I've now completed about half dozen knives from kits/blades and am ready to grind one soon from O-1. I started today with a new skinning blade of cs from Solingen Germany. Blade about .160 with a 10-24 tang thread. I ground and filed the tang to .156 or so to get a good fit with the guard. I noticed that the tang was softer than I anticipated but continued. I filed the guard's slot until I had a good push fit. I filed the guard area up on the blade to get a close even fit there also. Again, I thought the blade would be harder.
I've been coached a bit by a gunsmith buddy who turned me on to SWIF 95 solder, in a paste form. So, I stirred this stuff up good, smeared it on all the mating surfaces, cleaned up the overflow, and proceeded to heat it up with my propane torch. I had the blade up, and the flux ran and then the solder ran, just like the book says. I still wasn't happy. I wanted that perfect bead all along the joint so I added some solder (Sta-Brite). Then the guard slipped. I regrouped, repostioned the guard with some more heat and tapping with ? on the bench. I remember someone saying to center punch the guard to hold in place, and tried that. I did the whole process again but never got the right position and bead all at the same time. I tried using an acid brush and then a scribe to get the solder where it should be, but noooo, it wasn't happening.
In the end, I took it all apart. The blade had a blue area where I had been working, but it pretty well cleaned up with some simichrome.
What's next? Is this blade shot? I accept my failures, but really want to learn from them.
Any advise from you guys (gals) would be appreciated.
Thanks
Richard
I've been coached a bit by a gunsmith buddy who turned me on to SWIF 95 solder, in a paste form. So, I stirred this stuff up good, smeared it on all the mating surfaces, cleaned up the overflow, and proceeded to heat it up with my propane torch. I had the blade up, and the flux ran and then the solder ran, just like the book says. I still wasn't happy. I wanted that perfect bead all along the joint so I added some solder (Sta-Brite). Then the guard slipped. I regrouped, repostioned the guard with some more heat and tapping with ? on the bench. I remember someone saying to center punch the guard to hold in place, and tried that. I did the whole process again but never got the right position and bead all at the same time. I tried using an acid brush and then a scribe to get the solder where it should be, but noooo, it wasn't happening.
In the end, I took it all apart. The blade had a blue area where I had been working, but it pretty well cleaned up with some simichrome.
What's next? Is this blade shot? I accept my failures, but really want to learn from them.
Any advise from you guys (gals) would be appreciated.
Thanks
Richard