Art of Grinding

Awesome,
Thank you all for your input and suggestions. I will definitely study up on this information and practice, practice, practice.
As far as the grinder, for my first one, I made...
Grinder_zpslezxzg9y.jpg
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Grinder2_zpsdycn6uwm.jpg
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Any input suggestions on how to make this better?
 
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I started out taking a class taught by Paul Brach (awesome guy) and I was hooked. I was grinding on a 2x72 once a week for a few hours. 4 months down the line I bought my own. I also only freehand, I made a jig once but didnt like it. Ive screwed up more knives using the jig than I have ever free hand. Like others have stated Ive learned to use belts like they are free. I find that my skill at grinding greatly increased now that I can do it whenever I please. I suppose consistently grinding knives to get that muscle memory it is the best way to improve at grinding out knives. Throughout your trial and error, you learn how to fix your mistakes. But its practice practice practice, I am fortunate to have people around me that I can learn from.

Just my two cents.
 
downloaded them to dropbox, then hit the 'insert image' button. It shows up on my feed. I have a mac, so maybe not compatible formats?
 
You need a shareable link that you post here like this:
Code: 
 [img]shareable link address[/img]
 
Salem Straub said:
Hey man, it's really good to hear that worked for you. Funny, I came in here to post a link to my grinding tips page! Well, here it is, hope it can help!

https://sites.google.com/site/vorpalcustomknives/shop-techniques-3/grinding-tips
Click to expand...

Thanks for all the responses guys, newbie also looking to get into the art of grinding. Thanks for the link to your site Salem, I sent you an email a few days ago because your inbox here was full, but I was just saying thanks for your great write up on different kinds of grinders on the other section of your site! ( link here: https://sites.google.com/site/vorpalcustomknives/shop-techniques-3/grinders )

I'm about to set up my first work shop and was thinking about getting a grinder and then putting my own motor on it... I really liked the look of the KMG that you featured on your site and see that they now offer it in an 8" and 10" wheel size instead of up to 14"... I have the feeling the bigger wheel is worth the small hike in price?

Anyone have grinders in mind comparable to the motorless KMG in price/quality before I pull the trigger on one?

Thank you all again for your wisdom...

Jim

Edit: Looking forward to seeing OP's home made grinder :) I was thinking about going this route but have 0 experience with welding and even hooking a motor up to something, so I thought I'd start with that and ease into becoming a full on knifemaker/machinist :p
 
I have just reviewed again, the remarks and recommendations Salem has in his site. Each time I go back there, I pick up more to try and to go with.
It's true it can be a slower learning process to use a jig of some sort, however, what does one do who has the bug to make but whose upper body parts are weak? Some guide the blade along with the back resting on the grinder table or ---. I found that for me the jig I came up with was a pretty good answer but still following grinding information from makers such as Salem.
So what type of jig do I recommend? Any time you have to reset your blade you have to know that is just asking for more to deal with. You must have an adjustable up and down table. The length will have to be the length of the blocks used to hold the blade plus an inch longer than the blades you will be grinding on each side of the belt. I recommend aluminum angle iron about 3" wide on each side for strength.With this you will need two blocks about 3/4" X 3" x 6 1/2" or even a bit larger in height and length that are micarta and sized the same. A bolt is placed in each of the four corners. The blade is placed in the "sled" with the top of the grind line near center line of the sled. Now you still have to have the grind lines and other recommendations from other makers. You must look down on those grind lines and use then to tell you where you are going. By the way this works well for recurved blades and most others.
To see some of my work all done with such a jig go to custom knife gallery of Colorado
Frank
 
Alright,
I hope the pictures worked. I put them in photo bucket and copied the shareable img address.....
pnwjimbo - The grinder was really easy to make. I also had no welding experience, so I asked a friend that does and showed me a quick lesson. Its pretty ugly welds, but i can make it stick, hah. nothing a little angle grinding and paint can't fix. I'm doing pretty basic stuff with it. bought a hf 90 amp wire feed welder for $90. so far so good.
the plans are also straight forward. I combed over craigslist in the 'free' ads for a treadmill. Found one and took the motor out of it and just mounted it on. 2.5hp variable speed.
Obviously, this is not in the same class or even county compared to the KMG type grinders, but I'm just beginning and figured this was good to start with. whole thing cost about $115.
I also thought it was fun to build my own tools. Next up is a heat treat oven....
 
Decide what it is you want to do. Is your interest in learning how to grind with nothing but your hands, the belt and the machine, or do you want to make knives. If you want to make knives, get a Bubble Jig and never look back.
I can grind "free hand" just me and the grinder. It's interesting to grind this way. If I want to grind accurate blades, quickly, quicker than free hand and without mistakes, then I grind using my Bubble Jig. Each and every part of the blades I grind, "match" each other part. From tang to bevel, false edge and ricasso. they all match. That is what Bubble Jig grinding affords you.
So decide which you want to do and go for it.

