Kevin's fine knives came with nice covers that used cheap plastic pins. So I agreed to make some for him out of brass. The dimensions are shown in the following drawing.
A 1/4" piece of brass round stock was held in a 1/4" collet in the lathe. The end was faced. The head was then set at approximately 1.5° offset. The taper was cut for 0.710" and to a small diameter on the free end of the rod of 0.158".
The part was cut off at 7/8" and the wide end rounded with a file. The pin was polished with fine sandpaper. Three pins were made and they fit very nicely in the wooden knife holders.
See also the second Brass Pin write-up after the first set of pins vanished.