Fairly Knives Chat - For people who like Knives, have Knives or use Knives.

[Daniel Fairly Knives]

Another Kamisori razor!

This is only rough ground to 50# right now, still some blending to do is areas, but its pretty darn close.


I had a second rough profiled blank from the bar I cut to get the first one and decided I should heat treat two while I have the forge going. Hopefully both of these will be finalized for heat treat tomorrow and I can burn 'em on Thursday.

I have been wracking my brain to try and figure out where I can get a piece of natural slate (or some good hard chert) to make my own hone from, don't want to drive to the hills just for that. I think that would be awesome to shave with a razor I made and honed on a hone I made. Daniel, do you happen to know what the "slate" flag stone used for landscaping is? Maybe I can dig through that stuff and find a small one to start and test out.


-Xander

Sweet!!!! Those are looking awesome.

For something like chert I would check out a rock shop, you can find a slab for cheap I bet. Chert is microcrystaline quartz so flint, agate, heck you name it could work. Jasper too, I think a lot of the good Japanese stones must be jasper. I have a huge rock saw I need to finish setting up so I can cut some slabs myself.

Slate is just that, it is essentially mud that is fossilized or shale as that is known. I could imagine it could make a good slurry for a stone but that is just a guess. It is pretty soft but the cleavage is nice for making flat objects.

I'd consider a piece of agate for a hone, I bet that would be nice.You should be able to find something solid for cheap. I pay 1$ a pound for clean but not good looking agate slices out of the local rock shops random junk" pile, a 1# slab would probably do the trick.

Just guessing..... I know my rocks but am not too sure what makes great sharpening stones.

I do know you can buy slabs of the good arkansas stones but that kind of defeats the purpose. I'll look in my site books and see if I can find you a local source that you can collect from.

 

[shaymanx]

I have been wracking my brain to try and figure out where I can get a piece of natural slate (or some good hard chert) to make my own hone from, don't want to drive to the hills just for that. I think that would be awesome to shave with a razor I made and honed on a hone I made. Daniel, do you happen to know what the "slate" flag stone used for landscaping is? Maybe I can dig through that stuff and find a small one to start and test out.

-Xander

Very nice, Xander!

I would maybe look for some good clay. The grit should be good and small and uniform (think clay pots). Make your own bricks of the clay. You could form and fire them yourself.

 

[fast14riot]

Morning y'all its my day off and I'm gonna go burrow myself into the shop!

Daniel, thanx for the info! I know "chert" is pretty much a catchall term for many types of sedimentary rock, but I figured since your the only rock hound I know I would ask your opinion. I'm not really looking to get a stone to use like an arkansas, but more like a japanese natural waterstone, with a slurry stone. The slurry does the majority of the work, but it works in concert with the stone. I may swing by the landscape places and check out their supply. I have a diamond wheel for my angle grinder and I have coarse stones for lapping it flat. I know there is tons of slate and shale here in the Sierra's but I don't want to drive up there if I can help it.

Time to get going for the day.

-Xander

 

[IMWILSON]

Hey thanks!

Lol I think I need a 0-1" for what i am doing, measuring pivots and standoffs mostly.

I have pretty much no knowledge, not even how to hold one! I guess you just clamp it down, lol!

Let me know if you see anything, I would like to know what you think about the used opnes on ebay if you have a chance to look. One guy has old fowler ones for $8! I bet they are too trashed to use but I really wouldn't know.

I only know that Starret makes pretty good gear, we have a lot of pawn shops here and every one has a bunch of starret gear that I am unsure about. I think they must use them in the oil/gas industry as that is the main gig here.

My budget is pretty low but I don't want to waste my money, I saw one that advertised something like .001-3 accuracy, lol I can almost eye that!

Hey Daniel, I've got a machining text book I'm going to send you. It's about 12 years old, but it covers the basics. It was the first book I had whan I started Machine Tool Technology (machine shop).

 

[fast14riot]

Hey Wilson, I have found that it really doesn't matter much how old machine books are, I still use a 21st edition machinerys handbook from the 70's (older than me!)


-Xander

 

[Daniel Fairly Knives]

Very nice, Xander!

I would maybe look for some good clay. The grit should be good and small and uniform (think clay pots). Make your own bricks of the clay. You could form and fire them yourself.

Hey good morning! I think the clay sounds cool.

Morning y'all its my day off and I'm gonna go burrow myself into the shop!

Daniel, thanx for the info! I know "chert" is pretty much a catchall term for many types of sedimentary rock, but I figured since your the only rock hound I know I would ask your opinion. I'm not really looking to get a stone to use like an arkansas, but more like a japanese natural waterstone, with a slurry stone. The slurry does the majority of the work, but it works in concert with the stone. I may swing by the landscape places and check out their supply. I have a diamond wheel for my angle grinder and I have coarse stones for lapping it flat. I know there is tons of slate and shale here in the Sierra's but I don't want to drive up there if I can help it.

Time to get going for the day.

