Finished my first knife kit

[lloydxmas250]

Well I finished the first kit I bought. I seem to be told this everytime so I'll say upfront I know I didn't make a knife. I put it together. If anything I just made the handles. But I wanted to do this kit to learn before buying blanks and ruining them having no clue what I'm doing.

This kit is the bearcat blade that is sold from Jantz Knife Supply. It came with plain wood colored dymondwood scales, 3/16" pins and i bought the devcon 2 ton epoxy. Right away I didn't like how small the pins were since the tang holes measured 1/4". At the suggestion of some of you guys I hit the hardware store and picked up 1/4" steel rod. I used those for a less sloppy fit. Overall putting it together was an enlightening experience. Here are a few things I learned from this kit.

I don't like working with bolsters. They really limited how I could shape the handles and even though I had painters tape over it, it still managed to take some damage during my work. My fault I realize but at the same time they don't add anything I particularly wanted or needed.

My scales were too thick. I bought 3/8 inch scales and in my head they didn't seem too thick. Not until you put the tang between the two scales. It left a lot of unnecessary filing. It could be because the bolster is thin and therefore dictates the scale width but in the future I think I would be better served buying blocks and cutting them to my desired thickness.

I need more files. I have just a Nicholson handy file, one side is single cut and the other is double. While it worked well when I needed to take small amounts of wood off, it took a long time to take off large sections. That lead me to used a sanding wheel on a dremel which I managed to take a tiny divot out of the bottom tang. You can see it near the curve in the second picture. Lesson learned. Work slower but with the right tools. I'll be buying a bastard cut file for my next project. Also a half round to get to that curve in the tang better.

And the biggest lesson I learned was that making this, albeit a kit and albeit rushed, is that I am capable of doing this work. Next time I will slow down and really make it count. And when I'm satisfied with that, I will start making the blades as well.

 

[rocketmann]

looks good,

 

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

Nice job.

Take a good look at the handle. Notice how it bulges out of the bolsters, and is square-ish on the corners? This is called BHS....Blocky Handle Syndrome. It is found on nearly every first knife. The handle should flow back smoothly from the bolster, and not be nearly as fat. The top should curve down to the bottom in an oval or egg shape. There should be no 90° angle corners between the top/bottom and sides. You can sand/file the handle you have a good bit more, or just take this advice and apply it to your next knife.

 

[lloydxmas250]

Nice job.

Take a good look at the handle. Notice how it bulges out of the bolsters, and is square-ish on the corners? This is called BHS....Blocky Handle Syndrome. It is found on nearly every first knife. The handle should flow back smoothly from the bolster, and not be nearly as fat. The top should curve down to the bottom in an oval or egg shape. There should be no 90° angle corners between the top/bottom and sides. You can sand/file the handle you have a good bit more, or just take this advice and apply it to your next knife.

I agree with you completely. While its hard to see in the pictures, the scales are flush with the bolster where they meet. It's just a very rapidly increasing angle. My original idea was to go from even with the bolster and filing it so the scales were convex for a bit but with the file I had it never seemed to take that shape and I just stupidly thought that once I had the tips flush that I could then still get it filed down to where I had wanted but I was making no progress after the epoxy was applied. So I decided to cut my losses. If iWork with a bolster again I will be cognoscent of it and also work with thinner scales.

I also learned the need for a drill press. No matter how straight it tried to drill, they were always slightly canted. It's hard to tell but if they were studied closely, it's apparent.

Again I did this project to learn. And it was quite the learning experience.