Regards, Fred
 
A jig doesn't need to be fancy to work correctly. This one just sits on the table & I angle the platen to the correct angle. It keeps both sides symmetrical, is cheap, quick to make & works well enough. Just have plenty of light to see by, a couple of scribe lines to work against & you're good to go. Training wheels? Yep, but the results are what counts here & this helps quite a lot.

SmallBlade-s_zpsrwbhqy9x.jpg
 
noseoil said:
A jig doesn't need to be fancy to work correctly. This one just sits on the table & I angle the platen to the correct angle. It keeps both sides symmetrical, is cheap, quick to make & works well enough. Just have plenty of light to see by, a couple of scribe lines to work against & you're good to go. Training wheels? Yep, but the results are what counts here & this helps quite a lot.

SmallBlade-s_zpsrwbhqy9x.jpg
Click to expand...

Results is what counts, I second this.

I'm an ok welder. Not great. I can't weld underwater or anything like that even though it would be great to learn.
Even though I'm not a great welder, or a great anything, I can think of. I've built all my blown gas forges. I've built the things in my shop that make me a living. I built my son a go kart.
When you turn out that first master piece of a knife, you wont spend a lot of time considering how you did it, you will just be thrilled that you did do it.

Happy grinding, Fred
 
Fred.Rowe said:
Decide what it is you want to do. Is your interest in learning how to grind with nothing but your hands, the belt and the machine, or do you want to make knives. If you want to make knives, get a Bubble Jig and never look back.
Regards, Fred
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As much as I often agree with your sentiments Fred, and respect your skills and opinions, I gotta take exception to this... sure the learning curve is steep, but after mastering freehand grinding, you can get a LOT of work done quick if that's what you want to do. Guys like Bob Engnath, Gil Hibben... grinding pallets of blades freehand, damn near bogging 5hp Burr Kings, I don't think you'll get any faster than that fiddling with a jig, no matter how slick it is. As fast? Color me dubious, but I won't go to the mat with you over that, at least.
 
Can't add much to what has already been said. Just doing it over and over, practice, practice, practice is the best way to get good at grinding. Best thing to do is pick one grind and perfect it. I freehand grind. Pretty sure not many grind convex grinds the way I do. I run my grinder the opposite direction (away from me) at a 45 degree angle. This is the way I self taught myself to grind. As with anything experience is the best teacher.
Scott
 
Grinding is a very personalized thing. Some guys need to use jigs to learn how blades are ground while others just pick it up. I know top tier makers that tried for years to free hand grind and gave up, while some guys picked it up in months.

The two types of freehand are very different with hollow grinding to be the most challenging because of the required turn at the end towards the tip. I started out freehand grinding on a flat platen then moved to hollow grinding. I could make very good grinds on the platen within a week, it took me 3-6 months and 60-80 blades before I made good hollow grinds past 1000 grit. I don't use anything when I free hand, no extension handle or any device because that was my goal. The thing that helped me when I first started was a sliding jig to get the feel but I used it only 2-3 times. Now I can just walk up with a folder blade and put in any grind I want wth a wheel.

The key to any grinding especially hollow grinding is establishing your path. I'll put a pretty deep hollow for the first length that is the basis for the rest of the grind. Grinding is all about practice, there is no shortcutting. A big disadvantage I have is I don't have an organic workrest... I'm not kidding, I get real jealous seeing those guys that can rest their elbows on their gut. My arms aren't fixed so it took me a while to get the muscle memory.


This is my most difficult blade to grind...
9A81D889-AAA3-448C-A3BE-3A04F980F17C_zpsmb7z33sg.jpg
[/URL][/IMG]

This is my favorite grind to do
D5BE7533-801F-41A3-91DE-229121823EA0_zpsjy7rb2af.jpg
[/URL][/IMG]
 
Salem Straub said:
As much as I often agree with your sentiments Fred, and respect your skills and opinions, I gotta take exception to this... sure the learning curve is steep, but after mastering freehand grinding, you can get a LOT of work done quick if that's what you want to do. Guys like Bob Engnath, Gil Hibben... grinding pallets of blades freehand, damn near bogging 5hp Burr Kings, I don't think you'll get any faster than that fiddling with a jig, no matter how slick it is. As fast? Color me dubious, but I won't go to the mat with you over that, at least.
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Salem,

Same here my friend, nothing but respect.

Consider this though. Of the hundreds of grinders that are sold each year and the hundreds of new makers that take the plunge; how many of them are a Don Hanson or others of his skill. How many of them will be full time makers, making their living off their knife making? Just judging by the time I've spent at this, I will say very few.

