Getting a nice flat face for full tangs after forging.

J

JZknives

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Feb 7, 2013
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I cannot for the life of me get leveled out full tangs after forging. I will have maybe 90% of the tang perfectly flush with the handle material and then there will be an area that is too low and shows a gap with the scales.

This is driving me absolutely insane and I dont have a grinder powerful enough to grind the rest of the area level in a sane amount of time.

Is there any trick people use to get their full tangs perfectly flush?
 
You might try leaving the tang a little thick and flat filing it long ways. It takes awhile but seemed to work good for me.
 
Here's a tip. Forge your flats as flat as possible, then clean them up with the grinder. From there, use the wheel of your grinder or whatever other means you can devise to "dish" out the area in the center of the tang from behind the ricasso to just short of the butt, staying away from the edges. This will leave only the edges of the tang left to get to true-flat (much less material to remove) and it leaves a very shallow pocket for epoxy to use.

Also, it can be really tough to get true flat on a grinder, and it's common to have spots that are not flat. If you really want to get things flat, you might look into a precision granite surface plate. In the absence of one, you can get by with granite cast-offs from a local granite shop or even a plate of glass. Use spray adhesive and mount your paper to the flat surface, then lap your tang on the paper in a figure 8 motion, keeping even, flat pressure until it's uniform. If that's too slow sounding, it's time to invest in a flat disc and motor.

--nathan
 
silver_pilate said:
Here's a tip. Forge your flats as flat as possible, then clean them up with the grinder. From there, use the wheel of your grinder or whatever other means you can devise to "dish" out the area in the center of the tang from behind the ricasso to just short of the butt, staying away from the edges. This will leave only the edges of the tang left to get to true-flat (much less material to remove) and it leaves a very shallow pocket for epoxy to use.

Also, it can be really tough to get true flat on a grinder, and it's common to have spots that are not flat. If you really want to get things flat, you might look into a precision granite surface plate. In the absence of one, you can get by with granite cast-offs from a local granite shop or even a plate of glass. Use spray adhesive and mount your paper to the flat surface, then lap your tang on the paper in a figure 8 motion, keeping even, flat pressure until it's uniform. If that's too slow sounding, it's time to invest in a flat disc and motor.

--nathan
Click to expand...

flat disc?
 
silver_pilate said:
Here's a tip. Forge your flats as flat as possible, then clean them up with the grinder. From there, use the wheel of your grinder or whatever other means you can devise to "dish" out the area in the center of the tang from behind the ricasso to just short of the butt, staying away from the edges. This will leave only the edges of the tang left to get to true-flat (much less material to remove) and it leaves a very shallow pocket for epoxy to use.

Also, it can be really tough to get true flat on a grinder, and it's common to have spots that are not flat. If you really want to get things flat, you might look into a precision granite surface plate. In the absence of one, you can get by with granite cast-offs from a local granite shop or even a plate of glass. Use spray adhesive and mount your paper to the flat surface, then lap your tang on the paper in a figure 8 motion, keeping even, flat pressure until it's uniform. If that's too slow sounding, it's time to invest in a flat disc and motor.

--nathan
Click to expand...
Yes, dish out the tang, and then disc sand, then lap....
This is the reason I make very, very few full-tang knives.
 
Use a flatter (top tool, used under your hand hammer), and get it as flush as possible, then take it to the disc, or preferably, a surface grinder, or, if you're doing it old school, get crackin' with draw filing. Lapping on a surface plate is an option, just don't practice this option on a surface plate you expect to retain it's accuracy grade.

There are hundreds (or more) specialized "dies" that the average smith might have had a hundred or few years ago. The "Flatter" is one of the most essential.
 
Are you checking to make sure your scales are flat? More than once I've spent considerable time trying to 'flatten' my tang only to discover later that it was my scales that were not flat!
 
Mudbug007 said:
Are you checking to make sure your scales are flat? More than once I've spent considerable time trying to 'flatten' my tang only to discover later that it was my scales that were not flat!
Click to expand...

Yes I mostly use dymonwood and micarta
 
JZknives said:
Yes I mostly use dymonwood and micarta
Click to expand...

You'd think those would be flat. I check them all with the flat section of my calipers and I've found micarta and G10 that was not flat. It's been too long since I've used Dymondwood, but I'm betting that not all pieces of that are flat as well.
 
JZknives said:
Ya I want to try other styles of knife that might be more friendly to forging. Any suggestions?
Click to expand...
Yup, a hidden/through tang:
http://i665.photobucket.com/albums/vv18/GHEzell/DSCN0047.jpg
These can either pass through the pommel and then threaded or peened (european sword style), or they can be a little shorter than the handle and have a hole(s) drilled for a pin (japanese sword style)... or any combination thereof... the tang needs to be thickest and widest at the blade/handle junction, tapering in thickness and width to the end of the tang. This is common knowledge among knifemakers, but you did ask...:)
 
A hammer won't make a flat surface. A flatter will. It is a large flat faced hammer looking tool, usually with a 3X3" face. You place the flatter on the hot metal and strike it ( or have an assistant strike it) with a 4-6# hammer. This will make the hot metal flat. A few passes up and down the tang or blade will leave it nice and flat.

You can weld up a make shift flatter from a piece of 1X3X3 steel, and a piece of 2X2X2 steel. Weld them together, and then weld a loop of rebar on the sides of the 2X2 block to make a handle. Round the edges a bit to prevent gouges.

As Page suggested, once the preliminary flattening is done, gouge out the center of the tang to create a slight hollow ( only in the areas that will be under the scales !). Then grind the tang flat to leave the perimeter even. A few passes on a granite plate with a piece of 100-120 grit paper will get a nice flat surface. Use the same granite plate to get a long kitchen blade flat before going up the grits. A wavy or uneven bevel at 100 grit won't be a straight and flat bevel at 1000, unless you make it flat at 100 first.

The first purchase after the basic grinding/shaping tools for any knifemaker should be a 12X12 granite surface plate. It costs about $20-30 and is a tool needed to make professional looking blades. Without a grinder, you can make superb blades if you have a granite block. If dollars are hard to come by, and old piece of Corian countertop or any hard and flat surface will work. Many countertop shops will give you a suitable piece of granite for free. It may not be a laboratory flat reference, but it is a lot better than nothing.
 
G9650 - 9" x 12" x 3" Granite Surface Plate, 2 ledge, B-grade plate from Grizzly, cost me $40 shipped. I bought this specifically for lapping, as it fits a piece of 9x11 paper excellently, and using abrasives on a plate you expect to retain it's accuracy for other work is a no-no, and I didn't want to ruin my A and AA grade plates.

The ledges allow you to clamp things down, although usually just use wet/dry paper that's been soaked, and it'll stick fine.


Seriously though, $40 to your door, everyone should have one.
 
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