JD WARE Slim, Slip-Joint Vintage Ivory Micarta (SOLD)

JDWARE

JDWARE

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This is a Slim, Slip-Joint Folding Knife with a 2-7/8” flat ground, belt satin-finish blade. Blade and spring are of 3/32” CPM154 steel.

The handle is interesting vintage Ivory Micarta that has aged to a warm, rich colour. Closed length is 4-1/8”” including the lanyard loop. Nickel Silver liners (relieved), pins and file-worked bolsters. The Silver Escutcheon made from an 18th century Spanish 1/2 Real coin. Spine of blade with thumb grooves and geometric file-work.

This knife is “under-bladed” meaning that in the open position, the spine of the blade is just slightly lower than the top surface of the backspring**. This is an intentional design element that is often seen in old Sheffield knives. Without this feature, over time, as a knife is used, the blade will want to “climb up” over the back spring. The last photo shows the under blading clearly. The backspring itself is flush with the liners in the open and closed positions. There is no half-stop. The knife opens with a medium-easy pull. Supplied shaving sharp.

Included is a handmade leather pocket sheath. $315 (SOLD) (including shipping via FedEx economical insured to US, Canada or Mexico. $15 extra to most of EU. By quote elsewhere)

If you'd like, I can engrave up to three initials in the Coin Silver Escutcheon for an additional $25

I am a full time knifemaker working in Merida, Yucatan Mexico. I use almost exclusively local handle materials that I gather and mill or process myself. Dense tropical hardwoods as well as wild and ranched deer, cow, bull and water buffalo horns.

The silver escutcheons are made from old Mexican silver coins and are pinned through the liners. You can still see some of the surface irregularities of the coins. All of the pins are nickel silver and are hammered over and left slightly proud of the handle. The decorative file work and carving are precise and carefully done, but you can also see that it was done by hand – I don’t sand or polish the file-cuts.

Please checkout my website for more information about my work JDWARE KNIVES.

If you want to purchase this knife or have questions or comments, post here, pm me, or contact me through my website. I accept PayPal and credit cards.

Thanks for looking
J

**There have been a few discussions on the forum on under-bladed knives, including HERE.












 
Last edited:
J,
ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL GEOMETRIC WORK of ART.
Your HANDMADE KNIVES are VERY WELL CRAFTED.
:thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:

Dennis,
Cancel Your appointment with the Optometrist. ;)
 
Thanks for the nice comments. This knife is SOLD.

Here's a photo of the strip of Micarta. You can see how dark the surfaces have become. I bought it in the late 70's from Angus-Campbell in California. It's where Loveless was buying at the time.

 
Thanks for posting the pic of the Micarta slab. Neat to see the aging. Very much looking forward to this one arriving.
 
Great to see someone besides me educating the public about "under-blading". I make all my slipjoints this way, but never cease to have to explain this, even to friends, that are top end makers that assume it's a "mistake", I somehow didn't realize. I find it ironic, since literally anybody can grind a spring and spine together, but it's quite a chore to get them ground on different levels, but completely in-line with each other. This also allows you to slightly radius the spine, adding comfort, on top of the aforementioned concern of spring wear.

Ultimately this is akin to a "museum fit", one of the tricks the old masters developed to keep the proper proportions over time with use, and change of environment, a tedium only someone truly dedicated to perfecting their trade would undertake. This technique in particular being so seldom used anymore, that it's become a thankless and often derided feature, which separates the true masterpieces from the simply "great" slipjoints.


Excellent piece!
 
Thanks Javan. "Under-blading" seems to make sense. In fact, I find that small step up to the spring aesthetically pleasing. I posted a similarly under-bladed knife here a couple of days ago with bull horn handles.
Saludos
J

JDWARE KNIVES
 
If you consider a metaphor, of two hammer faces smacking into each other, whichever is the softer of the two, will deflect and deform. It's the same with the run-up on back square of a blade tang in a slipjoint. The usually, much harder blade, will deform the top lip of the softer spring over time, a little bit at a time. Essentially you're "peening" the face of the spring, just like forming pin heads. Of course with a real soft pull, this will be lessened, but on a heavy pull, the slapping of these two surfaces is intense. Especially considering that under most circumstances you don't have a full face-to-face engagement of the end of the spring and the back square, and don't want to, since a smaller surface area of contact is less likely to wobble as it wears.

Also, as the bottom of the spring wears, especially riding over the corners of a tang that's configured for a half stop (sharp corners necessary for a snappy action, as opposed to one without a half-stop which rides smoothly over most of the tang), the spring will lower relative to the liners, etc. This is obviously more noticeable if it wears below the spine of the blade where they were originally ground together, but not so much when the blade is "under bladed" to begin with.

As to the nomenclature of "under blading" JD, do you have any provenance of this term? I've always called it "stepped" and I've never seen any literature about it with any sort of semi-official terminology. Of course, it doesn't matter to me, we obviously know we're talking about the same thing. ;)

Cheers!
 
Yes, the uneven hardness of the tang and the spring are of concern to me. From my reading and from watching some of the old films of Sheffield knifemakers, I gather the tangs weren't even hardened. Some that I've tested have been in the mid 40 RC range. It probably made fit up easier and helped equal out the wear of tang and spring.

I've adapted the technique to the steels and heat treat methods we use today. After the blades are hardened and tempered, I clamp them between two aluminium plates with just the tang exposed, and with a hot torch, heat the tang and up into the back square. The plates keep the heat from moving down the blade. See the photo below.

I do it a couple of times, quenching between heats. The short "soak" time is more effective on the simpler carbon steels, however, the stainless steels still loose hardness, although I'm not sure how deep the effect is. Even if it's only a few thousandths, it serves the purpose of bringing the two wearing surfaces closer in hardness.

No idea where the terms underbladed, under-bladed or under-blading originate.

Saludos
J

 
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