Making My First Bush Knife (pictures)

S

SanitySource

Joined
Mar 20, 2008
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Hey guys hows it going?
I'm Miles and I'm 19 years old from Ontario Canada, i used to be really into knives and knifemaking and then i kind of lost interest for a little while. I had always wanted to make a knife and recently ive put pen to paper and started. Ive never worked with steel before and aside from a dremel, i only have hand tools.
This is my first knife ever made and it's a shiv compared to some of the knives that people make on this site but Im gunna post pictures as I go and hopefully get some feedback.

I started with this saw blade that i bought off a guy in toronto from kijiji for 5$
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Got rid of some of the rust
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Drew out my plans and tracers
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Started cutting with the dremel! (Safety first, definitely recommend having a plexiglass shield, it saved me from a huge potential injury)
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Started an arm workout with the hand files!
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It's still very far from being finished.
 
Awesome start, I wouldnt mind trying my hand at making a knife although Ive never done anything like that before.
 
HardTripper said:
Awesome start, I wouldnt mind trying my hand at making a knife although Ive never done anything like that before.
Click to expand...

Thanks, its coming along, sanded it today, pictures will be up soon.
Yeah this is the first time ive ever tried something like this too. Given ive read a lot about it though
 
I've heard that old saw blades are usually L6 steel and that this needs to be hardened / tempered (one of the two) similarly to 1095 steel?

I was also wondering about using vegetable oil for quenching the blade, im really afraid of it warping or twisting, i heard that water is the most likely to warp or snap the blade, how do i quench it without warping it? Is it a matter of the liquid i use, or are you supposed to hammer it out flat before quenching it?

Also, i guess i should make the handles after the blade is heat treated, when i buy brass rods should i buy them the same size as a drill bit and should i make the holes in the handle the exact same diameter as the rods and then just sand/hammer them if needed?

I'd appreciate it a lot if someone could help me out.
thanks
 
Couple of things.

Make sure you drill your handle holes before heat treating. It will be much, much, much harder after the fact!

For oil, probably the easiest thing to come by would be Canola oil. Heat it up to about 130? or so before doing your quench.


The edge. If you have filed it down to a edge, you have to knock some of it off. You want the thickness at the edge to be about the thicnkess of a dime (give or take). If the edge is "sharp" it will cause issues in heat treat.

When you quench, don't "swish" the metal back and forth. Vertical dip, with no side to side movement.

I have only done one knife, heat treat and temper. I did not have to fix any twist or warping issues.

What you have so far is looking great for a fist attempt, with very limited tools. (I did mine out of 5160, with hand files, and a hand crank drill!)
 
Bigfattyt said:
Couple of things.

Make sure you drill your handle holes before heat treating. It will be much, much, much harder after the fact!

For oil, probably the easiest thing to come by would be Canola oil. Heat it up to about 130? or so before doing your quench.


The edge. If you have filed it down to a edge, you have to knock some of it off. You want the thickness at the edge to be about the thicnkess of a dime (give or take). If the edge is "sharp" it will cause issues in heat treat.

When you quench, don't "swish" the metal back and forth. Vertical dip, with no side to side movement.

I have only done one knife, heat treat and temper. I did not have to fix any twist or warping issues.

What you have so far is looking great for a fist attempt, with very limited tools. (I did mine out of 5160, with hand files, and a hand crank drill!)
Click to expand...

Thanks, i had no clue that the oil had to be heated up, thats also a good point about now moving it side to side. It only makes sense now that i think about it.
in some parts the edge is a little sharp already, around the tip its about near a dime's thickness, i don't know what i'll do about that.

Next up is i have to make my first forge. :(
 
Wow. That's uncanny. I am jamie from Ontario Canada and am huge int knives and have always wanted to try making one. I also use primarily hand tools and my precious dremmell.

Weird.
 
Looking good so far! But if I were you I would take a scrap of that steel and test out the heat treat on it to make sure it will harden. Does that saw blade have carbide tipped teeth? If so, your knife will not be ble to hold an edge, because the steel isn't hardenable. Head over to shoptalk and post a link to this thread and ask your specific questions there.


