Recommendation? Fillet Knife Design Input

Stark Knives

Stark Knives

Joined
Mar 19, 2010
Messages
1,154
I'm working on developing a fillet knife design and was hoping to get some advice from you all to see if you would have any critiques or advice. Right now I have this design attached below and was planning on making them out of 0.07" AEB-L at around 60-61 RC. My questions are:

1. What is a good blade height for fillet knives? This one is sitting at around 1" at the tallest portion by the guard and I wasn't sure whether that would be too tall or not.

2. Would there be a problem with having a sharpening notch like in the top design? I haven't seen many fillet knives with one so maybe there's a big disadvantage to them that I don't know about. I was thinking it could maybe alleviate the problem of reaching the end of the edge when sharpening. The bottom one is the same, but without the notch.

V8Oj3mZ.png
 
Most fillet knives don't have a sharpening choil. It catches the flesh on long slices. The blade will get narrower with multiple sharpening, so the notch will eventually not be there anyway. I never put one on my blades.

For the same reason, your "guard" sticking out should be left off. Reduce it to a flat nub that projects about 1/8" past the edge.
 
Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith said:
Most fillet knives don't have a sharpening choil. It catches the flesh on long slices. The blade will get narrower with multiple sharpening, so the notch will eventually not be there anyway. I never put one on my blades.

For the same reason, your "guard" sticking out should be left off. Reduce it to a flat nub that projects about 1/8" past the edge.
Click to expand...

Thanks for your input Stacy! What are your thoughts on how tall the blade should be?
 
Fillet blades need no more height than is necessary. 3/4" on a smaller/thinner one, 1" on a larger/thicker knife. I only made one at 1.25", and that was a big one for large fish. Thin is what works best. .060" to .090" is a good range. .125" for a rockfish fillet knife.
 
Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith said:
Fillet blades need no more height than is necessary. 3/4" on a smaller/thinner one, 1" on a larger/thicker knife. I only made one at 1.25", and that was a big one for large fish. Thin is what works best. .060" to .090" is a good range. .125" for a rockfish fillet knife.
Click to expand...
Sounds good, I'll probably try to go around 1" or so if I'm doing a ~7" blade at .07" thick. Thanks again!
 
Sounds good. Post final drawings.

On last suggestion. Don't skimp on handle length.
 
Take a look at Rapala fillet knives they have been in the business for ever, they're great knives. They're 9" models are my go to knives for salmon, I would prefer a small guard and a crows beak on them and a bit grippier handle. Because your hands get really slippery when cleaning fish.
 
Scott Hanson said:
Take a look at Rapala fillet knives they have been in the business for ever, they're great knives. They're 9" models are my go to knives for salmon, I would prefer a small guard and a crows beak on them and a bit grippier handle. Because your hands get really slippery when cleaning fish.
Click to expand...
I'll check those out! Thanks!
 
Scott Hanson said:
Take a look at Rapala fillet knives they have been in the business for ever, they're great knives. They're 9" models are my go to knives for salmon, I would prefer a small guard and a crows beak on them and a bit grippier handle. Because your hands get really slippery when cleaning fish.
Click to expand...

Here's what I have after some of your input. I shortened the guard a bit and removed the sharpening notch. I'm going to cut the first run of these by hand so I'll be able to still tweak the design as I go. Right now the handle is sitting at around 4.8" long. That's the length I do for my full sized chef's knives, so I was thinking it should be about the right size. Let me know if you see anything else you think could be improved. :)

DqyU3EY.png
 
Stark Knives said:
Here's what I have after some of your input. I shortened the guard a bit and removed the sharpening notch. I'm going to cut the first run of these by hand so I'll be able to still tweak the design as I go. Right now the handle is sitting at around 4.8" long. That's the length I do for my full sized chef's knives, so I was thinking it should be about the right size. Let me know if you see anything else you think could be improved. :)

DqyU3EY.png
Click to expand...
Looks like like your off to a really good start, I don't think would change anything else.
 
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