Can This Travel Brush Be Easily Reknotted?

Scowley

Scowley

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UK
I bought the L'Occitane Travel brush as I like the look of it, and the design where the knot sits within the tube for storage.

I got it for a good price and I was aware that the knot (I believe it is early generation synthetic) would be nowhere as nice as my modern synthetics for example my L'Occitane Plisson, Razorock or Sterling.

My question is - Is it easy to re-knot this brush with a softer modern synthetic?

I suppose follow on questions would be

- Has anyone had any experience of doing this?
- Is this something I can easily do or is there anyone out there up to the task?
- What CHEAP synthetic knot would be suitable?



 
The metal is very thin on the L'Occitane. The trouble is, the knot it sealed into a plastic ferrule which itself is sealed into a rubber centering grommet inside the metal base. It's a really tough one to pull. You'll pull the knot almost free, but it'll keep from pulling all the way without warping the metal. Destructively, you could do it - pull the knot out as far as you can, cut it off, then go at whatever remains inside the base with whatever you can to remove the gubbins.
 
As Paul says - you would need to be prepared to ruin it. I'd take a slightly different approach - the same as I've used for removing Rubberset aluminium brush knots.

Tape the knot and cut it off close to the base. Starting at the centre of what remains and working outwards, use a drill to start breaking up the ferrule. Eventually you should have destroyed most of it and can then remove the last part around the rim. I imagine the holder is hollow - if so, you can insert the replacement knot at the desired loft, invert and the dribble some epoxy and let it set with the brush upside down.
 
Hmm, looks like we are getting there. As I said the brush wasn't that expensive and if it gets ruined I can live with it.

I'm not worried about keeping the knot so these solutions are viable.

So let me get this right, somehow remove the black plastic ferrule without damaging the base. That's the first step?

Would breaking it up somehow allow me to remove the pieces easily Paul or are they gonna be glued tight still? Is this an idea or would I end up with loads of little problems?
 
Sorry, it was a metal ferrule and from memory, there's a rubber ring in there which fills out the base and holds the ferrule in place. Start pulling the knot to see how much of the ferrule you can being out. Chop off what you can expose and then get proggling away to break up and remove what remains.

See the black ring around the base of the knot? That's the top of the ferrule. It is as long as that piece is deep.
 
The original travel brush had the white synthetic knot which was as hard as nails. L'Occitane updated it to the badger coloured synthetic version, which was much better, but still to harsh for me - I use it for cleaning the keyboard on my mac

I soaked it in a cup of boiling water for a couple of minutes, grabbed the base with a cloth around it (as it was hot) and the brush with a pair of pliers and pulled. Came out straight away.
I then used a hot glue gun to stick the new Silvertip Bager knot in. It's now a superb traveling brush.

IMG_0681.jpg
 
Glad this thread has been resurrected...
I too have one of these brushes and whilst I don't mind the knot for occasional use (it's only to be used for holidays after all) I agree that an upgrade might be the way to go.
It'll be bald soon anyhow; this thing sheds hair for fun!
 
The base of the new knot is so shallow, it only goes in to the ferrel part way and fits perfectly.
The one that came out of the white brush had a thick steel washer to fill the gap, the newer style one had a bolt on the bottom.
 
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