Made another file knife

GWashington1732

GWashington1732

Joined
Jun 20, 2009
Messages
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Unfortunately, I ended up with something resembling a wharncliff blade, I wanted a bowie. :p I still needs a few finishing touches, I'm not sure I'm happy with the way the stain worked out on the handle, and it needs to but sharpened up a bit. This thing is heavy though, I ground it out of a 12 inch mill file and it took hours. But it looks a lot more like a knife and a lot less like a prison shank than my last two so, I think I'm getting somewhere. :D
 
Looks good. How long did it take you to get from the standard file to what you have now in the picture?
 
Reminds me of a seax/scramasax. If anyone asks, that's what you can call it... they don't need to know you wanted it to be a bowie. :D
 
Looks good! :thumbup:

I've made a couple of file knives too, fun and a great learning experience! Unfortunately I knew nothing about annealing or heat treating at the time, so I'm not sure well they would hold up under heavy use, but they look cool. :)
 
GWashington1732 said:
I started at around one and finished grinding at around one. I doubt the neighbors were very happy with me. :p



I just ground it out.
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You need to soften it first. I would stick my files in a camp fire (when I was first starting out) get it yellow hot and then allow the fire to die out. This would soften the file up so I could grind on it. After you have it at the shape you want you need to do a heat treat. Files are really easy and I used old motor oil. After that you should temper it. Make sure you drill the holes for pins Before you do the HT, sounds reasonably simple but my first knife was cord wrapped because I neglected that part:o.

Here is a good link to making a file knife using pretty much the same setup I used. http://www.woodsmonkey.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=171:so-you-want-to-make-a-knife&catid=41:how-to-articles&Itemid=63I built a forge out of an old grill and my air source was a blow dryer (mom hated me for that as I put it back and it shot black dust over her hair:D) Another good source of Info is the $50 dollar forge. you can get the book pretty readily from amazon, helped me alot starting out.
 
barrabas74 said:
reasonably simple but my first knife was cord wrapped because I neglected that part:o.
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I've just been sticking mine on with Gorilla glue because I blew up a drill bit trying to put holes in them. They hold an edge pretty well, it just takes forever to grind them.

Here is a good link to making a file knife using pretty much the same setup I used. http://www.woodsmonkey.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=171:so-you-want-to-make-a-knife&catid=41:how-to-articles&Itemid=63.
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This looks pretty easy, I'm going to have to try it, my camp fires get ridiculously hot, and building the rest should be pretty easy. Now for something much harder for me, how do you mark a web page so that you can go back to it later?
 
Right click on the webpage and go to book mark page or add to favorites depending on which broswer you use. Pretty simple. :)
 
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