New to knife making: WIP thread (first 2 complete)

[wolffbite]

Hi there guys,

I've been lurking these knifemaking forums for quite some time... tried to absorb as much info as I can from the stickies and what you guys all post up.

I decided to give making my own knife making a shot, and it was great to know I could do it with the most basic of tools.

I'm an avid woodworker, so using these tools is nothing new to me, but using it on steel has been a very fun adventure.

To start I decided to make 2 knives. One medium sized fixed blade for myself, and a smaller necker for my sister's birthday in May.

I started with these two designs.

I settled on 1/8th O1 for my steel, and Tiger and Black/Blue G-10 for handles.

My tools are as follows:

Various files
Buttload of Sandpaper
4x36 Belt sander with 6inch disc sander

Chewed up a few belts the first day I worked on them, only had enough belts to do the first and larger knife. Wasn't prepared with the correct grits, and it was VERY slow so as to not heat up the steel with all the grinding. I also had a bucket up water to dunk the blade every so often.

Next hurdle... how the hell to do my bevels. I don't have a 2x72 grinder, so I had to employ a bastard file. On another forum I frequent I saw how someone set up a jig to get perfectly even bevels. I rigged up my own very crude but, quite effective jig.

Here is the first ~45 degree bevel that I cut on each side. I did one side at a time, but alternating sides so at the ensure I could keep everything even.

One more notch down on the jig, and again nice and even on both sides. This jig also helped get a nice even plunge.

 

[wolffbite]

All the stuff in my first post is from a few days ago. I'm in the midst of finals at school so I didn't get to this until today. About 6 hours was spent in my garage today... not a lot to show for it but it's finally starting to look like a knife.

First 1.5 hours was spent grinding out the smaller knife. Have a whole stack of belts ready to go, so it was nice and fast to grind it all down. One thing I did learn though.... order steel that is a closer size to the knife I'm making. Probably could have saved an entire belts worth of grinding and save money on buying less steel.

Fully bevelled on both sides and draw filed to even it all out. Used a chalked file, worked beautifully. And the draw filing really got everything even and true.

Started on 180 grit sanding here... found a series of low spots along the top.. near the spine. Refiled and resanded, got rid of them in no time.

A few in hand shots. 180 is almost complete, just a few touchups here and there. Not too many low spots found, but I refiled and ground out the ones that I did. Very happy with it thus far, and it is a great feel in my hand.

Here are my sanding tools. One flat, which is sized to get me 16 pieces from one sheet of sand paper. And just a length of dowel for getting those pesky handle curves.

Having a blast so far. It's quite satisfying to see it come together with relatively few mistakes so far. There were a couple close calls on the grinder today... couldn't be happier I wore gloves. There is no thumb left on my right glove, glad it wasn't my flesh

No more exams until the 27th so I should have plenty of time to work on this, looking forward to how the small one works out.

Tomorrow will be grinding at least 75% of the small knife bevels and doing the other knife to 400 grit.

 

[Mitchell Knives]

Nice work so far!

It looks like your jig is working quite well.

 

[machinistbutler]

They are coming along very nicely! Looks like a very useable profile as well.

 

[ERIK KNIVES]

Wolffbite,

Great work. Two thoughts for now. I hope you don't mind because I'm not sure if you are asking for advice. I ask for advice all of the time so I guess I'm assuming here. Be careful not to grind past the spine and create a ridge between the bevel and the flats - I've done it. Also, I would leave out the tear drop on the front of your handle and do something like this

One of my first knives looks like yours and I love it.

Keep at it and stick around here, these guys know what they are talking about.

Erik

 

[wolffbite]

No worries! I appreciate any feedback and criticism at this point. I'm eager to learn and if I don't catch my mistakes I'm very appreciative if I get guidance. That definitely looks like a better option for that scale, I think I will go with your mod on that one, thanks

Huh... Funny. What they say is true, no knife design is really unique, yours looks awesome! I'll be glad if mine looks anywhere near that nice when I'm through.

