Knife blanks and cheating?

[indy]

Hehehe, yep. Now let's argue ford vs. chevy Really, what part of a knife is the knife? FWIW I can make a functional one out of newspaper and oatmeal. It won't last long, won't be pretty, but it works in a pinch.

 

[atakach]

Hehehe, yep. Now let's argue ford vs. chevy Really, what part of a knife is the knife? FWIW I can make a functional one out of newspaper and oatmeal. It won't last long, won't be pretty, but it works in a pinch.

DODGE:thumbup:

no im really a chevy man, just happen to own a dodge at the moment.


andrew

 

[Jack O'Neill]

I myself , enjoy the grunt grinding . Getting the steel profiled to match my drawing is rewarding to me , it is the 2nd. step from vision to finished project . I only farm out the heat treat as I cannot afford the oven .

 

[David Schott]

I think style and design are a huge part of knifemaking. If you are having your own deisgns cut for you and nothing else, I don't have a problem with you calling a knife your own.

If you, however, are buying other peoples' designs, I think it is crossing a fine line....sure lots of designs are similar but sometimes its subtle design/shape features that make or break a knife. If you are completely removing the design stage from your knifemaking, you can't really claim 100% ownership of the resulting knife, IMHO.

This is indeed a slippery slope because where do you draw the line? If you outsource your profiling, many will say its still your knife....but what if you then send it out for HT, a sheath, sandblasting, have the scales cut, etc etc....you're quickly approaching making yourself a "kit."

Bottom line for me is that if you are doing 100% of the design work and just outsourcing the rough profiling of the steel to save time/costs on bandsawing and grinding them, its no big deal. Once people start buying pre-fab designs with the pin placement all picked out and drilled...things begin to get a bit more complicated.

I know that if I were buying a "custom" knife and later found out the maker outsourced the design, profiling, handle cutting, pin placement, HT and leatherwork...I might be a bit miffed depending on what I assumed when I bought the knife.

 

[Allen Newberry]

This is indeed a slippery slope because where do you draw the line? If you outsource your profiling, many will say its still your knife....but what if you then send it out for HT, a sheath, sandblasting, have the scales cut, etc etc....you're quickly approaching making yourself a "kit."

I think you would be quickly approaching making yourself a "manufacturer."

Personally I think the definitions don't matter as much as being honest with your customers.

Allen

 

[Allen Newberry]

After reading the above post it sounds a bit sarcastic. Please know I did not mean to offend you Mr. Schott.

Allen

 

[STR]

I opposed contracting parts out for myself for years. For me though it was finally looked at seriously to both save me time and save the customer some hard earned $, not to mention it became an issue of health from dusting up the shop with titanium smelt, G10 dust, Carbon Fiber dust, Micarta and wood and from cutting the blanks out on my band saw and grinding them to knock the burrs off just like the titanium and then shape them up for my folders.

As a result of these things and serious thought and of course talking it over with Dave at Great Lakes Water Jet I finally took the plunge for the first time to have some of my designs cut out for me. I haven't received the folder blanks back yet but the titanium was mailed off late in 08 and the actual knives I did make that I wanted copied have been sent with those sheets of ti to copy the lock and liner plus spacer/stand offs for the rear. In my case I happen to have plenty of blades already made up in the steels I use and also on this project the ones I'm doing are Cobbler blades from Ragweed Forge I'm converting into folders for folks wanting those excellent little slicers.

Because of this and having plenty of blades I've already made myself to keep me stocked up for the way I work I won't need any blades cut out for a while if at all but I tell ya, if you develop asthma and arthritis along with some other issues later in life with your health you'll consider doing all you can to make your work load less and your shop more dust free too. As the case was for me circumstances dictated what direction I needed to go but just getting to know Dave helped with my decision a lot to be honest. Regardless of what you do to make the knives you sell, whether it be cutting out your own blanks and parts after drawing them up yourself as I've done for many years or contracting to have parts you designed cut out for you by someone like Dave there is still significant amounts of hand work involved in getting the knife from the beginning stages to the finished product. In the end its still yours either way, stubborn as I was to come around to realizing that.

I think the other posters have hit the nail on the head as to what defines cheating and what doesn't, or what defines mid tech and what doesn't and while it is true that the Knifemakers Guild does not allow those using contracted out parts to show their knives at Guild shows, last I heard I understand this is something being discussed due to technology changes and adjusting policy to the times. It appears after discussing this with many folks both makers and customers that this is no big deal contrary to my original feelings on the matter. From my point of view if the customer doesn't mind, and apparently they don't care much about this matter at all, but instead care about the end result and quality of the product well, then why the heck should we give it a second thought? I understand that each and every part is identical and personally that may end up saving people both postage and down time. I mean imagine if a new lock was needed and all you had to do was have one cut out that is exactly the same as the last one and all without seeing the knife. In many ways its pretty exciting.

