1st knife almost done...

MeDoctor

MeDoctor

Joined
Dec 8, 2003
Messages
279
A little more buffing and shaping on the handle and it'll be finished. Finally...

cleaver.jpg


Comments / criticisms / suggestions gladly received. (I'll grab a better photo in the daylight tomorrow.)

Shalom,
Mark
 
Mark....did you break the point off already :footinmou :footinmou :o :footinmou

All kidding aside, it is looking good. The grinds look even, the bevel looks good, the finish is good and I'm glad you didn't go for a mirror finish. A lot of people try that on their first and become frustrated.

Nice job. Time to start number 2!
 
Great job of the chopper. Nice handle material.I am not sure of the size. Some of the big one benifit from a 3/8 or similar hole on the top front point. You can hang the chopper from a hook in the hole.

A mate of mine has a collection of choppers all sizes. I am a bit keen on them myself at the moment. I just need to get of my back side and make one. Thanks for the added inspiration.

I will look forward to the next.
 
Thanks guys. In answer to the questions posted: The blade is from 01, 5.5" long at the edge. It started as a chunk of 1/4" cold rolled and is now .177" along the spine. I wanted to leave it thicker than that, but kept having to grind divots out of it left by my 2 x 36 belts. I finally gave up and ordered 2 4 x 36 "finishing" belts (they look like scotch brite with a cloth backing), 2 cork belts, and some SC belts in 220, 320, 400, and 600 grits from SuperGrit. I wasn't patient enough to grind out some of the deep scratches it had with a 4 x 36 grinder, so I took it to work with me on 2 different Sundays and put it on a surface grinder. I work in a powerhouse on 7 day operations, so many of my Sundays are regular work days, not overtime - but the tool room and maintenance areas in the manufacturing area are usually deserted on Sundays.

It might be a bit light now for a cleaver, so if the guy I'm giving it to finds that to be the case I'll hollow grind the edge and he can use it as a veggie chopper (the photo is deceiving - it's got a convex edge right now). Oh, and the handle is black linen micarta.

Reg, the guy I'm giving the chopper to is a mill hand in the tool room, so I decided that if he wants a hole in the end for hanging, he's more than capable of putting it there.

Shalom,
Mark
 
peter nap said:
Mark....did you break the point off already :footinmou :footinmou :o :footinmou
Click to expand...
It's good thing it never had one, because if it did I probably would have broken it off!
 
I just noticed that I've managed to grind almost all of the belly out of the edge. It never had a whole bunch, and what it did have I put there by trial and error on a slack belt. Would I be better off to grind in the belly against a flat platen, and then re-shape the edge on the slack belt? Or is there a still better way? TIA.

Shalom,
Mark
 
Thanks Reg. Some of you probably recognize the 2 prominent light colored streaks in the black linen micarta as being areas where the linen was burned a bit during grinding/sanding. Since this isn't a collector's quality item (in which case I assume the burns would knock down the value or even make it unmarketable), I decided to leave them there since I like the effect. The opposite side has a pair of similar streaks. I'm only basing this opinion on the few articles that I've read on finishing micarta, so I realize that I might be full of noxious smelling gas here...

Shalom,
Mark
 
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