help making my first knife??

F

FoXHounDXD

Joined
Dec 13, 2014
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27
Im to make a full tang fixed blade hunting knife. It will be the first knife ive ever made. and my problem im facing is whether to get a kit blank or get a bar of 1095, 1085, O1, or whatever else steel. Id prefer something along the lines of 1095 carbon steel but im very open minded to suggestions. if all possible i would much rather buy the steel and shape, grind, and finish it myself becuase for one i like doing it all the work myself and i cant find a blank that has the shape i like with a steel i want but the heat treating it my self is my problem cause i would have to do it in a homemade old grill/hairdryer forge on top of having never done this before so im gonna be little skeptical even with a ton of tutorials and research. because im wanting a good durable knife things like rusting, precise fit and finish im not as much worried about. im mainly after good performance over cosmetics right now. on top of that im 18 so i dont have a lot of money to throw around. so id like to keep it in the $100 or less altogether ballpark. plus there are still some tools i need to get like files. so any pointers at all would be super helpful. ik like any other trade or craft its a learning process and you need to just do it to understand but i need to be as cheap as possible.so just ideas on what I should start out with and any suggestions on where to buy steel,kits, wood stock, etc. and any tips at all would be very appreciated. thankyou very much to anyone who takes their time to help me out!!!



This is the kinda shape im going for but i might go for a full flat grind rather than a saber and i like the very slight recurve in it but im not for sure yet exactly because ive a different idea everyday. plus i dont want the bolster and im gonna laminate my own wood handle going for this kinda "camo wood" look just maybe a few more layers.
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True Grit has good prices on just about everything you might need. Also as far as the heat treat you should send it out (again true grit has good prices if your just doing one knife) heat treat is the most important part of knife making and in my opinion if you want a knife that's any good you should spare no expense on heat treatment. As far as buying the blanks or doing it all, morally speaking and this is just MY opinion but buying a blank and adding a handle isn't really making a knife because most of the work is in the blade. I hope this helped you and good luck on your first blade.
 
thanks that helped a lot! and I agree with you about blanks. that's why i wanted to do everything my self instead of doing like some pp who would add a finish to the handle and say they "made" it.
 
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