Forging a distal taper

[Dixieblade57]

I am about to forge my first knife that will have a distal taper. The blade will be forged from Admiral’s HR1075/80. I would like to at least forge some of that taper into the knife, instead of doing do much grinding to achieve the distal taper.
Has anyone got advice in hammer control and or positioning of the steel to the anvil?
I will be honest I have never tried a forged distal taper, or seen one done. So am I correct in thinking that to start the taper I need to concentrate on the edge as if I am pulling it out and then bring that back into the spine to achieve the taper?
Something tells me hammer control is going to be key here!
Are there any tutorials on this subject?
Should I be thinking of doing some practice runs with scrap before trying this on the real deal?
I am flying by the seat of my pants on this as I have with most of life!
You have heard that old line about clueless in Seattle, just call me clueless in Florida!

 

[Rusty McDonald]

Your gonna think I'm nuts but try it on some modeling clay/bee's wax with a small hammer, You will see how the material moves and how to get it to go where you want it to with hammer control. Then practice on some mild steel, it's cheap and will move in a similar manner to the 1080
Try to keep the edge of the blade on or near the edge of the anvil, and try not to let the ricasso touch the anvil if you can.
(some start at the ricaso and go to the tip) start at the tip and work your way back to the ricaso with the hammer strokes pulling the hammer to you, then flip the blade to the other side of the anvil and do the same pushing the hammer away from you.


then move up about a 1/4" and repeat, don't hit the blade when it gets cold. when the blade starts to taper the tip will pull up you either straiten it or leave it your choice.

 

[Dixieblade57]

Thanks Rusty, now that is advice I can actually see in my mind! Now if I can just see it before my eyes!

 

[69_knives]

I use the angle peen hammer and start at the tip. Still learning but I basically try to, in a series of hammer blows, start at the tip and work back to the ricasso, each series of hammering going back further toward the ricasso from the tip.

In an ideal world you would start at the very tip and space the blows evenly toward the ricasso and the first series would be only one strike at the tip, the second series would be the tip and just behind it, the third series would be the tip and two strikes behind etc, etc, so the tip always gets the most hits and thins out the most.

I usually flip the blade over and use a smoothing hammer to smooth things out.

You can see how I do it in this video at about the 2:00 mark. : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2qAjQYqvsQ

I forgot my usual angle peen hammer that day so I had to cut my cross peen hammer and dress it so that I could forge that day.

Also, I start with the shaping of the tip, then distal taper, then forge the plunges and bevels.

 

[Dixieblade57]

Thanks 69knives for the tips on the distal taper. Great videos part 1 & 2!
Can I give you a tip on your hammer or should I say how you holding your hammer.
This is from an old carpenter so please don't take offense. :grumpy: I use to swing a framing hammer 5 days a week 8 hrs a day. If you move your hold on the handle with your hand out towards the rear of the hammer, (say about 1-2" from the end), it will allow the hammer to do more of the work. Your arm will be less tired and once you get the hang of it, you will actually gain more hammer control with less effort!
I use to catch guys with there hand slid up on the handle like that on the job and reach up and grab their hammer handle right behind there hand.Then I would ask them if they minded if I cut the rest of the handle off that they weren't using!

 

[69_knives]

I've been trying to learn to hold the hammer properly but it seemed like I was working a heck of a lot harder. I've realized that the gloves are a major part of the problem, they are very slippery and I couldn't hold tight enough when holding the end of the handle so I was trying to grip way to hard and causing all kinds of stress and spasms. I put hockey tape on all my hammer handles last time I forged so I will now re-start the learning process.