Basic Question

D

drlozier

Joined
Jan 4, 2010
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158
Not sure how to ask this without getting a lot of "are you serious ?" responses, but can anyone explain the MEANINGFUL difference between forging a blade and grinding one ? Obviously the tools and techniques vary and there is some overlap, but what are the basic factors that make you pick between the two as the basic approach to making a knife ? Thanks in advance.
 
Some guys just hate grinding so much that we snap and start beating the metal with a hammer:eek:
Seriously, I forge because I like it a lot more than I like grinding. And no matter how I look at it, it bothers me to make a knife and see 2/3 of the steel I started with laying on the floor in the form of dust. I'm just funny that way, I guess.
 
Its just a personal preference. Some guys, like myself, like playing with fire and red hot steel, while others like to keep it simple and make a lot of sparks.
 
Justin King said:
I forge because I like it a lot more than I like grinding. And no matter how I look at it, it bothers me to make a knife and see 2/3 of the steel I started with laying on the floor in the form of dust. I'm just funny that way, I guess.
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I heard that! I think this year I'm going to operate under the premise that any more grinding than what is required to knock scale off to be able to see temper colors is too much. Ambitious, yes, but will force me to nail down my forging (with any luck). In fact I may forgo the grinding altogether and just pickle my blades to remove scale.

That and I'm a card carrying miser and don't particularly like seeing the pile of steel on the floor either.
 
Steel is cheap compared to the worth of well made blade. The method of getting it there is a matter of preference. The steel does not care how you form it. A couple of dollars worth of steel dust on the floor, or a couple dollars worth of fuel to not produce the dust. A toss up.
 
Thanks. So do you use the same steel and hardening/finishing methods but just use a different technique for shaping ? All of my knives (6 so far) were ground but I have a forge that I use for annealing, quenching etc and I thought I might try forging my next one (and if I get real bold I may try making some damascus). What forging steel do you suggest I start out with...plain old rebar or round stock ?? My anvil is a chunk of railway rail and for flat work I have a 3/4 inch thick steel plate, (an old 30 pound steel barbell weight). Thanks again.
 
I've been making stock removal knives (grinding) about 3 years. These days I've divided my line of work to two, 3 days of grinding 3 days of forging... Forging is fun, really reduces the time spent to shape, being not limited to stock size is also a pleasure.
You cannot use high alloys, stainless and forge without trouble, so as I have both plain carbon steel orders and stainless and D2 orders I have to forge some, grind some...
Emre
 
LRB makes a good point.

For me, it simply comes down to enjoying the craft as much as I can. When I was doing solely stock removal, I didn't feel like I was making inferior blades, in fact, I felt like I was doing pretty well overall. However, I did feel like I was missing out on a major aspect of knifemaking that I wanted to understand.

Going from double hollow grinding pretty decent 10" dagger blades, to not even being able to forge a basic 4" hunter was a very humbling experience, and the start of an endeavor that totally changed my perspective on working with metal.


People often look at steel as a finite material. Something made by monster machines in some far away factory... made into a shape that will never change for as long as that piece of steel is around.

But then you put it in a forge, heat it up, and rhythmically move it into whatever shape you choose with a hammer and anvil.... Well, it's almost like magic, but it's a very real, tangible process you can see and understand.

Cutting and grinding a blade has the same essential idea behind it (of forming the metal to whatever shape you want).... it just doesn't FEEL the same.

Forging a blade to shape is, hands down, one of my most favorite aspects of creating a knife.

Other than shaping the steel with a hammer, I could make a forged fighter and a stock removal fighter and the process would end up nearly identical. But I would enjoy the forging a lot more. :)
 
Like the others said, there's not a scientific reason we do it, we just prefer stock moval over stock removal. There's still some (or a lot :( ) stock removal needed after forging, there's increased chances of damaging the metal through poor heat control or inattention but there's just something about hammering hot steel into your mental picture of a blade.

I've always found it faster to forge a large blade and faster to grind a small one but that's just me. Now that I'm not using power tools I've had to return to the basics of hammer control and really concentrating on good forging. 10 minutes with a hammer is 2 hours with a file.

I just like explaining to people that yes, I did use a hammer, anvil and forge to make this knife.
 
drlozier said:
What forging steel do you suggest I start out with...plain old rebar or round stock ?? My anvil is a chunk of railway rail and for flat work I have a 3/4 inch thick steel plate, (an old 30 pound steel barbell weight). Thanks again.
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You'll want to use high carbon tool steel to make knives out of. 1080 or 1084 are good choices for somebody new to forging.

As for the anvil, the more weight you have directly under the hammer the better off (and happier) you'll be. I started out forging on a 2" slab of steel and if I'd kept doing it for the last year I probably wouldn't be able to use my right hand anymore.

Oh, and my forging fuel is free, used motor oil I get from our fleet and a friends fleet that he services.
 
"Stock moval".....I like that!:D

Nicks right about the "feel"...plus forging is just cooler!:cool:
Mace:D
 
I forge because I like it. Playing with fire and hot steel is really cool. I can also take a piece of stock that is not amenable to being made into a knife and use it IE round or square stock. Also the MAIN reason I forge is it is the only way I can make Damascus. Damascus is my passion, and I want to be the one who makes it and not buy it from someone else.
 
I just started making knives, and have never forged anything. Forging seems like too much work! I make knives to relax!
 
69_knives said:
Oh, and my forging fuel is free, used motor oil I get from our fleet and a friends fleet that he services.
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Okay, I actualy have a source like that and was wondering if it were possible to use old motor oil for a forge, but wasn't sure how it would work. How did you set up your forge to burn used motor oil?
 
Thanks everyone. It would never have occurred to me that weight "directly under the hammer" is an important factor. Any suggestions on anvil sources or how to "beef up" the basic stuff I have ? right now I have it mounted on a big oak tree stump :)
 
drlozier said:
Not sure how to ask this without getting a lot of "are you serious ?" responses, but can anyone explain the MEANINGFUL difference between forging a blade and grinding one ? Obviously the tools and techniques vary and there is some overlap, but what are the basic factors that make you pick between the two as the basic approach to making a knife ? Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...

I think forging gets around some limitations to stock removal.

With stock removal, the knife blank you cut out is going to be limited by the size of the barstock you have on hand.

You are limited in the steels that are available as bar stock. If you want to work with a steel that is commonly available as rounds or ball bearings, then you need to find someone to forge it down into flat stock for you if you don't forge. The same goes for damascus.
 
thompsonblades said:
Okay, I actualy have a source like that and was wondering if it were possible to use old motor oil for a forge, but wasn't sure how it would work. How did you set up your forge to burn used motor oil?
Click to expand...

Here's a video of it working: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKjy9fnL4YY

It basically a Ron Reil style venturi burner that I converted to blown and what I did was drill a hole in the burner tube immediately behind the flare and drop in some steel brake line, wrap the brake line 3 times around the burner tube for preheating and continue with the line up to a precision metering valve and into a 1/4" copper pipe soldered to a coffee can. It works very well, it takes about 5 minutes to warm up on propane then start adding oil and decreasing propane over about 1/2 hour. I use a cast forge so it takes 45 minutes to an hour to get up to full heat after that you don't need to run any propane. I realized early on that it is not adjustable so I just run it full heat. it burns up to 1.5 liters an hour, or in a 2 day weekend of forging running the forge 8 - 10 hours each day I use around 20 liters.

I ahve a couple of pictures of the burner somewhere I'll see if I can find them

This is a pic showing the tubing and how it drops into the burner tube.

This was the first version with only two wraps and copper tubing but 3 wraps works better.
gedc0064-0.jpg
 
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