More images of the S30V Loveless style chute knife

Keith Montgomery

Keith Montgomery

Joined
May 9, 2000
Messages
29,205
Here are a couple of more photos of the knife Bruce Bump is making for me. The forged S30V blade is 4 1/2" and 3/16" thick. The scales are mammoth tooth and as you can see there will be red liners.
 
I'm not sure, but it should be ready very soon. I'm thinking two or three weeks. There is no rush as far as I am concerned.
 
Cool! I have to say I'm not a fan of the mammoth tooth as a handle material, but it's your knife, and with Bruce in commands, I'm sure it's going to be stunning.
 
I can certainly understand someone not caring for mammoth tooth. I never used to like it either, but the more I have seen knives with this material used for the handles, the more it has grown on me.
 
It's going to be SHWEEET! Those scales are going to look fantastic.

Perfect lines. Great rendition.

Nice going by all!

Cop
 
Wow Mr. Montgomery, THAT looks awesome. I could look at pictures of chute knives all day long!
 
Coop took the words out of my mouth... those scales look great, almost too good to the truth! It´s going to be a nice knife.
 
Mammoth tooth is something I want on a knife.:thumbup:

Great looking knife, Mr. Montgomery and Mr. Bump.:D
 
This has been a first for me. Ive done Loveless styles before but this is the first stainless knife I have forged. The S30V plate steel I have is only .160" thick and needed to be forged from the edges to thicken it to over .220" so I could surface it and arrive at .187" thick or more. I knew from Ed Caffreys experiences that S30V will develop holes big enough to see through if forged at the heats we are used to on simple carbon steels. So I decided to try it cold at first and found that S30V "work hardens" and will crack immediately. The next try was to heat it to 1500f. I had to use my Even Heat oven for this for more control. I found that there were still some cracks but very very small and only on the surface. At least Im on the right track. I was finally successful at 1600f and for just a short time under the press dies or hammer and anvil. I also heated the dies while the blade was in the oven each time. It worked pretty good but very slow going because of the many reheating cycles. The "working time" window is very small. I have 2 hours of forging time and was still not able to forge the tip to shape as well as carbon steels because the tip cools so rapidly but all could be finshed with the band saw and grinder.
 
It sounds like a pain in the butt. I hope you'll charge Keith extra for that!

:)
 
This knife is gonna be cool.

The first time I ever saw mammoth tooth on a knife it was a Buster Warenski skinner. The material can be pretty intense, but if done right it's absolutely beautiful.
 
I happen to LOVE Chute knives!! That is gonna be a really sweet, sweet knife!
 
Actually, in another thread there has been a discussion on value in custom knives. I can tell everyone that Bruce's knives offer excellent value. The cost of this knife was well within what I would consider the reasonable range. Especially when you consider that he forged S30V to make it.

What this did though was to also offer Bruce the opportunity to learn what goes into forging S30V. He now knows if it is something he is going to want to do again in the future. From the sounds of it he was very successful in this endeavour, thus opening doors for more projects in the future.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top