Needing all steps in order

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Kelven

Joined
Apr 14, 2022
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I am new to Knife making. I have a 48 inch sawmill blade with removable teeth and I believe it is 1080. I have cut the profile of the knife out and was wondering what the next steps would be. I have read a lot but not sure what all I need to do to proceed thank you
 
Go to the top of this subforum and read through all the stickies (those are the discussion threads permanently at the top of the list, in a different color). Everything you need to start is there. Good luck!
 
A friend and full time knife maker told me that making a knife is easy.

Step 1, get material
Step 2, remove everything that isn't a knife (by whatever means you have)
Step 3, make it hard and tempered (giggity...)
Step 4, put a handle on it.
Step 5, get it sharp.


The trick is doing it well and repeatable!
 
navman said:
A friend and full time knife maker told me that making a knife is easy.

Step 1, get material
Step 2, remove everything that isn't a knife (by whatever means you have)
Step 3, make it hard and tempered (giggity...)
Step 4, put a handle on it.
Step 5, get it sharp.


The trick is doing it well and repeatable!
Click to expand...
Thank you
 
the best parts of knife making are starting to make a knife, and then finish making it. All the stuff in between is just hard work. Not a big deal
 
Welcome Kelven,
The stickys have lots of information on knifemaking. Some of the older links seem dead, but if you use the Custom Search Engine (also in the stickys) you can pull the old posts up.
Here is a good thread with all the steps to make a knife:

How to instructions for making a knife

These are the instructions I use to get someone started with a profiled stainless steel knife blank. I thought there might be those who could use the tutorial and pointers. Some details are specific to a particular knife project, but the info is universal. You can start with a bar of any type of...
www.bladeforums.com www.bladeforums.com

I will caution you that the saw blade you have is very likely NOT good knife steel. It may not harden as much as you need for a knife. It is also probably far too thick.

Post a sketch of the knife you plan on making with dimensions. The folks here will help you make changes if needed.

Fill out your profile with your age, location, and a bit about you. That will help us help you better. It will also allow a nearby bladesmith to offer to help you directly with training, equipment, and materials. If you are in the USA, I will send you a bar of proper steel and some handle material I bet others here will offer to help you get started with offers of heat treatment, etc.
 
I have a saw mill blade like the one you do because it was a gift from a friend that worked at a sawmill in the area. It's just a solid blade 3/16" thick with no removable teeth so I thought I would give it a whirl and see what the results would be from making a knife from it and the resulting knife was below average obviously. I just treated it like 1084 and did my best with it. I also actually managed to contact the sawmill and from there they gave me the contact info for the saw blade company that produces them out of Georgia If I remember. But the reply I got was that the blades were made from SKS 51. Yours are probably similar.

I also did my own testing and made two 8" kitchen knives one forged from 1084 and the other from the saw blade and finished both just enough to where I could wrap some paracord on them for a quick handle and then proceeded to test them. I tried my best to test them both the same but since I'm no scientist I did what I could. After batoning them in a brass rod the saw mil blade showed some significant edge damage and rolling vs the 1084. I wish I still had the blades so I could show you a pic but you just have to take my word for it. After the brass rod I did some ferocious wood chopping with them, concrete tip drop testing, and other stuff. In the end the 1084 prevailed by a far cry.

I don't know much about SKS 51 but there is a certain way it has to be treated and I did not obviously treat it like such so yes it was not a neck and neck test, BUT I imagine you don't have the equipment to HT that alloy so backyard heat treating it will give you very poor results.

Long story short, just buy some known steel if you want to spend any worthwhile time on that knife. Very inexpensive for the better performance you'll get and DEFINATELY worth it! Do keep the saw blade, but use it for decoration :)
 
1. Cut out blade for 10" chopper
2. Start grinding
3. Fix mistakes
4. Harden steel
5. Fix warp by grinding
6. Do finish grinding
7. Fix mistakes
8. Put on handle material and shape
9. Fix mistakes
10. Use buffer, ricochet blade off concrete
11. Pry blade out of wall
12. Fix the tip
13. Show your wife her new 3" paring knife

(I'm not being a smart-ass, that's really the process to learn.)
 
Sando said:
1. Cut out blade for 10" chopper
2. Start grinding
3. Fix mistakes
4. Harden steel
5. Fix warp by grinding
6. Do finish grinding
7. Fix mistakes
8. Put on handle material and shape
9. Fix mistakes
10. Use buffer, ricochet blade off concrete
11. Pry blade out of wall
12. Fix the tip
13. Show your wife her new 3" paring knife

(I'm not being a smart-ass, that's really the process to learn.)
Click to expand...

😅 I have seen the horror stories about that on here and I had a scary moment today with that part of the process. The belt grabbed the blade somehow when I was lightly grasping it and it threw it on the floor. Luckily it flew away from me. 1st time its happened and I'll make sure its the last too!
 
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