Critique me too... don't hold anything back

J

jawilder

Joined
Jun 27, 2006
Messages
2,331
Guys, some of ya'll have chewed CM up pretty good, and I'm asking you to do the same to me... but please make it as constructive as possible for the sake of education and improving the craft.

This is a link to the custom forum where I have posted my latest knife. It is an "Arkansas Toothpick". Please critique anything that comes to mind.

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/864686-WIP-Arkansas-Toothpick

I want to be the best I can be and need some fresh eyes to examine my work.
Thanks,
Jason
 
First of all Jason, I think you did a bang up job on it! VERY nice rendition of the Cooper piece but with your own style and it came out great!!! :thumbup: :cool:

You asked for a constructive critique, and there is something I see. It's most noticeable in the 11th photo. When learning to do double grinds, it's VERY VERY VERY EASY to grind past center. There are a few things guys do about it.

#1 is to do nothing.

#2 is to try to even them out, which is possible, but will result in the blade being thinner where the bevels meet than at the ricasso.

#3 is to surface grind the ricasso and try again.

#4.... start over from the beginning (I don't want to know how many times I had to take this option! :o :grumpy: :) )

Your grind is a little past center, and I can see it because of how the two bevels meet at the centerline of the grind. There isn't really a radius there, they just sort of lay into each other. This is extremely common, but it is a tattle that the grinds didn't stop BEFORE meeting.

My only advice to avoid this is to stop the bevels shy of meeting prior to heat-treat, because it's easier to NOT do once the steel is hard. And if you have too much trouble with it, simply stop shy of them meeting with the grinder, and then go to die maker's stones to take it the rest of the way to a sharp center line.

YES, this is nit-picking. ;) :) :D

This is a dagger I'm currently working on, and despite my crappy pic that's washing out some of the detail, I think you can see what I mean about the grinds flowing into each other. They don't completely come to a sharp centerline until about 0.450" past the plunges. (the plunges look a bit washed out but it's my photos).

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Nick,
This was my first dagger and I think I should have followed advice #4 but did #2. After HT the blade was indeed thinner at the ricasso. I had to spend some time during the hand sanding to even it out as much as possible. I think I did a fair job, but I'm trying to move from a fair job to a great job in the future.

One mistake I did notice, or flaw, if you will, is that the brass has some "trash" or slag in it. There are two spots that the camera didn't pic up that wouldn't sand out. I didn't notice them until I was putting on the final finish. When I saw it I went back to the files, but it still wouldn't come out. Have any of you ever had trash in your brass? For what it's worth, I got it from Tracy at usaknifemaer.
 
wow- don't mean to derail, but is that Garsson's dagger, Nick?

As for critique on the piece in question, to my eye the guard looks blocky where the original is raised, separating it visually from the part of the guard which serves as a spacer, if that makes any sense. There also seems to be a subtle curvature of the guard for the original which is very nice. Also, the hex at the butt of the handle seems a little abrupt to me.
I'm also not sold on the contrastiness of the handle. No doubt the brass and the osage will darken a bit with time, but if the handle is to be flanked by brass at both ends it seems to me that a darker and more monochromatic handle in between would be less harsh and more interesting. Somehow, a stacked leather handle is what my brain would like to see, looking at this knife.
 
First off Jason, great job. :thumbup: I'm not sure how many knives you have under your belt, but I think it turned out well. Here are a couple of things that I would have done differently.
  • Thin out the guard. It seems a little clunky.
  • Go with a wider ricasso... maybe narrow the blade profile a bit. Or just narrow the handle a bit behind the guard to blend more with the existing ricasso. The step transitions from the wide handle to the narrow ricasso back to the wide blade do not flow as much as I would prefer.
These are just a few things that jumped out at me... my opinions only.
Great work and thanks for sharing.
Erin
 
Looks great!

I haven't ground a dagger yet, so I'm impressed!
 
Lorien said:
As for critique on the piece in question, to my eye the guard looks blocky where the original is raised, separating it visually from the part of the guard which serves as a spacer, if that makes any sense. There also seems to be a subtle curvature of the guard for the original which is very nice. Also, the hex at the butt of the handle seems a little abrupt to me.
I'm also not sold on the contrastiness of the handle. No doubt the brass and the osage will darken a bit with time, but if the handle is to be flanked by brass at both ends it seems to me that a darker and more monochromatic handle in between would be less harsh and more interesting. Somehow, a stacked leather handle is what my brain would like to see, looking at this knife.
Click to expand...

I thought about trying to do the guard like the model knife but didn't know if my skill level was up to par. I agree about the hex pommel. I took off too much brass and made it narrrower where as I should have left it a bit chunky. As for the osage, I would have preferred a darker wood, but the customer specifically requested Osage. I think it will look much better after it darkens

Erin Burke said:
First off Jason, great job. :thumbup: I'm not sure how many knives you have under your belt, but I think it turned out well. Here are a couple of things that I would have done differently.
  • Thin out the guard. It seems a little clunky.
  • Go with a wider ricasso... maybe narrow the blade profile a bit. Or just narrow the handle a bit behind the guard to blend more with the existing ricasso. The step transitions from the wide handle to the narrow ricasso back to the wide blade do not flow as much as I would prefer.
These are just a few things that jumped out at me... my opinions only.
Great work and thanks for sharing.
Erin
Click to expand...

Thanks Erin,
I believe this is my 13th knife and 6th hidden tang. Narrowing the Ricasso was an afterthought. I should have used narrower stock or thinned the whole blade down. The guard/handle are the same width as the ricasso. I think the angle of the knife in the picture makes the guard look larger. I do try to have the ricasso width match the guard/handle width. I should have planned tto use narrower stock to begin with.

Thanks Johnathan!
 
second guessing one's self is always a problem, I speak from experience!
I strive to ignore the 'you can't do it' voice whenever I can and I try and take note whenever I get reminded that I'm doing it. It is hard to push the envelope, fear of failure is an ingrained social phenomena and those who achieve liberty from limitation soar to amazing heights indeed in our society.
 
Nick,
You mention die-makers stones. Not to hijack this thread but perhaps
you could tell us how and when you use these over other sanding media.
I've always wondered about them and their proper use. Nice work Jason.

David
 
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