- Joined
- May 5, 2005
- Messages
- 955
After lots of inquires on exchange forum, I've decided to write about my hawks a little bit more
I am called graf, and together with melon from blog.melontools.com we make tactical tomahawks.
Melon is a metallurgist with 20 years of industry experience and I am ambitious knife enthusiast, user and designer.
We started over two years ago with grafknives throwing knives. They turned out to work great so last year I decided to try with tomahawks.
I've made a plywood model, played a little bit and made two prototypes.
They were made out of 40HM steel (more of that later), 1/4 inch thick, and 19 inches long.
One was full tang, one was radically cutout, but without and weakspots - I kept amount of material as uniform as possible.
I know my target(make great hard use hawks) limitation(i cant do really nice grinds) i also didn't had any troughtested handle materials and handle fixing solution, therefore I looked for something else.
Polyurethane coating was that.
Industrial grade coating - line-x and so on works great. We had to try four different shops before we found one that put polyurethane that is thick and hard enough.
Prototypes were 19 inches long and 1/4 inch thick. I found they are waaaay to long to be packable and too thin to offer proper punch.
I've redesigned them and came out with 15 inch, 3/8 thick H-01.
They are really nice and were quite popular both on BF and in Poland.
Now, I am working on new designs.
Jungle hawk - a 15 inch design inspired by classic Peter Lagana vietnam hawk, same handle as H-01
-
Warhammer - 17 inches, less cutouts, MOAR POWAH
I also have now kydex sheaths, high riding, with teklocks, and molle adapters.
And little bit more about technology behind Grafhawks.
Hawks are lasercut out of 3/8 inch steel plate, along rolling direction.
Cleaning, stonewashing and so on is made at laser workshop.
We now use polish 40hnma steel - which is same as ANSI 4340.
This is ultra high strength tensile cr-ni-mo steel.
Why this alloy? It will be tougher than any plain carbon steel, and is "easily" available in plates of desired thickness.
I make throwing knives out of 4140, but for hawks I needed something harder and tougher just to be extra safe.
This is achieved in 4340 with help of nickel. 4340 is tougher than 4140 at same hardness (or harder at same toughness).
Hardening a tensile steel is quite well known process, so we concentrated on most crucial things.
grain size control, and decarburation protection.
For tensile steel, aside from steel purity, grain size is most important factor when it comes to toughness. so heat treatment is about 12 steps process and takes at least 8 hours.
And because steel is heated 4 times during grain refinement and quenching we CANNOT afford to loose carbon from outer layer - it would completely ruin austenitization and martensite formation.
Steel is tempering at low temperatures.
Surface.
Another thing that is quite uncommon is our coating. It is absolutely standard industrial zinc coating.
And it is great. No more worring about corrosion, as zinc offer active corrosion protection.
Even if you scratch the tool to clean steel it will not rust, as zinc is preferable cathodic. it will work to about 1/8 inch distance.
this is standard - paintlike coating
this is zinc coating
Almost no other coating offers such benefit. But it comes at a price. Zinc will never be as nice as hard chrome, or properly done cerakote.
And it is shiny and UNPAINTABLE I found no way to stick and paint to zinc 
Therefore some of future hawks will be made in hot oxide, to make them "tactical black".
I am called graf, and together with melon from blog.melontools.com we make tactical tomahawks.
Melon is a metallurgist with 20 years of industry experience and I am ambitious knife enthusiast, user and designer.
We started over two years ago with grafknives throwing knives. They turned out to work great so last year I decided to try with tomahawks.
I've made a plywood model, played a little bit and made two prototypes.
They were made out of 40HM steel (more of that later), 1/4 inch thick, and 19 inches long.
One was full tang, one was radically cutout, but without and weakspots - I kept amount of material as uniform as possible.
I know my target(make great hard use hawks) limitation(i cant do really nice grinds) i also didn't had any troughtested handle materials and handle fixing solution, therefore I looked for something else.
Polyurethane coating was that.
Industrial grade coating - line-x and so on works great. We had to try four different shops before we found one that put polyurethane that is thick and hard enough.
Prototypes were 19 inches long and 1/4 inch thick. I found they are waaaay to long to be packable and too thin to offer proper punch.
I've redesigned them and came out with 15 inch, 3/8 thick H-01.
They are really nice and were quite popular both on BF and in Poland.
Now, I am working on new designs.
Jungle hawk - a 15 inch design inspired by classic Peter Lagana vietnam hawk, same handle as H-01
-
Warhammer - 17 inches, less cutouts, MOAR POWAH
I also have now kydex sheaths, high riding, with teklocks, and molle adapters.
And little bit more about technology behind Grafhawks.
Hawks are lasercut out of 3/8 inch steel plate, along rolling direction.
Cleaning, stonewashing and so on is made at laser workshop.
We now use polish 40hnma steel - which is same as ANSI 4340.
This is ultra high strength tensile cr-ni-mo steel.
Why this alloy? It will be tougher than any plain carbon steel, and is "easily" available in plates of desired thickness.
I make throwing knives out of 4140, but for hawks I needed something harder and tougher just to be extra safe.
This is achieved in 4340 with help of nickel. 4340 is tougher than 4140 at same hardness (or harder at same toughness).
Hardening a tensile steel is quite well known process, so we concentrated on most crucial things.
grain size control, and decarburation protection.
For tensile steel, aside from steel purity, grain size is most important factor when it comes to toughness. so heat treatment is about 12 steps process and takes at least 8 hours.
And because steel is heated 4 times during grain refinement and quenching we CANNOT afford to loose carbon from outer layer - it would completely ruin austenitization and martensite formation.
Steel is tempering at low temperatures.
Surface.
Another thing that is quite uncommon is our coating. It is absolutely standard industrial zinc coating.
And it is great. No more worring about corrosion, as zinc offer active corrosion protection.
Even if you scratch the tool to clean steel it will not rust, as zinc is preferable cathodic. it will work to about 1/8 inch distance.
this is standard - paintlike coating
this is zinc coating
Almost no other coating offers such benefit. But it comes at a price. Zinc will never be as nice as hard chrome, or properly done cerakote.
And it is shiny and UNPAINTABLE
I found no way to stick and paint to zinc Therefore some of future hawks will be made in hot oxide, to make them "tactical black".
