Pipe Pistol Handle
/Today I started working on the steel parts, which is the last thing to be done. To come up with the shape for the pistol hand grip I rigged up a homemade bending brake. In some tests a while ago I found 25mm wide flat bar was the most comfortable in the hand, so after about 3 trial I managed to come up with a bent shape which resembles the source image, and feels comfortable in the hand.
For the shall steel plate that goes between the hand grip and the wood, I laser cut a stencil of the drill hole locations so I can use a transfer punch to punch out the drill hole locations quick and accurate. It turns out the 1/2" bolts I have, and the thread taps I have are 2 different standards (12TPI vs 13TPI) so I will have to put this part on hold until tomorrow when I can go buy a new tap set.
The rubber 'ranger bands' around the grip don't appear to be sold anywhere in Australia, however looking closer at screenshots, it appears the bands have seams on them. So I think cutting up a tire tube will be an authentic material choice. I cut up an old tube I had in my junk drawer and tried it on the see how it looks.
It is starting to look good. I'm not worried about the steel being blacked or galvanized right now- I have a plan for that in the final finishing of the piece.
