Neva and Shadowynn: An Alaskan Tale of Two Tails

[Chris Montgomery]

Very nice Ben!

Chris

 

[Salem Straub]

Nice work, man!

 

[Ben Seward]

Here ya go...dad's gonna make a couple sheaths to carry 'em.
The big one is forged from 1075 and stamped JS

[/url]20161110_114820 by sewardknives, on Flickr[/IMG]

 

[Topcatpt]

those look great

 

[abbydaddy]

Those are stunning Ben

 

[Salem Straub]

Beautiful!

 

[Ben Seward]

Thanks, guys. Hopefully this will get a nice bit of $$ to the DesRosier's.

 

[BladeScout]

A beaut.

 

[P. McKinley]

I have finally finished this set.

A big, loud, shout out goes to Mark at Burl Source for providing a couple of stunning pieces of stabilized Royal Walnut for these two knives. I used them, but screwed up forward piece on the big knife which meant I could no longer use any of it because my replacement would look badly mismatched. So Mark's handle wood, now slotted and half sculpted, sits unused on my bench and this set now has air dried American Black Walnut harvested in Pennsylvania.

It was a honor and pleasure having the opportunity to build these in contribution to such a worthy cause. I am proud of this set. I hope they find a happy home.
I have a complete WIP set of photos that I will be editing and posting at some point in the near future.
I'll be making appropriate arrangements for this set shortly.

Please let me know what you think.

-Peter

Neva and Shadowynn, DesRosiers' Benefit Set

Blades: 1095 high carbon steel flat ground, 600 grit hand sanded finishes, then etched and polished to reveal prominent hamons.

Handles:
Large knife - Air dried Pennsylvania Walnut and Ebony with mortised tang, domed and polished stainless steel pin. The wood has a Tung oil and buffed paste wax finish. The wrought iron hilt and sub-hilt were forged from a large anchor chain link and etched to show texture and grain.
Small knife - Air dried Pennsylvania Walnut with Ebony bolsters and liners, carbon fiber pins, and a leather lanyard with a bead made from handle off-cut wood.

Sheaths:
Large - Open spine, lightly tooled, 6/7 oz veg tanned leather with walnut inlays and a turned ebony stud
Small - Cross-draw carry for a righty, lightly tooled, wet molded 6/7 oz veg tanned leather.

A few photos:

 

[abbydaddy]

Lovely work. The knives created for this project have been just spectacular.

 

[Lorien]

Peter...that is jaw dropping. I don't know what else to say. Your work here hit me right in the feels

 

[P. McKinley]

Thanks guys.
I should also add a nod of appreciation to Horsewright for providing design inspiration for the cross-draw sheath. The man does some VERY clean work and I love his style. Thank you sir.

-Peter

 

[P. McKinley]

Here's a bit of a WIP accounting of this project:

I've missed a few steps, but most of it is here.

Basic designs and materials:

Rough grinding the bevel:

120 grit finish

Second side. Almost there with the 36 grit belt:

The edge is taken right to the scribe lines:

Rough grinding the smaller blade:

both rough ground to 120 grit:

Hand sand to 180:

clay

Post heat treat

finish ground to 120

The large blade developed just a bit of sori when quenched:

I removed the full tang pieces

Clean up the shoulders with the file guide:

I forged out a piece of wrought for both hilt and sub-hilt:

Scale is removed with pH down:

Filing the tang slot:

Almost there:

Walnut slabs have been laminated with ebony and the tang traced onto both halves:

Dry fit looks fine. However, This is where I screwed up. I began shaping the handle piece between the hilts when I lost my grip and the grinder took a nice chunk out of one face. That made the handle material for both knives unusable if they were to match. So, I switched out the stabilized Royal Walnut supplied so generously by Mark at Burl Source, for some nicely figured natural American Black Walnut..... and built both handles again

Tobi just checking in:

I went down the road to the local garage and used their torch to bend the wrought pieces to shape. You'll notice I have now switched wood types:

Shaping the hardware:

Start shaping the handle:

Handle is rough shaped with a file finish:

Now the blade is hand sanded to 600 grit:

Ferric chloride etch

Final assembly. JB Weld for the hilt:

J-Flex epoxy for everything else

Precision tools at work.

The small knife receives the same basic treatment as the larger.

Sheath design. Not sure why, but I seem to draw sheaths backwards:

Leather has been cased, stamped and dyed:

The two walnut inlay pieces have been routed to shape and the edges cleaned up a bit:

The two pieces have been rough shaped and test fitted:

600 grit sanding with Tung oil. This will dry and be lightly sanded then three more thin coats of oil applied.

The ebony stud-to-be is cut from a small block, drilled and tapped, then rounded on the grinder:

Then chucked into my precision lathe for shaping.

Almost done:

I like it:

That's about all the good photos taken during this project.
Thank you for your interest.

-Peter

 

[Ben Seward]

Those look great, Peter. You put a lot of work into them!
The knives I made sold for a good price and Adam has received the funds. He said they're close to being finished but there are so many little things you need as you build.
Just want to encourage the rest of y'all evolved in this to give them a boost over the finish line so they can get back to work! Thanks to Lorien for getting this started!

 

[P. McKinley]

Thank you Ben. It is my honor to be part of this effort.
This set has been posted for sale here:http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/forumdisplay.php/754-For-Sale-Fixed-Blades

-Peter