 

[tobinsmith]

You're off to a fantastic start! It looks like you're putting a lot of thought into what you're working on as well.

Keep it up, and please show us more of your work on these as they progress.

 

[james terrio]

Looks like you've done your homework and planned this out very well. Keep up the good work!

...it was VERY slow so as to not heat up the steel with all the grinding. I also had a bucket up water to dunk the blade every so often.

I'm assuming the steel isn't heat-treated yet, in which case the only major concern about heating it up while grinding is that you don't burn your fingers. I'm not saying you should get it screaming white hot, but you're not likely to do any serious damage to O1 that a basic stress-relief cycle shouldn't take care of once it's all ground, drilled and ready for HT. At least that's been my experience, and what my HT guy tells me.

 

[Will Leavitt]

You can get steel pretty dang hot filing it.

Welcome to the madness, if you get this finished and make another you're probably addicted for life.

 

[wolffbite]

Thanks for the comments guys =)

Yes the water was more so that I didn't burn my hands. I could even feel the steel get quite hot through my gloves and watched the water droplets sizzle on the blade.

So I spent a bit of time in the garage today...

First knife is done to 400 grit and holes drilled in tang. This is almost ready to be sent off for heat-treat!

The tip came out nice and even using this filing jig =)

Before starting to bevel #2 I roughed out the G-10 for #1's handles. I used my scroll saw... but it ate through 3 blades just doing this much. Can anyone recommend what I might use next time? I do have a 10' band saw... maybe I'll have to try that.

Number #2 getting its first set of bevels...

Further bevelling...

This is my workstation... 1 side of a 2 car garage. It gets cleaned up and put away every evening for our vehicles to go in. Would be nice to keep it out, but not really up to me since I still live with my parents

Shaped the scales some more on the belt sander. Left about 1/16th-1/8th of an inch around the whole knife. Won't finish this until its back from heat treat. This will look pretty cool I hope, already has a good feel in the hand.

 

[james terrio]

Take a moment to lightly counter-sink those holes before HT.
Your scroll saw is likely running way too fast, with a too-coarse blade to cut G10 effectively. A typical wood-working bandsaw will have the same problems. A high-tension hacksaw with good bi-metal blades and a bit of elbow-grease will work fine.
Be sure to finish the fronts of your scales before mounting them.
I recommend Corby bolts or peened pins rather than screws and washers in the final assembly on your next knife. That's fugly and cheap-looking; the other work you've done deserves better.

 

[wolffbite]

Hmm... well it grinds down really easily. So I'll see what I do next time...

And you are totally right on the handle hardware... it seemed like a great idea to have removable handles when I was planning out the project but it does look kind of cheap now that I keep looking at it. No harm done, this G-10 can be used for a set of firesteels instead (it's already countersunk so I don't think I can salvage it for use with corby bolts or pins). I'll end up using epoxy I think, and if I clamp it tightly I shouldn't have to worry about rust under the tang.

Yep.. as I'm typing this I think I'll do some mosaic pins. My knife steel supplier has some very nice 1/4" brass mosiac ones that I will get with another chunk of G-10.

If you don't mind my asking, why countersink the tang holes? Just curious...
Will it also help with handle epoxy adhesion?

 

[james terrio]

I know, it's weird; G10 is a pain to cut but grinds easily. Just don't grind it too fast, it can scorch badly in a really unpleasant way if you get it hot. Take a piece of scrap G10, really lay into it on the grinder, and watch it turn black and shred apart. Open a window first. You're wearing a respirator, right?

Countersinking the tang holes gives peace of mind re: stress risers and burrs that will irritate the HT guy. It also gives a little more surface area for the epoxy.

Roughing the tang up again will also help give the epoxy more surface to grab onto. In general, the slower-curing epoxies are stronger. Search "glue wars" for a ton of information on that.

DO NOT clamp super-tight when using any kind of adhesive, you'll just squeeze it out and it won't do snap to hold things together or seal out moisture. Moderate pressure is plenty.

