Bill Siegle
Knifemaker / Craftsman / Service Provider
- Joined
- Oct 3, 2000
- Messages
- 6,808
A short while back I found a Western Bowie and I had planned on modifying it as per Bill Bagwell’s instructions in one of his Soldier Of Fortune magazine articles. Well as it turned out that particular knife was a super rare and early blade. It would have been criminal to mod. That’s where James Mayo reached out to me with a proposal to mod a neglected W49 he had. We agreed to a very gentlemanly agreement on the blade and he sent it to me. I got it yesterday and this morning I went to work. In its original state, it was structurally sound but the blade had been neglected and had a lot of merely cosmetic issues. The lower guard was slightly bent backwards so that got fixed first thing. In his article, Mr Bagwell states these mods can be done with a few simple hand tools but a bench grinder can speed this up 
I decided to stick to that and used files, a saw, Scotchbrite pads, and a Bader BIII grinder 
Sure did speed up the process using the Bader 
I tried to stick to the measurements listed in the article but went my own way on the tip a little as I liked it’s height where it landed and didn’t go as low as he described by maybe an eighth of an inch. The handle consists of some nice laminated wood and was pretty easy to shape to a better fit for my hand. The clip was ground to a zero edge for back cuts. When I was happy with the look and feel, I gave it it some attention to removing any burrs with a Scotchbrite pad. A little cold blue solution finished out the blade and even added a little patina to the brass. Quite honestly, if I or someone I loved was going places where a combat Bowie was possibly needed, I would have zero hesitation about this blade making the trip. Bill Bagwell knew what he was talking about all those years ago A big no nonsense Bowie modified to suit the user is hard to beat!!!! Lastly THANK YOU Mr Mayo!!!!!!! This has been a very enjoyable and exciting project for me!!!!! 
I decided to stick to that and used files, a saw, Scotchbrite pads, and a Bader BIII grinder Sure did speed up the process using the Bader I tried to stick to the measurements listed in the article but went my own way on the tip a little as I liked it’s height where it landed and didn’t go as low as he described by maybe an eighth of an inch. The handle consists of some nice laminated wood and was pretty easy to shape to a better fit for my hand. The clip was ground to a zero edge for back cuts. When I was happy with the look and feel, I gave it it some attention to removing any burrs with a Scotchbrite pad. A little cold blue solution finished out the blade and even added a little patina to the brass. Quite honestly, if I or someone I loved was going places where a combat Bowie was possibly needed, I would have zero hesitation about this blade making the trip. Bill Bagwell knew what he was talking about all those years ago A big no nonsense Bowie modified to suit the user is hard to beat!!!! Lastly THANK YOU Mr Mayo!!!!!!! This has been a very enjoyable and exciting project for me!!!!! 
