Making Hunting/Skinning/Bushcraft knife. Need help finding Steel!

[akoudlai]

Hi, new to the forums here and joined for some advice.

I'm the kind of person that like to learn a craft and make my own things when I can. The time has come to make my first knife.

I am looking to make a hunting/skinning/bushcraft knife and having trouble finding steel stock for it.

I hear vg10 and CPM 154 are good choices. perhaps there are more/better choices as well (sorry I'm a noob)

Would anyone here be able to suggest a place I could buy some stock from? Ormaybe someone here even has their own?!

Thanks for having me, looking forward to learning from you all!

-Andrew

 

[akoudlai]

Here is a link to the design for anyone who might be curious!

 

[A C Richards]

Where are you located. We can make better suggestions if we know where you are.

NJ Steel baron is the primary go to guy. Alpha knife supply is another great suggestion esp for some of the more exotic steels.

Who are you going to have do your heat treat??

 

[akoudlai]

Where are you located. We can make better suggestions if we know where you are.

NJ Steel baron is the primary go to guy. Alpha knife supply is another great suggestion esp for some of the more exotic steels.

Who are you going to have do your heat treat??

Thanks for the quick response!


I am in buffalo NY. And I know some chemistry researchers who have high temp ovens I can have heat treat it.

I'll look into the guys you mentioned too

 

[JG Custom Metal Works]

http://newjerseysteelbaron.com/

 

[ERRN]

What methods do you have access to for working, hardening, and tempering your steel? The steels you mentioned are not beginner friendly steels. I'd go with Aldo's 1084 to start with. Very forgiving, and makes a great user.

 

[akoudlai]

What methods do you have access to for working, hardening, and tempering your steel? The steels you mentioned are not beginner friendly steels. I'd go with Aldo's 1084 to start with. Very forgiving, and makes a great user.

I was planning on following the same process this guy did minus heat treating it in a toaster/ makeshift kiln.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=R98cGkhN18o

I have a full service wood/metal shop available for my use and am very comfortable working with anything you would find in a typical shop.

One of my main concerns is grinding the blade down to the pattern in the drawing. There's a lot of material to be removed and I want to keep it clean looking just over the guard where I imagine will be the hardest shaping section of the knife.

And thanks everyone for the two references. I just wish nj baron had smaller pieces than36"...

When steel is that expensive, I really don't want to buy 4x what I need!

 

[timos-]

Check out the "Scotts Drops" section of SB specialty metals website too.

 

[akoudlai]

Check out the "Scotts Drops" section of SB specialty metals website too.

Thanks for the reference!

Does anyone have any steel recommendations? Al I know is that vg10 and cpm154 seem to be good choices. But there's so many alloys out there I really have no clue what's what and how it ends up performing under real world conditions

 

[Bermont River]

Thanks for the reference!

Does anyone have any steel recommendations? Al I know is that vg10 and cpm154 seem to be good choices. But there's so many alloys out there I really have no clue what's what and how it ends up performing under real world conditions

To me it depends on your desired end result.

My ultimate goal is wear resistance and edge retention in a high performance hunting knife. For this, stainless is a must in my mind. My first knife was S90V. There are 7-8 blanks laying on the bench that didn't meet my requirements and they got replaced by another through the learning process. That's just life. I had paralysis by analysis for months and just had to dive in and go for it. $200 worth of steel and now I have a better product.

In hind site S90V wasn't the best choice for a first knife, however it worked out well. On my first knife the first heat treat went well and yielded a 62RC. (I heat treated it myself with a brand new oven too) It is in the field being R&D'd now before we go forward with more designs.

I have done 3 filet knives in CPM154 and it is way easier to work with after struggling with S90V. I spent a full day trying to get a mirror finish on S90V with no luck. While I haven't tried it, if I were to do it over again I would go with a S30V or S35VN from my reading. I get mine from Niagara Specialty Metals.

Dive in...you'll make mistakes, learn, and go forward. Experience will be your best tool.

Good luck.

 

[akoudlai]

To me it depends on your desired end result.

My ultimate goal is wear resistance and edge retention in a high performance hunting knife. For this, stainless is a must in my mind. My first knife was S90V. There are 7-8 blanks laying on the bench that didn't meet my requirements and they got replaced by another through the learning process. That's just life. I had paralysis by analysis for months and just had to dive in and go for it. $200 worth of steel and now I have a better product.