-Xander

Hey no problemo! Yes chert, flint, jasper, chalcedony, agate and even quartz are about the same composition with chert being the plainest and sedimentary. I always think of flint but I forgot about the stuff in your area, it seems to be the softer stuff with lots of sea fossils... sounds good to me if you can source a piece. I looked in the book I have for CA to no avail as it isn't too collected... look for outcroppings of limestone. Often the eroded base of a hill could be the place to look.

I like this idea a lot and we should look into this further, I have always wondered about the good Japanese stones and what they are.

http://www.japanesenaturalstones.com/

Maybe you could make a stone but buy your own nagura (slurry) stone. Bladsmith is a jeweler and a very knowledgeable guy about Japanese Knifemaking, maybe he would know.

Collecting stone used to be my main gig, if I get obsessed enough I will probably find some waterstone rock! It usually takes me years to find a good site and a few trips to start finding anything special.

If you find some chert look for fossils, I bet you see some! I was looking through my opal stash the other day, it comes from a base like chert and found an opalized sea shell.... score!

Hey Daniel, I've got a machining text book I'm going to send you. It's about 12 years old, but it covers the basics. It was the first book I had whan I started Machine Tool Technology (machine shop).

Oh wow! That is cool! I have really been wanting one! Thanks so much!

Hey Wilson, I have found that it really doesn't matter much how old machine books are, I still use a 21st edition machinerys handbook from the 70's (older than me!)


-Xander

Yeah for sure! I bet manual machining hasn't changed very much in a long while.

I'd seriously consider night classes for machining if the school was closer, I know it would step up my knifemaking a lot.

Cool!!!

 

[Daniel Fairly Knives]

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[IMWILSON]

^ Daniel, Put me down for one of those. ^

 

[IMWILSON]

Hey Wilson, I have found that it really doesn't matter much how old machine books are, I still use a 21st edition machinerys handbook from the 70's (older than me!)


-Xander

Yeah, about the only thing that changes are speeds and feeds for the newer coated and carbide tools.

 

[Daniel Fairly Knives]

^ Daniel, Put me down for one of those. ^

Sounds good! Thanks!

Yeah, about the only thing that changes are speeds and feeds for the newer coated and carbide tools.

Great for pointing that out. I was just reading an article about TiN coatings and drilling Ti.

I saw a drilling video recently and the feed rate was so fast, I bet I need to fine tune my drilling setup. There is a lot to it I know that! When I was a beginner I used a drill bit per knife, now the last 3 bits have lasted me probably 50 knives or more. I need to see why my drill sometimes slips at a fast feed rate, lol I forget if I was letting it slip (for safety or so I thought?) or not.

 

[fast14riot]

Ok, that Warhol-esque pic is just awesome! Must resist, I bought another razor today, can't afford it,but I can. Aaarrrggghhh!!!

Well, I did a small side trip down one of the levees near my parents house that has been stabilized with rip-rap and stone. I found a good section to poke around. I grabbed my trusty Estwing rock hammer and Gorilla Bar Jr. put on my safety glasses and gloves and went to town.

Found this stretch of fill that's about 200' long...

Found something that looked like it had good cleavage (haha, cleavage!) and I don't know what it is, likely some sort of granite and this stuff is HARD! Got it to cleave good and flat for a usable piece, but busted a knuckle, started a small fire from sparks, and got nailed in the face with a good chunk!

This is the piece I ended up with, still don't know what it is...

I als managed to score these two piece of what we always called "chalk rock" as kids. Some kind of sedimentary soft stone, I think it might work for a nagura stone. It is quite soft and I "faced" one on the road in about 1 minute...

Like I said earlier, the stuff I got for a hone is hard! Here is my Estwing hammer after working on just one 14x8x8 chunk. This hammer was in pretty good shape to start with, I used it mostly for gold panning. Yes, those are chips from the edge...

On a side note, my mom has some decorative rocks on her front porch and we know what all of them are except this one, you have any ideas? It is the most awesome piece of the bunch...

-Xander

 

[fast14riot]

Ok, a couple of quick pics before Brandi gets home and whoops my arse for doing this in the kitchen sink...

Left to right, top to bottom:

220# carbonundrum combo stone for lapping, 320# HF diamond stone for lapping, unknown hard-as-hell honing stone, chunck of concrete for coarse lapping (the potential hone actually lapped the concrete!), two chunks of soft unknown sedimentary stone.

Detail of one of the "chalk rocks" lapped flat to one sedimentary layer

Ofcousre, getting more and more flat surface then takes longer as there is more in contact with the lapping stone. This stuff has a soapy feel to it when I lap it. Very much like the soap stone carvings I have. The greenish blue parts cleaved to very fine edges, knife like edges. Not as sharp as obsidian but deffinetley as close to sharp as flint.

Radar approves this message.

-Xander

 

[Daniel Fairly Knives]

Oh wow!

Soapy, green, hard... it could be Jade! I was thinking jasper at first but Jade makes sense.... Jade and Serpentine are both found in CA and ar both soapy but serpentine is very soft.

The "chalk rock" is a mudstone, a it is a petrified mud and sounds good for your needs, the spots you see are dendrites... sweet score as well!

