Carothers/Loriendesign Chopper WiP

This is our last version before prototyping. Be prepared for a little bit of a wait.

I hope to have some WiP pictures as Nathan makes his way toward manufacture.

 
Lorien said:
here is an answer from the man himself;


It was going to move weight to the front, but not very efficiently so it was probably a mistake on my part because the chopping sweet spot became basically flat.

The center of percussion is going to be around the front of the fuller, the center of gravity is about an inch ahead of the scales and the sweet spot for chopping is going to be some point between the two, farther back than people realize. Your original design had some curvature there that I think will enhance chopping so rev B was tweaked to reflect that.
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Thank you for the explanation. Always appreciate being able follow along and learn. The final iteration looks pretty sweet. Mike

So, noon this Friday, right? :p
 
little birdy told me there'd be a little gap opening up between other jobs, and that there might be some pictures coming....
 
Looks good. What Nathan touches turns to gold, I am sure this will be no different. Looking forward to progress pics.
 
...I can't seem to find the cap where you pump the jet fuel in on ANY of your drawings.


:D
 
Shit just got real...

*****

Our shop is doing a change over today and the jobs that were finishing up yesterday left us with a nice opening for me to squeeze in the scales for our prototype, so I stayed up late last night and got it done.

I only produce a couple hundred knives a year, but we make thousands of scales for other makers, so scales production is something we have dialed in pretty well.


The first thing I do is suck a sheet of micarta down to a vacuum fixture. The sheet looks like it's just sitting there, but we use a pretty big multi stage system that pulls a hard vacuum, so there are a couple thousand pounds of force holding that sheet down because of its surface area. First I deck it, then I drill my holes, countersink them, ream them and finish mill the countersinks for a good finish.

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while I was setting that up and running it, Jo The Machinist made the 2nd ops fixture on her little mill

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I got everything setup on our scales mill and roughed them out.

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That mill stays looking filthy because all the mud from scales production. It's an unusual mill that built in a way that abrasive mud can't work its way into important bits.

This is the scales after the roughing cutters


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then I go in and finish machine all the visible surfaces with a special ball endmill designed for aluminum that gives the micarta a relatively clean smooth finish

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And here's the scale after a quick buff

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I like milling my scales this way because, once I have the geometry tweaked in how I want it, I can duplicate it exactly.

These are probably going to need a few tweaks after testing, but once it's finalized I'll experiment with different machined textures. But these will be fine for testing.

The next step in the steel. I'm programming that now so I can jump on it when I get an opening next week.
 
Lorien said:
This is our last version before prototyping. Be prepared for a little bit of a wait.

I hope to have some WiP pictures as Nathan makes his way toward manufacture.

Click to expand...

I remember having liked the look of the initial version much better than the second, proposed one. This version, however, has just enough curvaceousness to please both the eye are be well understood by the hand. I'll want one (I know the drill).
 
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I think it's safe for me to speak for Nathan, (and myself of course) when I say thanks all!
 
Btw, there's no need to worry about being on a list or whatnot.

Carother's method allows him to create limited batch runs of repeatable knives, with relatively few variations. Although he produces about the same amount of knives per year as your average knife maker, the tools he uses allows him to be more efficient wrt reproducing his designs.

Nathan does a sale here every Friday in the Knifemaker's Fixed Blades for Sale classifieds forum, so it's always a good plan to check in there on Fridays.

As it stands, we still have work to do as this knife is currently under development. I still have to design a scabbard and test a prototype, and Nate needs to be sure that the heat treatment is bang on for this tool through his own rigorous testing. There may be other refinements to both handle and blade that occur during this developmental phase.

We'll see where it goes, but our expectations for this knife are high.
 
I am in awe of these processes.
*subscribed*
 
I understand that there might have been some progress made today. Perhaps not. We'll see.
 
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