I think it's time : Another "who the heck are ya post.

My name is Walter R. Powers. I am 69 years old, a retired welder and have been making knives as a hobby mostly for the past 5 years. I work a part time job as a Deputy Sheriff and I do not always have as much time to "play" as I would like. I grew up in a farm/ranch enviroment and a knife has always been a daily tool.
 
My name is Rudy Joly, 52 yrs old, and spend most of my time as a construction supervisor. I started making at around 22 yrs old. I sell a few and give away a few per year. I started with stock removal and started forging four years ago with a blacksmith friend.The job doesn't allow for much free time but I really like what I do. Money talks.

Also, four of the six grandkids are at that age where they actually ask to spend time with you. That will end soon enough, so they occupy alot my free time. I've made knives for the two who are old enough to be in scouts and hope they are as awed in twenty years as the day I gave the knives to them.

This place is great, It gives me a chance to just veg out and put the daily grind out out of my head briefly every day.
 
My name is Erik and I am 37. Work for the federal government and love tinkering. Knife making has become my new love (and will stay that way for as long as I can do it!). Looking forward to Ashokan to start forging and picking up some more tips to refine my maker skills. I have daughter 10 and 3 (3 yr. old is my girlfriends but I treat her like my own). The 10 year old lives with her mother in Maryland but I see her ever other weekend and whenever else possible. I love the fact there are so many different makers on BF and can only hope to have a 1/10th of the knowledge of some of them someday. Maybe when I retire blades can subsidise my income...or at least give me something to do :)
 
Kris Jacobsen here. I am a wannabe maker who has about 30 or so blanks started/scribed/ready for heat treat. But I get little time so it takes a Loooong time to get anything done. My shop is in my basement (small, and not well ventilated). I have always had a love of knives and the outdoors who got serious about knives with the first issue of TK. Right now I have a collection of around 240 knives, swords, axes, spears ect. My goal is to have a folder for every day of the year and every different knife out there (except POS or dork ops) !!!

I live with my wonderful girlfriend and 15 month old daughter, here in wonderful Edmonton Alberta. Actually I think I have the best girlfriend in the world- she fully supports this crazy dream of mine and has NEVER complained/vetoed about knife purchases- and even has a collection of her own that is probably better than most families/ young men. I come from a rural background so I have always had a knife on me.
A month ago I broke BOTH of my legs at the end of my first ever skydive so it will be a long time before I am creative again!
 
My name is Bill W. Oops!! Wrong meeting:D I first got interested in knives back in the late 70's when I was hanging around a lot of badly dressed men in green. I went through all of the gateway drugs........Gerber, Randall, SOG, Al Mar, Ek, Blackjack, Benchmade, assorted cheap copies of Cold Steel tantos, bad Rambo knives, etc. Then I made the mistake of going to the Guild Show in '92 and saw and BOUGHT my first forged knife. It happened to be one of the last JS knives that Joe Flournoy made. I also talked ith Al Pendray about his wootz and Rob Hudson about how he was the Anti-Christ after seeing one of his "flame edge" multi-bar damascus viking daggers...lol. After that, I bouhgt a few more and then kind of drifted away. I had always wanted to try my hand at making knives, but never got around to it until the beginning of '05. I have been trudging right along but I had to take off about 8 months in '06. When I came back, I had a whole new outlook. I recently sold my first 3 forged blades and have orders for 5 more. Not too bad for a hack. Most of the first 90 or so from '05 and early '07 ended up in the dump and the remaining 3 or 4 are kept locked away where nobody can see them. :grumpy:
I have gotten TONS of help from the ABS guys and some of it has finally started to stick.
 
Hello everyone. My real name is Nick Larsen. I am married and currently attending college, which has a lot to do with the fact that my knife making is going so very slowly. I live in the San Francisco east bay area California. So far I've made one complete knife, and have a second almost finished, which so far has come out much better than my first, it just needs a handle. I started this year and I am completely addicted, but I cannot work on them like I would like to due to time and money constraints.

BTW: if there are any other makers in the bay area, I am having a hard time with my heat treating and would love to get together with another maker to learn more about how to heat treat properly.
 
Evan Martin here I live in Brandon Mississippi and am a full time student I also work at the largest taxidermy in Mississippi. I started obsessing over knives last year aroung christmas when my boss (who gave me the name hevy ev's) gave me a norwegian made Helle which sparked my love for knives which led my to attempt to make one still attempting and getting better with each one
 
Hey folks, Cap Hayes here. I've been around here for a little while, but many people here probably know me from other knife forums. I've been poking around (pun intended) making knives for about 4 years now. I am a member of the North Carolina Custom Knife Maker's Guild and also their webmaster.

I got my first knife when I was 8 or 9 and have been carrying one ever since. Several years back I decided that I'd like to buy a nice Japanese sword and was searching around for websites that sold them. I ran across Scott Slobodian's page and fell in love with his work. I also found his tech info section and got the idea that I could save myself thousands and just make my own sword...

Well, two things didn't come out as planned:
I haven't saved any thousands and I still don't have my own sword!
 
