I recently received orders to go to Ft Richardson Alaska as my new duty station. I took 30 days of leave and took advantage of my free time in my home shop to put together a beginners knife making setup to take with me. The tools I have are a simple paint can forge, homemade filing jig, dremel tool, files, and motivation. I also have a long piece of flat granite that I clamp an abrasive belt to which functions as "primitive belt sander". It works surprisingly well. I started a couple projects before starting the drive up to AK, a kiridashi and a utility knife/. I have yet to make any progress from the state you see in the pictures. I attempted to heat treat the dashi but botched it. I didn't normalize because its Aldo's 1084 and I figured there would be no need but neglected to consider that the material was bent in shipping and straightening while annealed probably introduced some stresses as it is warped. I also think I either didn't get it from forge to quench fast enough or didn't let it fully equalize after the magnet stopped sticking because a file doesn't completely skate off the steel. I'll have to straighten it, normalize and do the rest of it correctly. oh well, this is the best learning process I have ever experienced
I'll be sure to post my progress once I get settled in to my new barracks and my new unit. It's too cold to heat treat right now so i'll probably get some A2 and start a new project that will ultimately be sent out to be heat treated in the mean time. Thanks to all the experts here on BF that gave me the knowledge to pursue this endeavor. Here are the pics. Sorry I didn't take more
I'll be sure to post my progress once I get settled in to my new barracks and my new unit. It's too cold to heat treat right now so i'll probably get some A2 and start a new project that will ultimately be sent out to be heat treated in the mean time. Thanks to all the experts here on BF that gave me the knowledge to pursue this endeavor. Here are the pics. Sorry I didn't take more
