Down time knife WIP

Just hardware store water stone fragments... aluminum oxide maybe... silicon carbide maybe.

Don't know for sure. I used a couple of them. One was more course and the other finer.

Just cheap water stones. I used them dry though. It only takes a minute or two.
 
Kissed the profile again with the bench grinder and some files. I dressed the blade towards the edge,… a little filing and a little sanding. Also, got the stag to accept the tang. I drilled a pilot hole and then scraped it out with a scraper made from a round file and took the tang down to fit.

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It’s looking like a piece of ¾ copper pipe might be about perfect for a ferrule.
 
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Hi Tai, how do you get such clean hammering without any bends, burps, warbles, etc of the sort?

I find it incredibly difficult to forge something without it having small bends/twists/warps all over the place. Do you have any tips?
 
Don, that hardy with the radius helped quite a bit on the inside of the recurve. I do put a good deal of effort into the final straightening etc, but try to keep it as even as I can along the way. Keeping a reducing atmosphere inside the forge buys me some time. With this thin stock, it's a lot of light work, not much heavy hogging.

I guess I'm really just kind of anal about the forging. I'd rather get real close with hammers rather than rely on a lot of grinding. Grinding isn't as much fun to me.
 
Here we go with the ferrule.

First, I cut a piece extra long for stability on the mandrel. It’s also important to make sure it has a real nice snug fit on the mandrel. I’m using a dome toped mandrel, because I think a dome will look nice. It might complicate the fitting to the blade a bit though. Be sure and anneal the copper first and repeat the annealing as needed.

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I leave a little copper sticking up.

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I seat the copper over the shoulder of the mandrel first, so it doesn’t slip down on the next step.

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I forge the rim down against the mandrel.

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Then, I slide the copper up a little and I'll repeat the process until it’s almost completely closed at the top.

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I’ll probably just leave a little hole at the top that I can get into with needle files to make the slot for the tang.
 
T, Have you done the heat treat yet? If you did I probably missed it. Just wondering if the whole blade will be hardened? I'll have to try you copper pipe technic in the future.
 
R, No, I haven't hardened the blade yet. I need to fit it all up first. I'm still going to have to do some filing on the blade where it meets the ferrule... probably not a standard 90 degree ricasso shoulder on this one. That's one part, I don't know exactly how it's going to go yet. I plan on doing a full quench (through the blade to tang transition area) when it's ready...

I don’t plan on taking any chances or doing any thing fancy with the heat treat on this one (no water quench or quench line). If I do blow it on the heat treat (not likely), I’ll have a handle all ready to go for another blade. :)

I'm thinking some nice fresh warm,... earth, environment, blade and human friendly canola. It works O.K. on these thin 1095 ones. If I do everything else just right, I should be able to get a Rockwell 64-65 out of it. Besides, I have some just sitting around waiting to be used. It fit's my concept for this knife... water is out.
 
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Here’s what the bench mess looks like right now. That’s probably it for today. I’m still feeling a bit off from that virus…

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Thanks Calvin. Yours is looking great.
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If it starts to pucker out at the top a little like this, I use a swedge block and planishing hammer to bring it back down. You can do it without the swedge, but it makes it faster and easier. The brass shim is for a nice tight fit and to protect the surface of the copper.

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Fitting the ferrule to the stag:

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I'll probably do a bit of fabrication on the ferrule for reinforcement, fancy it up a bit and have some fun with it. The transition from blade to handle is very important and helps tie it all together… still not sure exactly how it will all work out, but will put some thought into it.

I like this part. :)
 
Calvin Richardson said:
Thanks Tai. The work that just went into that copper ferrule is amazing. I LOVE the texture to the copper as well
Click to expand...

Thanks again. So far all the textures are "process markings" as opposed to superficially applied textures. They give clues into how it was made.
 
One of these days I'm going to have to put the wrought iron down and mess with some copper pipe. I'm looking forward to seeing the knife close up.
 
Very cool thread, Tai:thumbup: I'm really enjoying watching this one take shape.

Thanks!
 
Tai,

Thank You for this WIP. It´s invaluable that you guys take the time to share your work with the rest of us. I too am especially taken by the copper ferrule work, which I´m definately gonna try out myself at some point.
Keep em coming please:thumbup:

Brian
 
Reinforcing the ferrule:
(not absolutely necessary, but should look good too.)

Wrapped copper wire around the mandrel, which is just a bit smaller than the outside diameter of the ferrule.

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Sprung over the same ¾ inch pipe as the ferrule for a snug fit. It also supports and holds the rings for sawing.

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Brazed with high temp., silver solder.

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Driven onto the ferrule.

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Brazed to the ferrule with high temp., silver solder granules.

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It’s in the pickle right now. We’ll see how it looks after it’s cleaned up. I might add a few more touches to it in similar fashion.
 
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