Bowie Build Off Ryan Weeks VS Robert Burns

scottishsmith24

scottishsmith24

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Sep 4, 2012
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A few weeks before the holidays I was privileged to take part in a bowie build off competition against/ with Ryan Weeks. The premise of the competition is really awesome Jonathan Porter and Alex Eisenberg from Dog House Forge got together with Pete's Kustom Koa and decided to sponsor a build off between two makers. The makers were selected on popular vote via Instagram and we were both provided with one billet of twist damascus from Dog House Forge, a block of koa from Pete, and some stainless steel guard stock. Our directions were to forge a large bowie blade (at least 8 inches) and to finish the knife by January. After we are both done there will be a vote that happens on Instagram for who made the better knife.

Ryan and I decided to share our blades and some WIP photos on here as well to show some of the cool things going on in the blade community. So without further ado here is my build.

The billet we received was approximately 9" x 1 1/4" x 3/8" and we were each given one block of koa (our choice).



They also provided us with a back up bar of O1 in case we had any issues during heat treatment. We both decided to go with harpoon point recurves (unbeknownst to the other). Here is my rough forged blade.



Then a quick profiling:



And the finished knife (Final dimensions were 15 1/4 inches overall length, .28" thick at the ricasso):



Also since the lighting is not the beast in my photo I have provided a short video showing some of the details of the knife.

[video=youtube;dFVHMNQqUhM]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFVHMNQqUhM&feature=em-upload_owner[/video]

Thanks for looking and let me know what you think! I'm sure Ryan will be posting his images shortly and his knife came out pretty awesome!

-Robert
 
Thanks for posting this up Robert... Had a blast on this build, definitely outside of my comfort zone and not a style I do (Ever) but it is the style of knives that I like the most!

As mentioned Petes KOA provided an amazing piece of KOA and Dog House forge provided a nice twist pattern 1095/15n20 damascus bar. I had a bigger design drawn up to start with but I couldn't quite stretch the provided Damascus billet far enough so i had to improvise on the fly.

Forging to shape out at Charly Mann's Place


Here is the rough shaped blade, still needed to clean it up to get to the final profile


Here is the new design drawn up after forging the rough blade shape


All Cleaned up and Rough ground, ready for heat Treat


This is post Heat treat fitting up the 01 Tool Steel Guard


Hand Sanding the blade


Parts ready for assembly


Epoxied up and being held together by my fancy "Sling Shot" Holder thingy!


Some rough shaping the guard and handle


Finished Knife! Photo taken by friend: David DeAustin


Closer look at that Beautiful KOA and Damascus Pattern
 
Those are some incredible blades. Nice work, gentlemen.
 
Lets see, each pro given basic materials, blade steel, handle KOA, and guard steel and told go to it. Like the concept, maybe even spec the basic blade shape and attachment type, and you've got a contest suitable for TV.

All kidding aside, beautiful work by both. And maybe a little specification would not hurt on TV.

Larry
Tinkerer
 
Don't know yet Joe! Still waiting on the vote to happen! I did want to let you all know though I will have a better photo of mine soon as it will be getting sent off to Caleb Royer this week. I just can't seem to photograph this one worth a darn!
 
Both gorgeous knives. I love WIP threads. This would be a real hard vote, deciding between those two. Real great craftsmanship gents.

Red
 
Caleb Just sent this over last night, and it definitely captures that piece of koa very well! Thanks again Caleb.


 
Very cool. Reminds me of the build off with me, Karl Andersen and Lin Rhea some years back. It wasn't a an actual contest (and not like I'd stand a chance against those guys anyway!) - more like seeing what three different guys would come up with given the exact same set of raw materials to work with.

Both knives here are pretty sweet. Robert, I don't know if it the high contrast in the photo that makes the texturing on the blade flats of your knife look really, REALLY deep, but my preference would be for less depth (visual or actual, as the case may be).

Good work by both of you and thanks for sharing the process - and the results - here.
 
Roger, I appreciate the critique, the texturing is certainly deep although the lighting may exaggerate it a bit. That being said it is an experiment in texture which certainly needs refining on my part if it is to be an added element in my future work. I would love to see the knives you three came up with! If you have any photos of them please feel free to add to to this thread. :)
 
Thanks everyone for the comments... this has been fun. Robert made an amazing knife as expected.
 
scottishsmith24 said:
Roger, I appreciate the critique, the texturing is certainly deep although the lighting may exaggerate it a bit. That being said it is an experiment in texture which certainly needs refining on my part if it is to be an added element in my future work. I would love to see the knives you three came up with! If you have any photos of them please feel free to add to to this thread. :)
Click to expand...

Cheers. I should have mentioned that I really like everything else about the knife! Here is a link to the conclusion of our "Knife Game"

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/651178-The-quot-Knife-Game-quot-Conclusion!

And the WIP thread:

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/562021-Knife-Game
 
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