My First Knife(s)

I've been thinking about it, and this is what I've decided.

The knife with the wharncliffe-style blade is closer to being ready for heat treating than the fat other one. I'm going to concentrate on this one. I need to fix the taper where the blade spine joins the tang.
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Question: What grit should I take the finish to before heat treating?
 
Depends on what you want your final finish to be. Remember, any scratch left behind is going to be three times as hard to sand out after HT. And the deeper ones are the hardest. 300 grit is what I like going to before HT.
 
Thanks for the info. Well, I'm still playing around with patinas. I want it to look finished, whatever that means. I'm open to suggestions because I'm not exactly sure what grits will produce what results.
 
Thanks. I like it also. I really hope it turns out good. If not, I'll be making it again and again until it is.
 
My fingers hurt like hell, so I guess that means progress, right?:)

2.5 hours of hand sanding, and I am almost done with getting one side of the flats, well flat. It's looking much better.

I'm not posting any more pics until the one side I'm working on is done, the flat and the high flat grind.

PS: I fixed the plunge on both sides and it looks real good.:)
 
Update: I'm still working on the same side. This is seriously taking forever. In order to get the the flat perfectly flat, I need to remove about 1/16" of material. That's a lot of D2 to hand sand. The other side needs about 1/16" also.

I'm considering just blending it in so I can get it mailed out for heat treating. I really want to be finished with this knife. It's been a whole lot of work trying to fix where if broke into the spine with the blade grind.

My 1095 came yesterday; enough to make quite a few knives.:)
 
Here's some crappy progress pics. Ignore the flats and the tang. I blended the transition from the flats to the spine. It's not perfect; in fact, I would call it mediocre. I'm trying not to let it bother me too much; after all, I'm correcting mistakes on my first knife.

Anyway, I chased my plunge cuts with a chainsaw file, and am almost finished making the plunge cut and the blade grind even. Once that's done, it's time to work on getting the deeper scratches out, and getting the knife to the finish I want before sending it off for heat treating. Oh, I'll also be reducing some weight from the tang.

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I'm also working on making a light box. I bought the fabric, and got a box; I just need to buy clamp shop lamps and bulbs.
 
I use a block of plastic with leather glued on the bottom and then sandpaper wrapped over that to handsand. You don't want to skip grits and changing direction between each grit helps a lot to see the previous deeper scratches so you can be sure they're all out. For the final finish try to get all the scratches going in one straight direction. Never worked with D2 but, yes, hand sanding sucks. Keep at it, man!
 
Thanks for the info on hand sanding. I made a little aluminum sanding "stick", shaped like this:
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to get into the plunge. It works OK, but my finger cramps up after a while. Hand sanding sucks; but, I'm glad I'm doing it. I have a better appreciation for the results...when the finally come.:)
 
I've had "cramped" finger tips for a good week after a day of hand sanding. I'm sure I'm not the only one. You'll definately be glad you did it when it's done though. Try the leather on the bottom of your sanding stick... I think it makes a difference. Also if you have any cutting fluid laying around like Tap Magic, try that out while sanding.
 
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