Drop point hunter

I made a jig for doing the bevel I already did one side and I am working on the other. I am leaving about a dime worth of meat on the edge itself in thickness for HT. Its more of repairing the bevel at this point I suck at free hand apparently.

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Excellent little DIY file guide. This knife will be lightyears ahead in quality compared to your previous efforts as long as you let someone heat treat it right for you. Keep it up!
 
yeah I ran into a snag with where I had already used a belt sander and it bit into the top spine of the knife to much. Then I tried to fix it.... Now I have a DPS "Drop Point Skinner" I wont let it go to waste so I am going to finish it. I will use the jig from now on I think.
 
I know its not like my drawing I am trying to make the best of it and learn from the mistakes made on this one for the next one. It is actually starting to feel very nice in the hand I am going to round the shape once I get the knife heat treated and polished and glued together. Right now I am working on the top that will not be able to be finished when its glued.
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I still have to take it apart for heat treating "its not peened or glued" so I only formed it with 50 grit and put in some finger groves and gave it some really nice shape. I tried to get the sides to match as close as I could. It is solid black micarta so I do not think anything is really going to show as in the layers but this is how it looks so far.
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Last try to give you some advice.....but I don't think it will be heard.

So far you have done a lot of work on that knife. If you would slow down and do some reading, then drawing, then planning, and then do the knife in slow and planned steps with a pause between them....many problems can be avoided. You will have time to think about things and see where changes are needed, and people will have time to give the advice you need badly.

On this knife you have had to make changes due to doing things wrong. You have added a big dip in the spine, and have a top to bottom plunge line. The main problem is that you have created a major stress riser right in the spot on the knife where the most stress is applied. Any side pressure in use could easily snap the blade. Your error is not fatal as it is, but it may come back to haunt you later on.
Additionally, the handle is normally only shaped in the most basic way before HT. Any attempt to make it fit fully ( as you did) will have to be re-adjusted after HT and final sanding.


Hopefully this one will survive and come out nice after a bit of final sanding/shaping/sharpening.

I know what your first though of reply to this post will be, "Oh, this is just for practice, and it doesn't matter." etc. That is not true, and you are old enough to know it.
 
yeah next ones going to be all with the file guide till I get better. I am also learning how to form the micarta which is actually kind of fun.
 
Awesome thank you for the help Stacy I think it was because I was getting to much information from different sources some said I could free hand a bevel which I guess I failed at. So when I tried the jig it was already hosed and all I could do is start removing some material to make it straight again. I see what you meen about the weak point with the grind all the way up hmm I may have to think about that. Someone else said I should do differential heat treat where I dip the first edge part in oil up to mid blade highth and wait a few seconds then dip the rest to help resist warping durring HT.
 
you should send it to a professional who knows how to heat treat, differentially heat treating a blade is pretty advanced stuff, I'm not an expert maker or anything but I've made about 20 knives and only 1 has been worth finishing to completion, my focus at this point is the basics, grind lines, even bevels, structurally sound and comfortable shapes, fit and finish. master one thing at a time, there's no reason for me to become a master leather worker making amazing sheaths before I know how to make an amazing knife.

just my view on learning how to do things, good luck!
 
It sounds like you are getting info from multiple forums. Edge quenching isn't the best practice when hear treating. I think you should use one forum for getting info from. There are a lot of forums out there with amateur knife makers giving advice. Stay here and READ THE STICKIES.
 
I got the second one done. The coal forge did leave some patterns on the blade itself and I kind of liked it so I left it after speaking with some blade makers because its not that deep it should not effect the blade any and I could have ground it off if I wanted to. I have some buffing work to do tomorrrow but I am going to keep the blade sort of two toned. I think it turned out good overall and just have some cleanup to do thanks for the help everyone.

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I just wanted to keep everyone up to date. I got my second drop point finished and polished I went 2 tone with the blade.
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I then started on a new survival knife as well with a brushed look not polished.

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Thank you for all the help :)
 
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