Making a knife on a surface grinder

That should get nice accurate flats, but what about the bevels? Sorry, noob here.
 
Another machinist here. I made an awesome kitchen knife from 154 cm on a surface grinder. I used a magnetic sine plate. I can't rememeber the exact angle but it works fine. I have also done tapered tangs with a similar set-up.Have fun!!
 
You could lock the table and set it up to use the in or out, lite cut and do
a hollow grind!
Ken.
 
There are some makers that use a surface grinder for all their blade grinding and a lot more. Frank
 
that sounds like somethigni would like to see
set up like 3 degree and do a dead on full flat grind


JBS TOOLMAKER said:
Another machinist here. I made an awesome kitchen knife from 154 cm on a surface grinder. I used a magnetic sine plate. I can't rememeber the exact angle but it works fine. I have also done tapered tangs with a similar set-up.Have fun!!
Click to expand...
 
butcher_block said:
that sounds like somethigni would like to see
set up like 3 degree and do a dead on full flat grind
Click to expand...

I made my first knife on a bridgeport mill my cocking the head and side milling the bevels, it was made from 3/8" A-2. At that time I had no idea that people made knives on belt sanders.Being a toolmaker it was logical to me to heat treat and then surface grind it on the sineplate.The tricky part is when you grind one side you have to change the angle when you do the other side.I think you double the first angle.Anyway it's a long process, but you are guaranteed perfect angles and symmetry.I still mill tapered tangs, It's way faster than grinding,and much less labor.
 
JBS TOOLMAKER said:
I made my first knife on a bridgeport mill my cocking the head and side milling the bevels, it was made from 3/8" A-2. At that time I had no idea that people made knives on belt sanders.Being a toolmaker it was logical to me to heat treat and then surface grind it on the sineplate.The tricky part is when you grind one side you have to change the angle when you do the other side.I think you double the first angle.Anyway it's a long process, but you are guaranteed perfect angles and symmetry.I still mill tapered tangs, It's way faster than grinding,and much less labor.
Click to expand...

I don't mean to sound like a smart-alec, but does milling them take longer than 4 minutes? Just curious, because thats how long it takes me to taper tangs.
Del
 
JBS,

Another machinist here also. I thought of ways to do this also but I like distal tapers and compound angles on my blades. They would be very difficult to obtain an organic look without extensive tooling. I have seen many who use CNC machines to cut their blades and do the bevels etc, these blades normally look futuristic. This is not what I am after. I like the forged blade personally. Yes I do finish grinding but I still like to have that distal taper. I do use the surface grinder to prep the ricasso and transition into the tang. When I do this fit ups are really easy and seamless.
 
delbert ealy said:
I don't mean to sound like a smart-alec, but does milling them take longer than 4 minutes? Just curious, because thats how long it takes me to taper tangs.
Del
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The reason I mill them is I don't have a platen on my grinder. I only have an
8" contact wheel. It's just faster and easier for me. I drill all my pin holes and then mill the tapered tang on bar stock before I profile the blade shape. As long as I know the length of the handle or where the guard will be. I use angle blocks in the vise and I take all the stock in one cut per side.I can do 10 or so in less than 30 min. It was 7 yrs ago when I made the knife on a bridgeport. About 6 yrs ago I bought a belt grinder and everything since then has been hollow ground.
 
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Another machinist here also, yes there is a lot of us here. I have friends at work that say "o well you could just mill or surface grind the edge bevels. And i tell them you know by the time i set up the mill or surface grinder to do a grind i could have the blade ground by hand. i was helping the bosses sun make his first knife last year and then his dad got a hold of it and said hay we could mill that. well 2 hrs later we still had to hand grind it to remove all the scallops left from the mill. we have a 2 wire EDMs here that could do a sweet edge bevels how ever i would want, but then the same problem comes up, Time. it would take 5-8 hrs to do it. o well each to there own, but i'm a hand grinder and love it.
 
delbert ealy said:
I don't mean to sound like a smart-alec, but does milling them take longer than 4 minutes? Just curious, because thats how long it takes me to taper tangs.
Del
Click to expand...

:D You really must be the fastest grinder alive, Del. One of these days I'm going to have to come over and have you train me. I work too hard! :D
 
I don't want to give the impression that I make my knives on a mill.I use every tool availible and through trial and error I have found the most practical and time efficiant way for me to make a high quality knife.I use a mill to slot guards,square handle blanks and do tapered tangs. JT I have used a wire EDM to cut a spade symbol in a customers blade.I have used the blanchard grinder to clean-up barstock.I try to look at every situation and find the fastest most efficiant way to do a job. Just like in the machine shop let's say you have a part that has 2 tapped holes, 2 dowel holes and a keyway. If you only have to make one then you should probably go to the manual mill. If you have to make 100 then you better be writing a program.
 
im about as far from a machinist as they come and my tools here know it too
but you will be hard to beat a mill when it comes to slotting a guard and with a carbide cutter square the sholder on a blade
i also use a fly cutter to square my handle blocks up

flat and square are to huge helps when it comes to fit and finish
oo and i use the mill with my folder work too
 
JTknives said:
Another machinist here also, yes there is a lot of us here. I have friends at work that say "o well you could just mill or surface grind the edge bevels. And i tell them you know by the time i set up the mill or surface grinder to do a grind i could have the blade ground by hand. i was helping the bosses sun make his first knife last year and then his dad got a hold of it and said hay we could mill that. well 2 hrs later we still had to hand grind it to remove all the scallops left from the mill. we have a 2 wire EDMs here that could do a sweet edge bevels how ever i would want, but then the same problem comes up, Time. it would take 5-8 hrs to do it. o well each to there own, but i'm a hand grinder and love it.
Click to expand...

but once you have it set up you could do 2... or 10 :)
 
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