-Xander
 
Nice work. This is a simple jig that i found helpful hand tooling a knife. A simile aluminum profile and I held the black part stationary and moved the handle in a semi-circle.

IMG_0151.jpg
 
Does anyone know of a simple plan for a forge? I think i've got to forge it vertically because i imagine that if it is on a diagonal it will just completely bend.
 
Regarding your forge question....One of the many rather simple forge build techniques is the Tai Goo inspired washtub charcoal forge. The forge body is a galvanized washtub, lined with nothing more than wood ashes, with a handcrank blower providing the heat. It burns pretty much any wood product for a heat source.
 
fast14riot said:
Looking good so far! But if I were you I would take a scrap of that steel and test out the heat treat on it to make sure it will harden. Does that saw blade have carbide tipped teeth? If so, your knife will not be ble to hold an edge, because the steel isn't hardenable. Head over to shoptalk and post a link to this thread and ask your specific questions there.


-Xander
Click to expand...
I agree with that, although carbide tipped teeth are usually obvious, and I don't see any there...
Back when I built knives completely from scratch, I always tempered just when I got the "blank" cut out, holes and notches cut, etc... But I never did any edge work. I think that makes for an uneven temper and may give the thinner part a brittle edge, if you harden the thickest part to what you want RC 59-61, but I'm not enough of a metal pro to state that as fact.
I also agree on the "no swishing", and dipping one direction, but I always did it with the blade lying horizontal. Again, no proof to my theory, but I figured that it took far less time to dip when you have an inch or two if holding horizontally, compared to 5-10" if you dip vertically... Again, just my opinion, far from proven fact.

Today, they have all these fancy new ways of tempering, "Cryo", "Progressive", etc., but to me, simple is, was, and always will be the best way... Canola oil huh? Never thought of using vegetable oil...I always used plain used motor oil...
Also, keep in mind that when talking about "Tempering", that is really the last part of the process.... The first part is actually "Hardening", and that is when the quenching is done. "Tempering", is the last step in the process, where you heat the "hardened" steel to a specific temperature (can be as low as 400 deg), and keep it at that temp for specific amount of time. This turns the very hard and brittle steel a little softer and less brittle... In other words, you wouldn't want your knife to be as hard as a file, they snap pretty easily, but are really hard which makes them good or what they do, cut softer steel...

Sorry for the long winded post, probably more info than what you wanted.

But be dang proud of that blade you have made, it is beautiful, and would be something to be proud of even if you made it in a full machine shop!

Bravo! Can't wait to see the finished results!
 
SanitySource said:
Does anyone know of a simple plan for a forge? I think i've got to forge it vertically because i imagine that if it is on a diagonal it will just completely bend.
Click to expand...
I shouldn't admit this, but I used an Oxy-acetylene torch.... Probably not as evenly heated as in a good forge, but where I lived the fire volunteers lived right behind me, and after spending days making a coal forge from brick, as soon as I got it going, they were right there with their truck, blasting it with water, destroyed the forge, and wrote me a ticket for "burning without a permit".... I nearly went postal on those idiots, You wouldn't believe the mess they made spraying burnt coal everywhere, but when I went to court the judge stated I could not have a forge in a residential area, even though he dropped the ticket and made them write me an apology letter for doing/acting the way they did....
Torch worked very well, and I tempered in a small "oven" I built using two elements from toaster ovens, and wired up to 220..... It would get to 900 degrees....
 
peppen108 said:
Nice work. This is a simple jig that i found helpful hand tooling a knife. A simile aluminum profile and I held the black part stationary and moved the handle in a semi-circle.

IMG_0151.jpg
Click to expand...
NICE Peppen! What degree angle does that give you? Scandi grind, yes?
I'm going to have to try that!!
I assume that the angle comes from not only the height of the aluminum, but also the distance from it to the edge being worked on? If so, would you mind giving me the measurement for a scandi grind?
Thaks!
 
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