Mike Walton Model 14 Attack inspired fighter

Matthew Gregory

Matthew Gregory

Chief Executive in charge of Entertainment
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I've had the privilege of getting to be friends with Mike Walton, aka Mike157 Mike157 , and over the last few years we've become Blade Show pals, traveling to the show and keeping one another in line (well, sort of ;)). In our many conversations, he mentioned a particular project he had started many years ago, and that's where this knife comes in.

Our normal Blade Show routine involves Mike flying out from the left coast to stay in my Northeast Tropical Rainforest treehouse, so we can work in the shop a bit and hike the pup in the forestry. After a couple days of fun here, we fly down together and experience Blade Show. For the last couple of visits, we've been secretly working on that old project.

I'll let him provide the details, but here's the finished knife.


41660256285_347c62f64f_b.jpg



Mike didn't require too much assistance, really, and once a technique or a task had been discussed, I let him run and tried to stay out of it until he needed help. I did, however, insist that he hand sand the blade to a pristine 800 grit satin finish. :D

He's a blast to have at the house, and in the shop, and his passion for all things knives is inspiring and contagious. Perhaps dangerously so!


My dog already misses him.


Hopefully he'll chime in here and explain the details.
 
Hey Mike (and Matt, of course!), very cool project. To both, a very good looking blade! My only question, how does one get an engineer to tediously hand-sand ANY blade??:D
 
betzner said:
Hey Mike (and Matt, of course!), very cool project. To both, a very good looking blade! My only question, how does one get an engineer to tediously hand-sand ANY blade??:D
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Ha! We thank you, Bob.

The truth of the matter is, I’ve always been more comfortable with a tool in my hand than doing calculations, so I find that, for me, focusing on the physical details is just plain more fun and satisfying. Couple that with the fact that Matt bolts, chains, barricades, blocks, and bricks over any exits to his dungeon, errrr, I mean shop, until any errant scratch or hidden “previous” grit lines are eliminated. So I really didn’t have any choice. That, and those whips of his are kind of scary.:eek: Mike
 
So, as many have also related about themselves, I’ve had a life long interest/very, very, very, very strong attraction to sharp, pointy, steel. It’s pretty darn magical stuff, to me.

About twenty or so years ago, I built up enough steam and courage to try to make a knife. I had a Randall Model 14 Attack at the time and figured I’d try to copy it.

My Randal had a half through tang and a double brass guard. I wanted a full tang and single stainless guard. I bought a bar of 1/4” 440C, some black micarta scale material, stainless stock for the guard and a guard pin, and stainless Corby bolts - and some fresh hacksaw blades and new files.

Using the hacksaw, files, machinist dye, and scribe lines based on a template I had made, I managed to create a somewhat reasonable profile and bevels. I’m slow, and if I remember correctly, it took me close to twenty hours to get to that point. When it came time to make and attach the u-shaped single guard, all with hand tools only, the thought of the highly possible occurance of screwing the whole thing up, had me put things on hold for a “bit”. Turns out that that ended up being slightly over twenty years.

After Matt and I met and became friends some years ago, we decided that this might be a good project to finish. So, with Matt’s generous help, guidance, shop, and coming to the rescue when I managed to grind in “features” that weren’t supposed to be there, we finished the knife, over the period of a couple of visits.

The blade was heat treated in Matt’s shop. The guard sits in a notch at the bottom of the tang and is pinned near the top. It is sealed with JB Weld. The micarta scales are fastened with two part epoxy and stainless Corby bolts. The blade was finished to the point of using the raw exposed bone of my fingertips:p.

We incorporated a hidden lanyard hole, replacing the through hole originally planned. Matt’s wife, Jill, was kind enough to install and tie the dual cord, dual knot lanyard- something that probably would have taken me another twenty years to learn and do.

So a very big heartfelt thank you to Matt, and Jill, for their friendship and putting up with my presence and to Matt for the great fun and opportunity to experience and learn. Mike

And my apologies for taking way too many words to say what probably could have been said in quite a few less.
 
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Mike157 said:
So, as many have also related about themselves, I’ve had a life long interest/very, very, very, very strong attraction to sharp, pointy, steel. It’s pretty darn magical stuff, to me.

About twenty or so years ago, I built up enough steam and courage to try to make a knife. I had a Randall Model 14 Attack at the time and figured I’d try to pretty much copy it.

My Randal had a half through tang and a double brass guard. I wanted a full tang and single stainless guard. I bought a bar of 1/4” 440C, some black micarta scale material, stainless stock for the guard and a guard pin, and stainless Corby bolts - and some fresh hacksaw blades and new files.

Using the hacksaw, files, machinist dye, and scribe lines based on a template I had made, I managed to create a somewhat reasonable profile and bevels. I’m slow, and if I remember correctly, it took me close to twenty hours to get to that point. When of came time to make and attach the u-shaped single guard, all with hand tools only, the thought of the highly possible occurance of screwing the whole thing up, had me put things on hold for a “bit”. Turns out that that ended up being slightly over twenty years.
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Great project with an excellent result.:)
 
The knife is okay..................... but what was REALLY great was getting to see the two of you and spend little time together at Blade.
Two of my favorite People.

Paul
 
So very kind of you, Paul.
It was a pleasure for the both of us also (think I can speak for Matt in this instance). Always fun to be able to spend some time with you.

Mike
 
Rick Marchand said:
That turned out great! Although, I still think Matt was just kidding when he told you to hand sand it to 10,000,000 grit.
Click to expand...

Thank you, Rick.
Well, maybe it had something to do with leaving me in the shop to work, while went and ate all of the goodies in the house.:rolleyes:
 
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