I believe what you say is true, there are people that stand at the grinder 8 hours a day, grinding blades. They don't even need to watch what they are doing. But that is the exception and not the rule. Most makers are part time, or weekenders, making 10 to 40 blades a year. It's this vast majority of knife makers that are my customers. The ones that don't have a mentor. The guy on his own.
What I promise a new maker, or older guys like me that aren't as steady as they once were, is the ability to produce machine like results, whether its bevels or swedges, daggers or swords. Results is what my product offers.

I have even considered a run off, free hand against Bubble Jig. And the reason I think it is faster, not only from experience, but think about it. Each pass with a BJ is precise, where as passes free hand tend to be an amalgam of angles meant to be corrected as you grind. I have run these side by side test here at the shop and have found that BJ grinding is faster and more accurate. I can produce an exact copy of a blade I make once a year, all I need is the profile and the angles I used.

My hat is off to those who make their living making knives. I tried it for a few years and never found that I could support my family. That is why I turned to inventing, I am still in the knife industry and I can help many more makers than I have helped apprenticing at my shop by making Bubble Jigs.

My Best Regards, Fred
 
I have to agree with Fred. I think generally, most people can learn to do most things, if they put their mind to it, relatively proficiently. However when it comes to hand eye coordination and 3d visualization, some people excel beyond mere proficiency. Either from lack of desire, or lack of natural talent. I've evaluated a large number of people who want to be welders. Every one was capable of learning the theory of spray transfer, amperage, voltage, wire speed, etc, but some are just not capable of the 6 axis movements required to make a good weld.

I'm really good at eye balling center, sizes, seeing square and perp. I can look at a picture of something and duplicate it on a Bridgeport mill very closely.

I can't get a freehand grind like Josh RG for the life of me. Even with a jig. I don't think I'm capable of it. So using a jig to establish my grinds is so much more efficient for me it's not even funny.

Which is why I'm in awe of people who can. Because I understand there is a talent there, regardless of the amount of practice it took, I believe a natural talent of at least some small amount, to get to that level.

Jigs can help those of us lacking that. Both in speed and consistency.
 
Pittknife said:
Grinding is a very personalized thing. Some guys need to use jigs to learn how blades are ground while others just pick it up. I know top tier makers that tried for years to free hand grind and gave up, while some guys picked it up in months.

The two types of freehand are very different with hollow grinding to be the most challenging because of the required turn at the end towards the tip. I started out freehand grinding on a flat platen then moved to hollow grinding. I could make very good grinds on the platen within a week, it took me 3-6 months and 60-80 blades before I made good hollow grinds past 1000 grit. I don't use anything when I free hand, no extension handle or any device because that was my goal. The thing that helped me when I first started was a sliding jig to get the feel but I used it only 2-3 times. Now I can just walk up with a folder blade and put in any grind I want wth a wheel.

The key to any grinding especially hollow grinding is establishing your path. I'll put a pretty deep hollow for the first length that is the basis for the rest of the grind. Grinding is all about practice, there is no shortcutting. A big disadvantage I have is I don't have an organic workrest... I'm not kidding, I get real jealous seeing those guys that can rest their elbows on their gut. My arms aren't fixed so it took me a while to get the muscle memory.


This is my most difficult blade to grind...
9A81D889-AAA3-448C-A3BE-3A04F980F17C_zpsmb7z33sg.jpg
[/URL][/IMG]

This is my favorite grind to do
D5BE7533-801F-41A3-91DE-229121823EA0_zpsjy7rb2af.jpg
[/URL][/IMG]
Click to expand...

Mike, Those are very nice grinds and I agree that free handing work is generally preferable to using jigs. I started grinding blades using a small (2"x3") work rest and now use it on every blade whether resting my fingers or the spine of a blade on the rest. I have been thinking about a piece of 2" steel tubing for a work rest that I can rock my broad short hollow ground blades on to get a nice curved hollow at the tip of those style blades. My opinion is that there is no shame in using any type of rest that helps make a professional looking blade. Many professional knife makers do just that. Larry
ofqB79qm.jpg
 
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I won't quibble with the general direction of those remarks... freehand grinding is very difficult, at least the more advanced stuff, and indeed many people will find it perhaps too difficult in the end to be worth the bother. I do like to believe though that "talent" is an overrated concept, and that focus and a good patient teacher can make up for a lot of the perceived lack of it.

Then again, I am "talented" at a number of things, and am sometimes guilty of taking it for granted that picking them up has been relatively easy. That's why I like trying new things, or trying old things in new ways, to remind myself that in many respects I am just as lacking in "talent" as anyone else.

Wayne Goddard liked to say that he really didn't believe in "talent" in knifemaking. Then, there are geniuses I could point to, but I believe that sort would be incredible at almost anything to capture their attention...

In closing, I would also like to say that there are some grinds that just need freehanding skill to be able to execute.
 
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