In hind site S90V wasn't the best choice for a first knife, however it worked out well. On my first knife the first heat treat went well and yielded a 62RC. (I heat treated it myself with a brand new oven too) It is in the field being R&D'd now before we go forward with more designs.

I have done 3 filet knives in CPM154 and it is way easier to work with after struggling with S90V. I spent a full day trying to get a mirror finish on S90V with no luck. While I haven't tried it, if I were to do it over again I would go with a S30V or S35VN from my reading. I get mine from Niagara Specialty Metals.

Dive in...you'll make mistakes, learn, and go forward. Experience will be your best tool.

Good luck.

Awesome thanks. Good to know that there's someone local! Although their prices are nearly double of some of the other online merchants people mentioned. And again 3' lengths. Do you know if they sell drops?

 

[Willie71]

Re steel preferences: read here:

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/1441560-Favorite-steel

 

[Busto]

Pricing for high quality alloy steels will always be up there so its a trade off of quality over quantity. If you are only planning one blade bite the bullet get a long section 3' and make 3 blades the third one will probably be the best one and the first two will be loaded with mistakes. If you can salvage the first two give them away to whoever is allowing you use of their shop equipment.

I prefer the Carbon steels they are easier to work with and much easier to maintain an edge in the field. The suggestion of Aldo's 1084 is a great steel at a very reasonable price compared to the particle metal stainless you are looking at. I would rather discard a $4 piece of steel in lieu of a $20 piece of steel.

When you have mastered the carbon and feel confident about not wasting money/steel then jump into the high alloys. I make a lot of folders with CPM steel or the Bohler N690 great steel for folders but no where near as tuff or easy to maintain an edge as the 1084.

Many of my long term customers much prefer and request the carbon steels for their hunting/skinning knives cuz they know they will take a better edge! Check out the exchange for "Fixed Blade Knives" see how many are Carbon Steel.

 

[rustyrazor]

Here is a link to the design for anyone who might be curious!

Hey boss... just a suggestion before you start. there are a lot of great suggestions for knife steels and you really can't go wrong with any quality blade steel that will take a little abuse, but my suggestion falls more along the design of the knife. Love the shape of the knife by the way... looks very practical. That being the case, I would make that first hole closest to the blade smaller if it were me. if you look at the thickness you have remaining on the top and bottom it would appear to be about 3/16 per side remaining and if you are going to be using the knife for rougher tasks in bushcrafting, this may well be your weak point and a possible point of failure if the knife is to break.

 

[akoudlai]

Hey boss... just a suggestion before you start. there are a lot of great suggestions for knife steels and you really can't go wrong with any quality blade steel that will take a little abuse, but my suggestion falls more along the design of the knife. Love the shape of the knife by the way... looks very practical. That being the case, I would make that first hole closest to the blade smaller if it were me. if you look at the thickness you have remaining on the top and bottom it would appear to be about 3/16 per side remaining and if you are going to be using the knife for rougher tasks in bushcrafting, this may well be your weak point and a possible point of failure if the knife is to break.

Thanks for pointing that out! I'm actually pretty surprised I didn't catch that myself. Glad I posted it up.

I'm thinking I'll just reduce that to a 1/2" dis and get an extra 1/8th on each side . Maybe even shift it right an 1/8" too.

Thanks!!

 

[rustyrazor]

there's a really good thread about a broken knife on another forum that you can Google search under "G.E. Chen Duty failure/ handle break" that he had made with a similar sized cutout toward the front that showed how he had broken the knife throwing it... really loved how he showed what he had done and what he decided to do to make that area more solid for his next generation of duty models. I actually appreciated the honesty and the candid way he talked about the knife's shortcoming and how he would work to improve it, so much that when one came up here for sale (with the modifications made) on the forums I bought it immediately and it's one of my new favorite EDC models in rotation at work. other than that, I think the knife is an awesome design and well thought out.

good luck

Royce

 

[akoudlai]

So I adjusted the design by reducing the size of the uppermost hole and making the blade a bit less bulky.

I also got my O1 steel and double dyed redwood burl scales pic below:

Looking forward to making this thing come together! Will post some pics for everyone that helped me out with bits of valuable info along the way!