Got a design!

dartanyon

dartanyon

Joined
May 10, 2002
Messages
705
Hi all, I am dumfounded at finding this forum ... sort of like a kid in a toy store at christmas :)
I have a design that I would like to market but don't have access to any knife makers where I live, just me and my 3 inch angle grinder ... not even a vice and I've spat out at least 15 blades. A friend of mine has a machining workshop, can he grind blades or does he need specialised equipment?
 
red scorpion, no I dont. From the thread I started prevously titled "protecting a design" where a member directed me here to seek help and discuss my issues.
Yea Bruce a belt grinder is a usefull tool for knives and I have access to one although in the past I tend to overheat the blade with the belt so I put a sanding disc on my angle grinder and use a wet rag. Any suggestions?

As far as quantity I have no idea of that either, it boils down to demand.
 
Overheat the blades? Overheating blades shouldn't be a problem, as long as you're grinding them before heat treating.
 
Grind then heat treat,then finish, works better that way. shape when he steel is soft, heat treat to the desired hardness and toughness, then finish out.

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Ok then it looks like I'm back to building my long waiting brake drum forge (dam I shoulda grabbed that truck drum) ... anyway so far my materials have been an old band saw blade from a sawmill (6 foot long 3 inch wide and 1/8 thick) and some stainless flat bar I bought for my spearfishing blades. Because I don't have a forge I've been really carefull not to change original tempering. Can I temper stainless steel the same as mild steel? I'm getting into an area I have little knowledge of but understand the basics. Mostly I come up with the idea and once the proto works I hand over to someone that knows what their doing although I seem to love making knives.
As far as thumping shape with a hammer thats pretty new. One day I would like to do a damascus blade :)
 
you can do most of the blade shaping with a milling machine if you have access to one.
When you say temper, do you mean heat treat?
 
Yea heat treat ... is that the same as tempering?

Wow a milling machine?? Yes for sure, he has a cnc lathe and cnc mill. When I spoke to him about my blades he mentioned pressing the shape out? I didn't like the idea ... but I dont know. I thought the blade was ground on a table?
 
On the stainless question.... There are many types of stainless. the most common will not harden to knife quality. Some will, but without knowing the type and or composition of the piece it would be a shot in the dark to harden, plus you need a way to keep out the oxegen as you will need to get it around 2000f to harden.

Pressing the blade out is a forge, one hit would take a huge hammer or a lot of hydraulics while red hot. With a forge, hammer and anvil a lot of hits while red hot will "pres" it out. Most of us grind our blades (even after forging) on a belt sander/ grinder usually a 2"x72" belts of various grits
 
My suggestion is to stop making knives for a few days and read the stickie at the top of this thread list. The one titled, "newbies, good info here". It's full of tons of information on the different methods and skills required to make knives and will answer a ton of questions for you! There are step by step tutorials on many different topics and will save you months of learning things on your own the hard way.
 
scottickes said:
My suggestion is to stop making knives for a few days and read the stickie at the top of this thread list. The one titled, "newbies, good info here". It's full of tons of information on the different methods and skills required to make knives and will answer a ton of questions for you! There are step by step tutorials on many different topics and will save you months of learning things on your own the hard way.
Click to expand...

Considering I started making blades at 14, and am 41 now, had the stickies been available in 1980 they would have saved me 24 years of hard learning curve. Seriously.

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