This has been a difficult subject for some, perhaps many. I was one of them that didn't like this at all and although I've done a complete 180` by some perceptions I still find that I value and seek out true 'handmade' knives for myself when I purchase customs but its not the be all end all to limit my purchase if its not the case. I mean as we all know, some of the finest makers in the world contract out for various things they need and with the advent of waterjet and laser cutting equipment as well as modern high tech grinding equipment to speed up making grinds there is really no excuse not to use it if it is faster, easier and better for all concerned.

Right before I retired from dental sales I was selling lasers and dental crown, onlay and inlay milling machines for $85,000 to $100,000 to dentists to make crowns for patients needing them and all in one appointment. These were traditionally done the old fashioned way for many years of course and by human hands in a lab or by the dentist themselves. Looking back on this memory I don't recall a single lab or dentist calling it cheating to adopt this technology in their practices. In fact these crowns (one of which I have in my mouth) fit better and are precisely cut from a block of ceramic matched up to your own tooth shade and color so it looks like the real thing so in many ways they are light years ahead of where we were just a few short years ago. Such is the times we live in and we should be welcoming it with open arms. Color me slow I guess to be hesitant to wake up to this fact.

Please note that I'm eating some crow here to post my current opinion because I was of quite the opposite opinion at one time. However, with anything in life sometimes change is difficult to take and requires time to digest and I am no exception to this fact. Anyway, thats my two cents worth on this topic. Thanks for listening.

STR

 

[David Schott]

After reading the above post it sounds a bit sarcastic. Please know I did not mean to offend you Mr. Schott.

Allen

Not at all, I 100% agree with you. I dont outsource anything, dont have a problem with people who do, but think for my own hobby that I like to keep as much as possible being done within the confines of my shop. The more a knife is in my own hands during fabrication, the more I feel the end product is "mine" and not just assembled by me.

I agree with you...if people are honest, it doesnt matter. The tricky part comes when a maker needs to decide what needs to be told to a customer or not. Profiling doesnt really need to be told, IMHO....but I have strong feeling that if you buy someone elses' blade design pre-profiled, its important to share that you did so even if you did everything else yourself. Style and design are big enough parts of a knife that I dont think they should be ignored.

 

[Steve Hayden]

Some of the fanciest and most expensive knives in the world are made by Scandinavian makers that use blades made by others.

Personally, I feel that in order to claim I made a knife, I have to have made the blade as well as the handle and sheath. I would never presume to claim that you have to make everything yourself to claim to be the maker, but have these standards that I hold myself to.

 

[Allen Newberry]

I agree with you Mr. Schott.

Allen

 

[kc custom]

"We built this house" "WE" started at he basement and physically wired, plumbed, assembled, and finished this house without outside subcontractors that we had to
pay to do something we either couldn't do or did not want to do is a far cry from building
a house from the bottom up with one's own hands. (yeah I know did we grow and saw the trees?)
Ken

 

[deloid]

The true value is in the quality of the finished product, not in who swung the hammer.

I'd agree on that. I think that it would be hard to argue that point.

At a personal level though I don't like any machinery at all for something I am making. I prefer not to grind, mill...frankly ...I don't like moving electrons for my woodworking, violinmaking, blacksmithing etc...

While I enjoy the spirit of human touch at the most rudimentary level, I don't fault anyone for the use of fine technology.

 

[hellgap]

I will take full credit for saying its CHEATING.It really is simple if you want to be called a knife maker then make the knife the handle and sharpen the knife.I am so new at this hobby and looked at my first knife with disgust the other day ,its not bad but i CHEATED . The blade was a old ice auger blade that I welded a tang to and then just shaped the blade and sharpened it .Although i made the finger gaurd and laminated the maple onto the oak its just not the same as forgeing the steel and truely making the knife from scratch. I have ordered several knife blanks so i can practice on making better handles before i start forgeing steel.So to me i think thats CHEATING and not a true form of knife making. Thats my opinion, just like some guys say using a belt sander is CHEATING. KELLYW

 

[atakach]