My name is Ron Petley, I work in the hospital as a respiratory therapist, so smoke em if ya got em. I live in winnipeg, Canada. I am married and have 2 children, monkey boy and his sister 8 &4.
I had a old hunting knife from my father, looks like the cowboy, leather handled knife. It was beat and I had broken the tip off as a kid throwing it into trees. I tried to fix it up for my son. Well it did not fix up well so I thought I would make him a new one, and so it goes, two years later.
I have a home built forge and the family anvil that my wifes great grandfather brough over on the boat from Sweden, giving carry on lugage a whole new meaning. That is about it, Reg Ellery provides tech support via e mail, from down under. :jerkit:
Cheers Ron
 
Hello all ya all. My name is Eric Fleming. I'm 45 years old, married and two boys 16 and 19. As an avid outdoorsman I’ve used knives most all my life. When my 16 year old was 13, he got into throwing knives. He was going through those cheap throwers like they were made out of wood. He got an interest in making his own by starting out with junk metal and a file. Soon he was done making throwers and focusing on various fixed blade knives out of O1 as well as attempting a 40" katana out of 1050. During this time I shared my years of craftsman experience to help him achieve his making ambitions. He was bit by the knife making bug.

Now I've made things all my life and wanted to contribute to a better way of making knives at our home. One thing lead to another and I found my self making a 2"X72" grinder (now variable speed), filing/sharpening table, knife vice, sanding blocks, grinding ventilation system, propane forge, electric heat treat oven, multiple quench tanks, quench plates, etc... You might say I like to design and make stuff. Well in the process of all this I too was bit by the knife making bug. Reading everything I can get my hands on regarding knife making, metallurgy, watching knife making videos, reading forum articles, and now in the process of making my 22nd, 23rd and 24th knife, you might say I'm hooked.

Living in San Diego, I've not found any other makers to hook up with. My son still makes a few knives here and there but I continue on an upward trend. Now I have people placing fixed blade knife orders for the past six months and this part time hobby has taken on a life of its own. Most of what I currently make is via stock removal. My current favorite blade materials are D2 and CPM154. If anyone out there is in the San Diego vicinity and would like to share knife making experiences/ideas, shoot me a PM.
 
I think it's good if the old forum farts say who they are, too. New people don't know us.

I'm 56 in a couple weeks. Retired chemist from pharmaceutical research for Abbott Laboratories. Hunted, fished, rode motorcycles. Knife nut since a kid. Made my first "adult" knife in 1981, got serious in 1983. Stock removed, then forged, and made some damascus. Health issues slowed me down in the mid-nineties. Nowadays I work as my health permits, and this year it seems my forging days are to be a thing of the past. My current interest is learning to engrave and I hope to make some artsier knives eventually if the skills come together.

The good thing about knifemaking is that the horizons are endless and there's always something new to learn. Did I mention that I love tools? :) I should also mention I have a very indulgent wife of 33 years, Nancy, who has always let me buy whatever I want for the shop. No kids, one dog, and way too many friggin mosquitos. I enjoy reading about almost anything and play around with the guitar.
 
I like the way these posts start...

" Hi I am Bob, I have been addicted to knifemaking for 5 years now..."

Is there an organisation to help people like us!!!?
 
Hi, my name is Marco.
I'm 36, married, no sons, live in Italy and have been a knife addict since I was twelve.
I work as IT Manager for a firm that builds security systems, and write for the italian knife magazine "Coltelli" as a secondary job (more a hobby, actually), and have started setting up my shop seven years ago.
Intially I had quite a lot of problems, leaving in a condo in Milano. Not enough space, and couldn't make too much noise.
Now I have my shop set up in my wife's country house in Monferrato, and forge and make knives during holidays and weekends.
Lots of space, and nobody troubled by hammering.
I've spent a lot of time building the shop, finding the anvil, the tongs etc. I've made a few knives, I've forged various tools, but I'm just starting to get the hang of grinding.
First knife blade I made, I made it with just files, non grinder. :rolleyes:
Now I've a grinder with inverter to set the wheel speed.
I forge knives out of old nicholson files or C 70 steel (similar to american 1075). I like plain carbon steel as it lets you play more with the heat treatment.
I like to forge, I don't like much making handles (but that was mainly because the fixed speed grinder burned up most grip material... now with the inverter things should improve).
I suck at making sheaths. Will have to learn, tough, as since I do fixed blades, a knife without a sheath is pretty useless...
I have very little time, and manage to forge perhaps 10-12 times a year, which makes improvement (especially in grinding) pretty slow... :(
 
My name is Luke Swenson, i am from Lakehills Texas about 30 miles west of San Antonio. I have been making knives for bout 4 years now. I prefer flat ground outdoors knives and 01 steel. I enjoy martial arts ,shooting ,hunting,fishing and riding my Harley. I have an 8 year old genius, who when not trying to take over the world is giving me strange looks for interrupting her spongebob to show off a new blade.
 
im matt athayde, an 18 year old college student at virginia commonwealth university, studying art now (foundation for first year) and planing to go into craft/material studies in metal. ive only completed one knife all the way but i have about 6 blanks sitting at home that are about half finished but havent had the time to work on them in about 6 months. My business is called Captive Metal Design mostly doing chainmaille jewelry now but trying to branch out into knife making and other custom metal work and metal art (more so to the functional side of art).

and if anyone needs a nice set of earrings or bracelet for the Mrs. i work in sterling and gold fill and will happily trade a few pieces for a nice knife :p

-matt
 
Robert Dark at 60 years of age here. I used to be known as "Roosko". I retired from a Community College at the end of '06 after 32 plus years. Now I work full-time trying to make a few knives. I actually get one or two finished now and then.

I got in trouble a lot when I was a kid because I would steal my dad's files, gasket scrapers, and screwdrives and try to make knives from them.

I don't ask a lot of questions here because I don't know enough to formulate an intelligent question.

I rarely give advice here because you know what they say about anything that is "Free".

Good folks here, and I try to check in at least once a day.

Robert
 
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