Hi everyone. First question on the knife forum. I'll try to keep it quick. I'm in the process of making my second knife. I bought a piece of Damascus bar stock steel. It's 10" long, 1.5" wide, and 0.15" thick. The steel has a slight (very slight) curvature as you look down its length. I want my knife to be straight. So, what is the best way to straighten the steel before I start making the knife? Bend it in a vise? Heat it slightly then bend? Thank you in advance for any help you can offer.
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How to straighten bar steel?
- Thread starter Landodnal
- Start date
- Joined
- Oct 19, 2011
- Messages
- 5,030
Be careful. The piece is not very thick and you can end up putting kinks in it which are harder to remove than gentle curves. I wouldn't advise using a vise. You need to spread out the bending forces over the length of the piece. If the curve is a gentle arc along the entire length you can try things like flexing the piece by hand. You can try putting something under the ends of the bar with the curve arcing up, then flexing the piece downward. Or you might jack up one end with the arc upwards and use a rolling pin to gently roll up the piece towards the jacked up end. In any case with whatever method you use, make sure you have a flat surface to check the results. A granite surface plate, a thick piece of glass, a granite counter top or other solid flat surface will work.