AmericanLongRifles Forums
General discussion => Gun Building => Topic started by: yip on October 14, 2025, 06:54:16 PM
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just wondering what gun builders of years ago use for engraving? they done some very good work, and i was wondering.
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I believe you can get a pretty good idea what the old timers used by watching some of the Hershel House videos. I don’t think he does a lot of explaining what he’s doing, but the visuals are pretty good. I think some of the gravers he used in the video are made from worn out files.
Worn out chainsaw file work well for me. I haven’t had real good luck with gravers that are purpose made. They seem to be a little too springy for my ham handed approach to engraving.
Hungry Horse
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My first Gravers were ground from chain saw files. They work fine when using a hammer. Ppwer hack saw blades can work also. I've also used just plain old drill rod put into a wood file handle
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Years ago at Conner Prairie I watched Hershel break off half of a 3 corner file, grind the end to shape by eye and started engraving. A "point" well taken!
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Hi,
It depends on what engraving and where. Eighteenth and early 19th century American stuff is pretty simple and I am sure the demonstrations by Herschel House and Wallace Gussler help folks get a feel for it using simple hand made gravers. The work done in Britain and Europe at the time was a whole different ball game. They had much more sophisticated tools, probably better lighting and even magnification. They also were professional engravers and highly trained.
dave
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just wondering what gun builders of years ago use for engraving? they done some very good work, and i was wondering.
I know little about engraving but in the past I have seen stocks that looked like they were done with a shingle hatchet ;D ;D'We had a fine engraver locally,Norris Sperry but cancer took him away.
Bob Roller
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You can make a graver out of any steel that is harder than the material that you are cutting. The trick is knowing how to sharpen the graver to make the cut that you want to make. So you need to ask the question, what cut do you want to make with the graver? Most of the simple engraved American rifles were engraved with a "90 degree V graver", sounds simple enough to make, doesn't it. When you look into how to sharpen a traditional 90 deg gaver most likely the info will say to sharpen with a 45 deg face and 15 de heels. This is where the wheels begin to come off for a lot of starting engravers. How do you go about setting these angles? Unless you have the basic knowledge of how to properly sharpen a graver you get lost very easily, I speak this from experiance.
People say, well Wallace and Hershel just broke off a 3 corner file and went to engraving so it shouldn't be that hard. No, they knew how to break the file and they knew how to touch it up on a stone to make a graver out of the file that would cut the line they wanted to cut.
You can't cut a good line until you grasp the knowledge of how to sharpen. Figure that out and you can make a graver out of just about anything.
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WATCHED HERSHEL HOUSE, THAT MAN WAS AHELL OF A CRAFTMAN, HE COULD DO SO GREAT ENGRAVING WITH BEAT UP FINGER AND DIRTUNDER HIS FINGER NAILS. HE'LL BE MISSED
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Not to long ago there was a thread here about engraving, it had a link to a video that showed making them, shaping and sharpening one. I'll see if I can find it.
Tim
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Can't find it but this may be some help.
https://americanlongrifles.org/forum/index.php?PHPSESSID=8368a1f27e5e8e7b7463221b08004bbb&topic=18541.msg174129#msg174129
Tim