I will take full credit for saying its CHEATING.It really is simple if you want to be called a knife maker then make the knife the handle and sharpen the knife.I am so new at this hobby and looked at my first knife with disgust the other day ,its not bad but i CHEATED . The blade was a old ice auger blade that I welded a tang to and then just shaped the blade and sharpened it .Although i made the finger gaurd and laminated the maple onto the oak its just not the same as forgeing the steel and truely making the knife from scratch. I have ordered several knife blanks so i can practice on making better handles before i start forgeing steel.So to me i think thats CHEATING and not a true form of knife making. Thats my opinion, just like some guys say using a belt sander is CHEATING. KELLYW

let me start by saying im defending you from yourself hellgap

i didnt want to comment any further on this thread, (prefer to just listen), but if you took an old auger blade and welded a tang on, thenm shaped and profiled the blade........how's that not making a knife, it took more design and thought effort,creativity, etc to do that than to take a piece of 01 offa of ebay, bansaw it out, then grind it and have joe shmo heat treater hook ya up.

it has to be forged to be a hand/custom made knife....
tell that to all the lovless collectors

one note i'll add, if in fact any maker cheats the trade and slights his work, the buyer of the product may never know and be quite content with his purchase.....mission complete, BUT IT'S THE MAKER WHO LAYS HIS HEAD DOWN AT NIGHT AND LOOKS AT HIM SELF IN THE MIRROR KNOWING HE SLIGHTED HIS WORK :barf:

just my opinion , if your putting all you have into your work, ideas, creativity,artistic ability, even a little bit of your blood and sweat into a knife, then who gives a $hit who cut it out, i mean really if Dave at great lakes cut it out or who ever, either way all you have when your done is a bar of steel , far from being a piece of art/cutlery thats ready to attempt to sell.

maybe having you steel cut out for you is the only method to get your ideas onto steel, due to location,$$, or tooling,etc...just my thoughts,

i know i sleep well at night,

andrew

 

[skilldust]

I agree with David Schott 100%
Every cut ,every grind, every scratch, by my own hand-then it's mine. Jerry

 

[atakach]

I agree with David Schott 100%
Every cut ,every grind, every scratch, by my own hand-then it's mine. Jerry

this is my method as well, i just don't feel that every one thats not in the position to do this should not be able to claim the creator of their knives.

when i need a guard blued, then i take it to the gun shop and get it done, i aint in the position to get all set up to hot blue, but still everything i make is mine 200%


im not arguing i agree with david schott 100% as well but i just would hate to see a first time maker read this thread and be discourgaed from making a blade, and feeling any thing but proud of what he has done with his hands, just cause he had to at some point send it out for a portion of the work, or start with a precut blade.

down the road when he becomes a more skilled craftsman and better equiped to do so, he'll probably devlope the same sole authorship in his work we do, and be in a better position to do the work on his own.

sorry ill shut up now and go back in my cave(the shop)
andrew

 

[greatlakeswaterjet]

So when i become a knifemaker and cut blanks on my waterjet instead of buying a bandsaw, does that mean I'm cheating? Just because I have the machine? So if a forger uses a power hammer instead of a regular hammer that is cheating too. If I send my blades out to get heat treated, am I cheating? Really guys, this could go on and on for now on. There will never be a 100% correct answer. It has to be a matter of personal preference and what the maker is capable of. As my skills improve, I would love to learn to heat treat, forge, make damascus and all of the stuff that all the cool kids do. One day I will be a KNIFEMAKER!

 

[hellgap]

Atakach thanks for the back up lol .I meant to say heat treat and blah blah all that stuff .I guess you do have a point about the knife i made it did take alot of thought and i free hand polished ther blade to 600 as well as the handle was sanded to 600 grit by hand but to be called myself a knife maker im not yet till i forge as far as im concerned.Maybee once i make 50 knives and if there crap ill get help to learn tricks.I am a fisherman and have alot of patience and will over come most hurdles by myself.I am not tryin to bust ball s just call um like i see um. Kellyw

 

[hellgap]

I forgot to say one important thing .Aperson should only take credit where credit is due.So if i dont pound out the blade to make the damascus is that more of a black smith to make the steel.This is a deep subject dont take it to serious.PS NO ONE TOLD ME I COULD CUT MYSELF ON A BELT SANDER third time was a real charm the other day . Kellyw

 

[rayban]

...then there's guys like me...I'll buy or trade for a blade that someone else made, slap some handles on it, make a sheath for it, show it to someone who thinks it's really cool, offers me $x for it, sold, they don't care where it's been....it's still called a knife.
I had fun doing it, and have some beer money in my pocket....and I don't really care what others have to say about it....