First knife in many years - WIP and New Question

A

arsenius

Joined
May 29, 2012
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24
A little introduction first, I suppose. I used to make knives when I was in high school, 12 years ago or so. I actually spent a little bit of time back then in Ron Hembrook's shop, but not as much as I would have liked! I just learned that he passed away, which is sad. The last knife I finished was actually stolen from the high school art show. Oh well. I didn't actually like the design on that one anyways. Recently I got the bug again, and decided to give it a try. It was pretty difficult getting started since I now live in Korea. I had to have *everything* shipped to my friend in the States, and then he shipped it all together to me. I had tons of trouble ordering my magicut file, but that's another story...

I'll start with my question, and then put pics of my WIP.

I have read on here that you should keep the edge about the width of a dime before heat treat. My edge is about that thickness now, or probably thinner. I'm wondering how realistic that is when using only hand tools, though. Can you really take enough steel off after HT to get a decent edge with just sandpaper?

The reason I'm asking is because last night when I started hand sanding out my file marks I found a low spot near the ricasso (You can see it in the picture with the cord wrapped handle at the end of this post). An hour or more later with 120 grit and that spot was still there, but the other file marks were long gone. So I've decided to go back and file it out. But this got me to wondering how I will ever get my blade thin enough after heat treat, given how much time it took to make any progress on that low spot.

Here is a picture of the thickness I have now. The blade is made from Aldo's 1/8" 1084, which I then sanded down a bit when I took the plunge cut a little too high. Since it started out thicker than 1/8" it's probably around 1/8" now. Does that look okay for heat treat?

PRR4v.jpg


Having asked my question, here's how I got to that point.

I designed this using inkscape. It's not exactly setup for technical drawing, but I made it work. You can export to dxf if you want to have something waterjet cut, which I considered doing initially, since profiling takes so long with hand tools. I actually made several designs, and traced them onto cardboard, and finally wood. I tried longer and shorter handles, but this one felt the best, since the bulge sits near the center of my hand. My son likes playing with the wooden one.
lpvqKl.jpg


I taped a printout to the back of a picture frame and cut it out. Then I traced that onto steel. The dots are center punches for drilling (Next time I'm doing those one at a time. The holes ended up too far apart. *Drill*Punch*Drill*Punch*...)
5Vmyx.jpg


Partially cutout
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All cutout, and plunge cuts made. The practice cut on the left came in handy when I was filing the bevels. Practice didn't do as much good as hoped, though, as I ended up going much higher on my actual plunge cuts. (I think this turned out to be good, though. The blade still feels quite thick to me. A narrower bevel might have been too fat to cut well.)
UedEj.jpg


Bevels are done.
4x9Vs.jpg


I couldn't resist putting a temporary handle on it!
NcHxB.jpg
 
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I have read on here that you should keep the edge about the width of a dime before heat treat. My edge is about that thickness now, or probably thinner. I'm wondering how realistic that is when using only hand tools, though. Can you really take enough steel off after HT to get a decent edge with just sandpaper?
Click to expand...

Very nice!

I think that most folks who leave edges that thick are doing finish grinding with belts after HT.

Personally I've had good luck bringing 1084 down to as little as 0.015". I've gone smaller with success, but can't in good conscience recommend it. 0.020" is probably a safe target.
 
Since it's all hand work, and you've done a great job so far, I would reduce the edge thickness by half. As well with such a clean finish there shouldn't be much clean up to do after heat treatment. Frank
 
Thanks Daizee and Frank. I've got it taken down about that much. Hopefully it's not too thin now, but it feels a lot better. Unfortunately, in the process of making the plunge cuts deeper, I also brought the grind height up even higher. I think I still have enough thickness to fix up the transition after I finish the bevels though.
 
By the way Daizee, I noticed that the knife in your profile picture has red liners. Are they vulcanized fiber? If so, have you had any problems using it? I have some red fiber that I wanted to use, but it seems like a lot of people have had troubles with it.
 
arsenius said:
By the way Daizee, I noticed that the knife in your profile picture has red liners. Are they vulcanized fiber? If so, have you had any problems using it? I have some red fiber that I wanted to use, but it seems like a lot of people have had troubles with it.
Click to expand...

I asked this question and it was fairly unanimous to never use vulcanized paper liners. I myself had them shrink badly an basically ruin the knife aesthetically. If it was a hard use knife and not a kitchen knife, the scales may have fallen off, I don't know. I should abuse it any see.. but you can get thin G10 liners now, which I'd probably use next time.
 
