Converting AD-15 to Tanto Blade?

PeteCress

PeteCress

Joined
Jan 2, 2023
Messages
16
I have another knife which came with a tanto blade out of the box and I find it to be superior as a tool to do the things that I use a pocket knife for.

That being the case, I figured "Why not convert the AD-15?".

Trace the other knife's blade outline and then do the cutoff with a Dremel tool, followed by a lot of time in the sharpening jig....

Adding insult to injury: I am tempted to make the tanto part single-bevel for three reasons:
  • Better-suited for scraping
  • Less hassle to initially sharpen
  • Potentially sharper - albeit weaker.
Are one or both of these notions problematic? (Making it tanto and making it single-bevel...)
 
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Well for one the single bevel will shorten the belly depth by a lot and cutting the tip may make it stick up from the scales where it needs to sit below so you don't poke yourself. Best to find another knife already set up as you want.
 
Just buy the AD10 tanto and save your AD15 from the hack job. The AD10 tanto is quite the formidable beast and on sale regularly for $99. Why chance ruining a nice AD15 when you can already buy an amazing tanto folder that will be magnitudes better than anything you will be able to do with your Dremel. The AD10 is arguably a better knife than the AD15 anyway. I’d love to see CS come out with a 4 Max in a tanto blade
 
Dremel will absolutely overheat the steel and will make where ever you make cut it more brittle, or simply less performance, ruining the supposed good steel of the knife.

A drop point has thinner tip, so you have to cut a significant portion of the knife to reprofile to give it the same performance as the intended US tanto.

You do you though...
 
Not sure I get the last two points.

"Less hassle to initially sharpen"
Surely the initial sharpening is less hassle than this whole plan(?)

"Potentially sharper - albeit weaker"
Is this because your plan involves thinning parts of the blade? You can do that without changing it to tanto
 
May I suggest a Cold Steel Voyager Tanto large? It could be had for around $80 I believe.
 
PeteCress said:
I have another knife which came with a tanto blade out of the box and I find it to be superior as a tool to do the things that I use a pocket knife for.

That being the case, I figured "Why not convert the AD-15?".

Trace the other knife's blade outline and then do the cutoff with a Dremel tool, followed by a lot of time in the sharpening jig....

Adding insult to injury: I am tempted to make the tanto part single-bevel for three reasons:
  • Better-suited for scraping
  • Less hassle to initially sharpen
  • Potentially sharper - albeit weaker.
Are one or both of these notions problematic? (Making it tanto and making it single-bevel...)
Click to expand...
You'd need to remove A LOT of material on the back side to get it flat for a chisel grind, so I wouldn't even consider that a viable option.
You're much better off using a belt grinder, or even a Worksharp, to re-grind the blade than a Dremel, but overheating the blade is still very easy to do.
If you're just flattening out the curve on the edge from the main straight section to the tip to make a tanto, it's probably best to use a file to adjust the profile.
 
PeteCress said:
I have another knife which came with a tanto blade out of the box and I find it to be superior as a tool to do the things that I use a pocket knife for.

That being the case, I figured "Why not convert the AD-15?".

Trace the other knife's blade outline and then do the cutoff with a Dremel tool, followed by a lot of time in the sharpening jig....

Adding insult to injury: I am tempted to make the tanto part single-bevel for three reasons:
  • Better-suited for scraping
  • Less hassle to initially sharpen
  • Potentially sharper - albeit weaker.
Are one or both of these notions problematic? (Making it tanto and making it single-bevel...)
Click to expand...

i say try it and let us know how it goes.......
 
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