Made a Throwing knife

[44-henry]

I don't know how important size is where throwing knives are concerned, but this is the second one that I built and I made it a bit heavier than the first. The blade measures about 14 inches long and is a full 3/8 inch thick with a convex grind, with an edge duller than a stump. I made some leather handles for it, but liked the case colors enough that I decided to make a set of curly maple scales to go along with it which will probably be removed before throwing.

I have used the bone and charcoal color case hardening process for several years, but these are the first knives that I have done this with. I think the heat treatment is actually a pretty fair choice for a knife like this leaving approximately a .032" thick case that can be left glass hard because of the softer inner core for support. About the only area that I purposely temper back is the tip where the carbon likely penetrates all the way through. A knife this heavy will resist bending to a large degree, but can bend if necessary without breaking and can be easily straightened afterwards.

Thanks for looking.

 

[sloth357]

I like that a lot. I'd be interested in one some day if you were to ever sell them

 

[bchboy1206]

Beautifully done!!!

 

[Rat Finkenstein]

what steel is it? A throwing knife should never take a set, it should be spring tempered.

 

[44-henry]

It is 1018 mild steel with around a .032" thick case. Time will tell, but it should be pretty resistant to bending. I might try making some out of 8620 or 4140 which would provide a very hard skin and a core which will be appreciably harder than the mild steel one. I could easily make the same knife out of 5160 or other mid-high carbon steel with a spring temper, but I thought this might be kind of fun to try out. I probably had crappy throwing knives growing up, but they all seemed to bend in time and I just straightened them out as needed, never had one break on me though.