A little progress on my first knife

Bigfattyt

Bigfattyt

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Jun 23, 2007
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I have made a little progress on this. I still need to sand the blade to remove more scratches, and I think I will remove a bit more material from the handle to thin it out some more. It is still rough. I have started the light green G-11 handles, but will wait till I have the handle how I want it.

I did some rough file work on it, next time I will plan the pattern better, and maybe get some small needle files to make it easier. They I was going to do an alternating pattern, and originally did not have the filing marks meet in middle, but had to fix some. The only power tool I have is a crappy hand drill. Next time I will use a guide for the plunge line, and a round file to do it. I only spend a little time here and there, so progress is slow.
Here it was cutting it out.
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It looks good. You must have patience to do all that with just hand tools.

You are in Washington? Where? Come by here on the next one and use my bandsaw.
 
I am in Spokane. Originally from Moses Lake. I would love to come to your shop some time and learn a few things. I have a larger one that I started in Utah, but will likely finish this small one first.



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Looks good, I'm enjoying (enduring?) much the same experience right now as well. Which steel are you using?
 
Keith_H said:
looks good, did you file the 11" blade too? :eek:
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not at all! that one was done thanks to JT, of JT custom knives in Utah. He spend a whole day with me out in the cold trying to fix every bad grind mark i put on it. I almost died of hypothermia. I still need to reduce the handle width on that one, with the scales it will be too wide to be comfortable.
 
P J 234 said:
Looks good, I'm enjoying (enduring?) much the same experience right now as well. Which steel are you using?
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the steel is 5160 1/4 inch that I managed to talk JT out of. I have enough to make more knives when I get these ones finished. hopefully the next one will have fewer mistakes to fix.
 
after I got some better bits they drilled just fine. The hard part is not making the holes look like ovals. And I did snap the tip off of one of the smaller bits

PJ234 I like the blade. I wish I had some three inch wide stock. the stuff I have is 2 inches wide if I remember correctly. I have some ideas for small neckers with finger holes, but my stock is not wide enough. (and I would also likely want a drill press, and maybe a dremel tool)
 
I started with nothing but a hand drill and files too, but in the last couple of weeks got a Sears 2x42 beltgrinder and on Sunday a benchtop drill press. I'm planning to gut it out and finish this one with handtools because I'm stubborn, but I played with the grinder last weekend and it is shockingly fast compared to files!

I could not drill this stuff to save my life, and that's after getting Cobalt bits, cutting oil, annealing the blank again, etc. I finally managed two 1/8" pin ovals after lots of time and cussing.
 
My standard bits would not cut at all, I think I got some titanium coated that were rated for drilling metal. They worked fine. A drill press would be nice.
 
Bigfattyt said:
I am in Spokane. Originally from Moses Lake. I would love to come to your shop some time and learn a few things. I have a larger one that I started in Utah, but will likely finish this small one first.



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Youre only 3 hours away. The invitation is open.
 
WOW!
I sooooooooooo suck!!!! My first(and only so far) stock removal blade really looks terrible, the angles are off. The knife (rail road spike) I forged so far needs a lot of work!!!

Your stuff looks like you had it machined!
 
Bruce, I would love to come to your shop and learn some time. I will have to find some time. Maybe when I finish my finals for lawschool this semester I can finish these and come and learn how to heat treat them. I have visited your site a ton, and and have often wondered about visiting. I had planned when I was younger to go spend some time with my uncle and have him teach me (his name was Glen Hornby, a custom maker from California), but he died of a heart attack about the time I finished highschool. The knives that my family and I got from him will be heirlooms in the family. I would love to be able to make a few users for my family members, and my son to have. Even if I never make beautiful knives.
 
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