I was told 1mm is enough for most steels.
If you get yourself a diamond flat file, it'll make light work of putting an edge on after HT.
I have an 8" file 7/8" wide. with 6" of diamond coating. It took less than an hour to put an edge on 59HRC O1 Bladesports cutter
 
Well, I got it hardened and it's now in the oven at 190 C. I think I had to try about four times to harden it. Here's what I used for heat. Cost me around $3 for the torch and $3.75 for four cans of gas. Not ideal, obviously. But I've used a propane torch in the past, and this honestly worked about as well as a single propane torch. I might pick up a second cheap torch for my next knife, and the two together should probably put out plenty of heat. Not elegant perhaps, but living in an apartment in a foreign country, it's nice to have stuff that I can just toss if need be.

Here's the knife all charred up.
rGfZI.jpg


Here's the torch:
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And here's a shot of my "workbench". Two pull-up bars with a board bolted to them. Like I said, living in an apartment!
gH9vQ.jpg


By the way, Peter, I also fenced sabre in high school. I wasn't close to international level, but I was usually the guy to beat at our high school tournaments.
 
Looks good.
After HT, Wet-or-Dry paper and water will be your friend ( add a few drops of dish soap). Start at 120 grit and go to the finest available. Make sure each step is done before moving to the next grit.
 
I originally took this up to 1200 grit, but wasn't happy with it, especially after it scratched when I looked at it funny. I ended up going back down to 400, and I'm pleased with it like that. I actually want to be able to carry this, and I wouldn't like to have a 1200 grit finish all scratched to heck.

Now I've got to get a real handle on it. I actually like the way the cord feels, but I won't feel finished unless I put some slabs on it. Wouldn't want to be kept awake at night! I tried out some green liners made from some flat plastic thing I found in a store. Unfortunately I didn't get them flush against the micarta when I epoxied it up, so I'll probably just end up with 1/8" scales on this. That's ok, since I intended this to be a neck knife.

Thanks parbajtor for the tip on the diamond file. I found one at a discount store for $1.50! It was pretty coarse and I ended up scratching up my finish, but I got it sorted out. I also scored two files, a half round and a flat bastard, for $3.50 together! They look pretty poor, but for that price I couldn't walk away.

And Stacy, I thought I wouldn't have to go down to 120, since I had gone up to 320 before HT. But you were right and I had to do it to get the scale out of my plunge line. Guess I was a little hard headed there. ;-)

Here's the latest pic.
bCOyI.jpg
 
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That's nice. Right away I notice a crisp, clean plunge line, and the overall design is very handy. :thumbup:
 
Thanks James and mgysgthath.

My mother in law was over this last weekend, and wanted to see my knife after my wife told her about it. She was quite impressed, and actually noticed the plunge line, which I thought was cool. Koreans in general probably have a worse attitude about knives than most Americans, so I was pleased that she didn't think I was crazy!

Now that she's gone, I have been able to get back to work. I started making the scales. Got them mostly profiled now, and tomorrow maybe I'll be able to start rounding them in. I felt like it was too heavy with the scales, so I added some holes to the tang since the last pictures.

I'm really missing the drill press I have back in the US. I don't know anyone here who has one (One friend had one and sold it!). I did my best getting the pin holes to be straight, but they're not perfect. Also, I ordered black, brown, and dark brown micarta. I had planned to use this dark brown since I started, and never even looked at the brown when I received it. But I just saw it a couple days ago and it's such a nice shade compared to this darker stuff. Guess I'll have to make another one of these...

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How do you handle the noise, or better yet what kind of tools do you use? I just moved into a condo, and got about 2 seconds having a relatively quiet belt sander running before I had a neighbor pounding on my door... mind you it was 5 past noon not like 2 in the morning...
 
The only noise complaints have even from my wife. But since I'm using files it is probably a lot quieter. Also, our apartment is all concrete, which may make a difference. Best of luck to you on a solution!
 
I'm hoping to get this glued up tomorrow. Just doing some final sanding. But, I noticed that I have some rust that's formed in some of my holes. Is that something I need to clean up before epoxying, or can I just leave it? It's not a ton, but I don't want my new knife to eat itself from the inside out.
 
Excellent job. You now know the value of taking it back to clean, hard metal. Time spent doing that saves time and heartache later on.
 
"I couldn't resist putting a temporary handle on it!"

Love your post and the knife looks fantastic. I also got a lot of my own questions answered. I laughed out loud because I am working on my first knife and also put on a paracord handle a little premature because I was excited to see what it will look like. Have to do a little more sanding and will post some pics for advice. You'll probably see some similarities. Great job though!
 
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