The cool slab you showed is likely a chalcedony, it almost looks like a plume agate or an included carnelian/chalcedony. It is cool for sure and will almost certainly take a great polish. edit - I mean Carnelian, it is a type of Chalcedony

Rocks are known to be tough to ID especially through photos, some hardness tests may confirm my guesses.

That Estwing got destroyed, something you rarely see. Jade is literally the toughest stone, tougher than some steel. Jade is rare but man it all adds up! I have a couple of those hammers and they are tough to chip. Good score!

 

[fast14riot]

Jade?! I had no idea! I know that many stones have very different coloration depending on exactly where they came from, but this stuff I guess must be it. I've hammred on lots of rock, nothing quite this hard! I was really putting everything I had into it, I kept hearing the cartoonish ricochet sound of pieces flying off into oblivion as I whaled on it!

This stretch and many others throughout the area are heavily laden with this same stuff. Maybe I'll send you some small pieces to check out. Thank goodness for flat rate boxes! The mother piece I took the chunk from was about 25# maybe more and there are plenty of smaller pieces and more larger.


-Xander

 

[fast14riot]

Well I've been busy getting my rocks off....

I have that jade-like specimen lapped flat and am down to just the very small pits and such. It is usable and of course I had to try it out!

I took a well used chefs knife, Henckels 8", it had a working edge, but it wouldn't shave arm hair and had been deformed in areas from cutting casserols out of glass dishes and such. I started on a coarse carbonundrum stone, 220# to reprofile the edge, then went to a 400# carbonundrum stone to refine it just a bit. I then went straight to the jade-like specimen. It is hard and smooth, slow cutting, but after I got into a rythum things progressed well! It makes a good polishing stone as is! It is removing the 400# scratches from the edge nicely and polishing it up well! I call it a success!!!

The mud stones are very coarse grit, I tried them as a slurry stone and it was actually felt rolling under the edge. It might work well for edge setting on a coarser grit stone, but in conjunction with the jade-like it is too big of a difference.

I'm stoked, I am now determined to find what I am after from a local source! I will go back and grab a few more pieces of this stone nd set some aside for you Daniel, I would like to hear what you have to say about it.

-Xander

 

[Daniel Fairly Knives]

BRB to comment, sounds cool!

I'm taking out the trash, just to the curb but it takes over an hour. Time for some gnarly driving! We often go check out 4x4 trails in the 4runner and they are never as bad as our road! lol

 

[Daniel Fairly Knives]

You should post that rock up on a rockhounding forum, some of those guys are really good at ID'ing stone... a local rock shop would also help. I know all of my local stones but the specimen you have does not look familiar.

An acid fizz test, scratch test, streak test will tell you a lot. minedat.org is a good site... I am a little rusty on my rock ID

Jade is really rare stuff so who knows, it does kind of look like it and not many rocks that feel waxy are tough. I see that green streak too!

Only maybe 1% of stones will be good enough to be called gem quality so you may have found some gangue material, I wonder what the source could be. I collect gangue ("trash rock" to the miners") as the older mine sites threw away some good stuff, my favorite being a clear jelly purple colored platinum ore. My buddy had a claim where he lived at and mined full time year round that was just a gangue pile from a mine a few miles away, lol he owned that one too but it was more effective to mine the already once processed material from the 1870's.

I look forward to some test results!

the best resource you can find will be local guide books, you can locate verified sources then use the knowledge to find other sites with the same formations. It is a lot of fun. Here is a good book, I have the CO version and have been to every site in my area and found cool stuff! http://www.amazon.com/Rockhounding-California-Gail-A-Butler/dp/1560446390

 

[fast14riot]

well with a little research I have a probable suspect, Gneiss.

from Rockhounds.com...

"What Type of Rock Is It?: Metamorphic

What Does It Look Like?: Gneiss is usually light in color, but it can be quite dark. It looks like it has ribbons or stripes of minerals running through the rock. The grain size is usually fairly coarse. Gneiss usually breaks into blocky pieces, not along the layers. Unlike granite, in which the crystals are randomly arranged, the crystals in gneiss are lined up and in layers. Gneiss is a tough and hard rock.

What Minerals Make Up the Rock?: Almost always: feldspars, quartz, and mica. Sometimes: kyanite, garnet, hornblende, tourmaline, magnetite, and many others.

How Was It Formed?: Gneiss is formed from another metamorphic rock, called schist. The schist formed from fine grained sedimentary rock (often a shale). Gneiss can be formed also from some igneous rocks, especially granite. It is usually formed under great pressure from moving plates of the earth's crust."

There are lots of granite quaries in the area and lots of glacial formations in the lower sierras, sounds probable at this point. I will try to test it further...


-Xander

 

[flatblackcapo]

Good morning y'all ! This thread is sarting to get pretty stoney

 

[Daniel Fairly Knives]

Makes sense...

the feldspar, mica and quartz should look familiar, think of granite

I could see the quartz trashing the hammer too

in one pic it looks like a bunch of rocks cemented together, that would make sense that it is something else

the feldspar and mica are soft and should flake or crush easily under the hammer

rock id is tough!