Making knives on a bugdet part 2!!!!

A

armlessbandit

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ok guys, if i cant make my own tools, can you please recommend some tools that are not bought on the internet, in canada in stores , im looking for some tools to profile ,my blades, ie a beltsander or a disc sander.
 
I do profiling on a Craftsman 6" bench grinder. Takes care of everything except tight angles and finger notches. You can get these sorts of grinders for well under $50 U.S. anywhere. I then use a 12" long bastard file to do everything else. Can't get much cheaper than that!
 
Armless,
I can relate I was in you shoes once and in some ways still are...
I recommend getting Wayne Goddards book"$50 dollar knife shop" And get all the books from Gene Chapman(Oakandiron.com). His books are pamphlet style and run 6-12 dollars there are 6 books in total. He is what I would call neo-tribalist(thats a compliment). With these books youll "learn" alot about the basic of knifmaking and the simplicity in making them on without a great deal of expence. Hope this helps:D
 
frontier, that helped a lot, but it kinda got off topic, i should have included when i started this thread that i have wayne goddards book, and found it allright, but it could go for some more extensive areas as far as making the big red grinder. I am currently working on a knife at a knifemakers shop because he offered to teach me, and i am going to ask him, but i stil;l cannot go back untill after the holidays because he had to do a lot of knives for a show, so i figured before asking him, to ask you people on the forums.
 
oh yeah tools.. Unfortunatley besides files and hammers and general metal shoptype tools. Ive found that hardware store tools to be a waste of "my" money. My first grinder was a 2x 72 grinder from Grizzly about 200 US works great and all kinds off buffs and other accesories can go on the auxilliry shaft. Its the knife maker model,there in Bellingham WA. USA. Now I have the KMG-1 with a bunch of extras. It seems to me other than the net,and mail order companys like: Koval or Jantz or K&G and sheffeilds. You probably arnt going to find tools that are real usfull in knife making. Just an opinion. Dont get trapped by thing you "have to have" A bunch of spendy tools to make some pretty blades. So far I estimate Ive got 10k tied up in tools some of which can be used for other things. And I find my self still wanting a rolling mill for damascus billet drawing, a hydraulic press for die operations, a surface grinder, a mini mill. So theres another 5k or so. Oh yeah so far all of my blades have been gifts..so no profit has came into my shop....Ask me any thing specific Ill try to help... Im new to this myself
 
oh ok, i see were playin tag today, so YOURE IT
hows the grizzly grinder? can you show me a picture of the first one that you had? 200 us is ok for me, im from canada so i would wait till the exchange rate is a little better. Im trying to keep a cap on space too, so im not going to heat treat blades either, ill send them away, its cheaper here, its like 7 dollars a blade, and tyhe more you send, the cheaper it gets. FOr example, the guy im with, he made 40 blades and he sent them all to get heated and the final price was150 dollars canadian, so its pretty cheap.
 
I would go for a coote before a griz,You can put stetp pulleys
on it to change speeds on it, the griz is a fixed speed.
 
Originally posted by Nathan House
I would go for a coote before a griz,You can put stetp pulleys
on it to change speeds on it, the griz is a fixed speed.
Click to expand...

I bought Coote grinder 6 months ago and I of it am very satisfied... I added an variable speed motor and that gives me a machine not too expensive and perfect for my needs

I also bought a 10"and 8" contact wheel and 9" sanding disc and a small roller attachement) Mr Coote adjusted the grinder to accept the two sizes of wheel and the transaction it passed very well. I did not have any problem of shipping or customs...(I am in Canada)

In short, I recommende this grinder

Alain Miville-Deschênes
 
Hi this is DaQo'tah

okay, I know many people hate the grizzly,,,and true enough there are some bad things about its design,,,but,,,it does give the new bladesmith a very big Bang for the buck.
am I happy with mine?..well, yes, from time to time,,,it really deppends on what you had before, and where you think you are headed. I was useing hand tools and cheap one inch belt sanders, so the grizzly took me out of the stone age.

she was a bit of trouble to set up (see my webpage on the grizzly)

.http://eastof29.tripod.com/daqotahforge2/id7.html


I dont think I will ever need a different belt grinder ,,,if I do, i will look around at the best,,,but for now, and for me, the grizzly works well enough for most things,,,and its cheap enough to allow me to learn how to make a knife, without haveing to start making them by the ton to pay for the grinder.
 
Alain, Nathan, Etp, and Daqotah, thank you VERY muchm that was super informative except for the part when etp siad sometrhing about rob, and i was like, wtf, but thas cool, now momre questions.


daqotah: how much was your grizzly? was it that hard to put together, did you have to cut, or adjust any parts?

Alain: do you have a picture of the coote?? how much was it in canadian $$

and i was looking for something that could help me profile the blades, and do the filework on some simple blades.

edit: when i say filework, i mean doing the edges, like flat, hollow, convex, concave grinds.
 
Hi this is the DaQo'tah

I have been asked the question - "daqotah: how much was your grizzly? was it that hard to put together, did you have to cut, or adjust any parts? "

and my answer is - the Grizzly was, and is as far as I know, $ 295.95 (American)

The Grizzly was very easy to build, but there were a few problems , if You do decide to get the grizzly, do not build it before you go over each on my photos and text on my webPage where I talk about some things I ran into that you will too.


the moment I finished building my Grizzly and put on the belt that comes with it, I noticed that the "Platten?" was not in the right spot at all.

(the belt was over-hanging 1/2 inch, to a side, and there was no way to line things up more) But this is a little problem to fix.

I drilled a few new holes in the mounting area, and it was all set to go.

The tracking was hard to get all lined up, the reason for this is that the Grizzly has many ways to work, and each has a bolt to turn, so, getting it set-up in each position takes a bit of "turn this bolt this way, that means I turn the other bolt the other way..."


the real great part of the grizzly is that it has a darn good buffer built in!...this means that I dont have buy a buffer down the line . I had a bench grinder that I thought I was going to turn into a buffer, but the grizzly is way more powerfull.

Im very new to knife making, infact Im on my 3rd and 4th blade, so perhaps over time I will also go looking for a different belt grinder, but I have to say that for the few knives I have made so for, the Grizzly has been just what I was looking for to learn this craft on.

The Grizzly has Lots of power, was not much money, and has a buffer to do the finish work too!
 
Armless,

I recently went through the Coote vs Grizzly debate. What I decided on was the Coote (10" contact wheel) with step pulleys and a 1 HP TEFC electric motor. The total setup cost me about $1000 cdn. (Coote grinder + shipping+taxes =(410+50)x1.5x1.15=$793.50 cdn then add another couple hundred for motor and pulleys).

When I was looking for a grinder I did a search on all the popular knifemaking forums for both grinders. Based on that feedback the Coote seemed to be the right choice for me. You may find the grizzly will suit your needs perfectly. One thing to remember when you look at the Grizzly, they do not ship to Canada. This was not a concern for me since I live 30 minutes from the border but may pose a limitation when you look at the cost of having a freight forwarder deliver it to you.

I found the Coote to be very rugged and it tracks very well. As well Norman Coote was excellent to deal with.

Best Regards
Dean
 
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