how much wear it is likely to be exposed to.  We like to use hard woods when the wood will be exposed to a lot of traffic.  You can search "Janka Wood Hardness Scale" to see a listing of woods and their respective hardness values.  Bear in mind that this scale is an average hardness.  We currently have some white oak in the bin that is the hardest wood I have ever used.  Our last shipment of cherry contained a few boards that were extremely dense and hard and a few boards that were well below the average hardness for cherry. 

Also consider elements the wood will be exposed to.  If it is going to get wet or constantly exposed to high humidity, go with something like cypress, cedar, or juniper.  These woods have been used by traditional boatbuilders for many years.  Our canoe outriggers are constructed from these woods. 

 Always check The Wood Database for Wood Allergies and Toxicity if you are not familiar with the wood you are working with. Some can be extremely toxic.  It is a good idea to wear a respirator and have a functioning dust collection system when using tools that make a lot of sawdust.

Make sure your wood is dry.  Many moisture meters are available on the market to test the amount of moisture in the wood.  Just remember, wood will absorb moisture from the air.  If it has been humid for the past week, expect the moisture meter to reflect this. Also, just because you buy the lumber from a retailer does not insure that the wood was properly dried before putting it up for sale.  If it feels wet, it probably is.

Most occasional woodworkers purchase wood from big box building supply stores.  The sooner you can get away from this the better!  Have you purchased several 3/4 inch boards and started on your project only to find that some of the boards were a little fatter than the others?  If this has not happened to you, it will.  Find a sawmill and have them plane the wood to the desired thickness.  You will get wood that is uniform thickness.  And, you will likely save a lot of money.  Better yet, if you plan on doing a lot of projects, get a band saw and a planer and dress the wood yourself.

We purchase the bulk of our wood from one of three local sawmills, all within an hour drive of our house.  Our wood is purchased rough sawn, we resaw with the band saw and plane it to the thickness that suits our project.  After all, 3/4 inches is not the ideal board thickness for every project!

The primary woods we use are maple, walnut, cherry, red oak, white oak, and ash.  We also use sassafrass, holly, cypress, cedar, juniper, yellow pine, white pine, poplar, birch, beech, and hickory.  When asked, we can get most exotics.

Customers occasionally ask if we use recycled wood, reclaimed wood, pallet wood, and bamboo. The answer to all is NO. First of all, bamboo is not a wood, it is a grass.  It is pressed and glued into something that resembles plywood.  I understand the economics and why it is used in the Asian world, but we can use real wood here a lot cheaper than we can get bamboo.

Recycled wood, reclaimed wood, pallet wood all fall into the same area in my mind.  To begin with, I don't know what kind of chemicals this wood has been exposed to, and, if they will leak and be harmful to the health of my client and their family.  I have some experience driving a big truck, believe me, no one cleans pallets and they are exposed to everything.  Pallet wood is the last thing you want to bring into your home.  And, I am aware of the argument that maybe the wood was not exposed to anything, maybe it is from a church that was demolished and not a formaldehyde factory.  Which brings up the second point, I want to protect myself and my tools.  More than likely, this wood was joined using nails and screws.  Both of these will damage tools, blades, and bits.  They can also send bits of these metal missiles flying around my shop.

Another note, in my area the sawmills run out of many species of wood around the end of the year.  New wood is cut in the spring and then it takes a little time to run it through the kiln for drying.  Try to stockpile wood in the fall that will last you until middle to late spring.

Remember, buy your wood from someone you trust, not a clerk at the big box store. Know the properties of the wood you want to use and fit it to the project.  Know the health hazards of the wood you have chosen.  Keep your shop free of dust and avoid recycled, reclaimed, and pallet wood.