10 hours work

SBranson

SBranson

Joined
Oct 29, 2006
Messages
2,912
I'm working on finishing my 3rd knife. The blade is essentially finished except for a final wet sand at 2000 before assembly.

Just spent the last 2 days on the guard. About 10 hours work and it's still not quite finished.

It's mild steel. Slot was drilled (no mill) and filed and took quite a while because the shoulders of my ricasso are probably only .010"

I bent the ends up to try to avoid having the make the center flat but in the end had to anyway.

You can't see it in these photos but where the rounded parts are under the tines of the guard is "textured" by smoothing then scuffing hard with 80 grit paper, then blending with 1200x.

Anyway, I'm kinda posting this to try and figure out how the heck everyone gets such nice looking guards without spending forever on them.

Just commented on a thread where the guy says his whole build was 14 hours.

Am I doing this wrong?:p:p

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Hi Stuart, That is a nice looking hilt. One thing I have learned over maney years of making knives is that your equipment will directly impact the speed and efficiancy of your work. However with that said I'll pass along a bit advice that Ed Caffary gave me, Do what ever it takes for however long it taked to get the end results that you want. I believe that if you just take care of the quality the quality will take care of the rest. Good luck and God Bless. Jim
 
Whatever you are doing, KEEP IT UP. Time will eventually get better with the learning curve. If this is only your 3rd build you are definitely on the right track.
 
Thanks. The basic process was to cut a 4"x1"x3/4" piece with an angle grinder. Squared it on the 2"x72". Drill the holes and with a file and dremel bore it out to fit the tang. Then square it to the tang or rather the hole I just made.
Cut a couple bits under the tines out with the angle grinder then shape with a 2" wheel then 1/2" on the 2"x72". Bent the tines up and shaped underneath with a dremel with a burr then drum sander.
Then lots of sanding.
The last stage so far was filing the channel. Still have to even that out, shorten the bottom a little and square it up again. Then onto the handle.. etc....

Thanks for those words of advice Jim... They are something I should write on my wall to remind myself to just have patience and accept that to get what I want will take time and there's no point rushing it.

Thanks Chuck.. Encouraging words are nice to hear. :p :) Ever since I saw it in Blade magazine, your Scott Taylor memorial knife has been one of my all time favourites. :thumbup:
 
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Now you know why all your freinds and neighbors aren't knifemakers. You did a really nice job on that guard. The time spent just becomes water under the bridge, at some point. Just wait until you spend that long on a piece and ruin it:eek:
 
That guard looks great. Even though it took awhile, your next one will take less. Based on how this one looks, you're going about it correctly. Great job!
 
Justin King said:
Now you know why all your freinds and neighbors aren't knifemakers. You did a really nice job on that guard. The time spent just becomes water under the bridge, at some point. Just wait until you spend that long on a piece and ruin it:eek:
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+1 :thumbup:

Great guard BTW. The pieces made mainly on a machine and mainly by hand looks very different to me, even you just perfected the symmetry, finish etc. even then it is quite apparent to me, and I love the look of hand made things. Although I have a belt grinder, disc grinder etc, I usually use only files and sand paper to make the handles. That way the handle looks much more natural...
If it is totally hand made I believe it adds (should add) a value to to the whole blade...
Emre
 
Stuart, Don't worry about the time you spent on the guard. I think it looks great! Here's some pictures of the guard for the last bowie I made. I was thinking this one took forever.

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Beautiful Ray... thanks for the progress pics.. it's really helpful and suddenly my guard doesn't look like so much work compared to yours... though you're much better at this game than I am... ;)
 
SBranson said:
Beautiful Ray... thanks for the progress pics.. it's really helpful and suddenly my guard doesn't look like so much work compared to yours... though you're much better at this game than I am... ;)
Click to expand...

Stuart, You did a nice job on the guard! 10 hours well spent.
 
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