Titanium Spatula

So for Christmas my family draws names and whoever's name you draw,  you have to make a gift for them.  The goal is to make it for under $10.00.  This year I drew Heather's name and, since she's a chef, I decided to make her a titanium spatula/pancake turner.  The handle material is a piece of scrap Corian my friend Tim gave me, and the the titanium was some various scrap pieces I bought on e-bay. I'm making it out of titanium because it sounds 'kinda exotic and if you look up "titanium spatula", on the internet, you'll not find many. I found one that is intended for backpacking.

I started out doing a drawing based on a spatula we had in the house, I drew one side and then folded it in half, to keep it symmetrical, then cut it out. 

After I cut out the paper, I traced out the shape and cut it out on a bandsaw.

The above shots are me clamping the cut out titanium shape into a vise and then clamping some scrap plywood around the spatula shape and attempting to bend it into a spatula shape.   This was harder than it looks, titanium is very resistant to being bent!  You had to really over bend to compensate for the titanium springing back.  

Above, sitting on my metal band saw, is the sawn out and bent up spatula blank. 

The above pics are the Corian slab scrap, Tim gave me quite a while ago, and the piece I cut out of it that's about to be cut into 2 pieces in order to make the handle for the spatula. 

I glue the rough cut handles on both sides of the spatula blank, just because I like the idea of glue and rivets together holding the handles on and it makes a nice black line.  

Whoops!  I forgot to grind the front blade down to a reasonable edge, so I had to go back downstairs to the dirt section of the shop to do that. I just used a 4 1/2" grinder with a hard grinding wheel. It took noticeably longer than steel, it being titanium and all, to grind down. 

After cutting, sanding, buffing, and otherwise forming the handle,  I drilled out the holes for the rivets.  I like having the glue and the mechanical connection of the rivets to hold the handle securly and aesthetically, the rivets look nice. I drill the hole twice, once to allow for space for the head of the rivet and again to allow for the rivet to go all the way through.  It takes two drill bits.  I used a brad point drill bit for the rivet countersink and a regular bit to go all the way through.  

These are a close up of the rivets I used, I think they're knife making rivets, 'ya just pound them together. 

Here's a shot of the riveting and sizing the rivet holes in progress. 

All riveted up and awaiting some buffing and some texturing of the metal. 

To apply the swirl texture I just chucked up a wire brush in the drill press and up and down and around the surface of the spatula.

It came out real well, although I certainly should have taken a better pic, 'cause it looks and feels better than the pic above shows.   I scrawled some stuff on the back for Heather, wrote the year, and that sort of thing.  The Corian handle has a nice feel to it. The process of working the titanium is a bit more difficult than your average metals, but if Heather ever has to go work on a space station, this should be more than up to the task! I missed not seeing you Christmas, Ms. Heather, hope you're feeling better soon!