 

[Remyrw]

Great job so far. a lot better work than my first, that's for sure. I got a good laugh when I saw your avatar, looks like the artist either had the same original piece in view or at least in mind, or random luck strikes.

Not exactly the same, but funny how similar they are. Mostly the shape of the mouth and ears, the rest is just wolf/moon, million variations out there. No worries, just thought it was interesting. That's the first I've seen anything similar as a drawing. Most either are the whole wolf as part of a complete drawing or have a couple wolves... I went this route because it would translate well to a small etch and I kept it all inside the circle for the same reason. I freely admit to browsing around a TON of clip art for inspiration, I'm just not that good at drawing to freehand something like this without examples in front of me.

 

[wolffbite]

@james: Yes I'm wearing a respirator. Still young... rather not damage myself too badly early on

@Remyrw: heh... my avatar is from a google image search of a howling wolf lol. I just edited a bit in photoshop. Really like your etch/logo though, simple but pleasing to the eye =)

Thanks again for all the comments/suggestions guys, appreciate every word. Will... I think I agree that this will become an addiction, dangerous amount of fun I'm having already

 

[wolffbite]

Hey guys.. sorry for the lack of activity in the thread. Had 2 exams the past 2 days so I was pretty much a hermit at my dorm and unable to get any shop time since the last update...

Well while I was gone I was recruited by my mom to make my dad a set of steak knives for his birthday in june... I told her I should probably finish these first two (to see if they actually turn out half decent) before I start... but I kinda had to say yes when she agreed to buy me all the materials

But as for the first two knives... They are pretty much ready to go off to heat-treat but I won't send them off until these steak knives are profiled and ready to go as well. Rather not pay twice the shipping...

Since I jacked up my tiger-g10 with some premature countersink drilling and poor initial choice of hardware I ordered another slab and will give it another go.

This one is called pistachio... looks like it will be quite nice.

Anyways, i got 3-4 hours in the shop today so I managed to get 2/4 of the steak knives profiled out and sanded all over to 120 grit on the first and 50 on the second.

I also got a block of stabilized Wild African Olive... had a very nice grain pattern on the web shot I saw and it was even more stunning in person. Being a woodworker I kind of drool over any sort of burls... can't wait to get these slabs onto the knives.

I cut them up and got matching slabs set up for each of the knives.

Also ordered a brass mosaic tubing and brass tubing for new handle hardware. I think I will like this much better and it will look fantastic!

I will finish profiling the other 2 knives out tomorrow and then maybe start grinding some bevels.

I have a question though... do I need a liner material for the wood slabs? Not sure if metal->wood is OK or if I need a g-10 or other spacer material in there for better adhesion.

Ugh.. I'm really in deep it seems. 6 knives my first time around, am I insane? I don't know... but this is stupid fun and gives me an excuse to blast music outside and ignore my cellphone for hours on end

Edit: This other set is S30V 3/32. Since I hear it's not easy to polish I will probably leave it a ~1000 grit finish

 

[jonnymac44]

Just found this thread. I'm liking what your doing, wolffbite:thumbup: I love your ingenuity with the filing jig. Very nice work all around, hope you continue!

 

[wolffbite]

Thanks jonny!

The jig has been very useful. I can't take all the credit, the basic mechanics of it I borrowed from MHill, mine is just made of wood and screws

Spent the afternoon grinding out the rest of the steak knives, and hand rubbed them to 220 grit all over.

Here is all 6 of my knives in progress.

And all 4 steak knives rubbed to 220 grit and marked for drilling..

Not a lot to show for 2-3 hours work but its coming along nicely. Was really hard to get all the blanks the same, but they are pretty much all even in length, width, thickness and cutting edge.

I did try and drill the tang holes on the first knife but it chewed up 2 bits... is S30v suppose to be hard to drill (i'm using a drill press also)? Maybe I need to go pick up some carbide bits... odd though since my O1 knives were very easily drilled with the same bits.

Will work more on this come monday. Won't be able to get much shop time until next weekend after that because I start work on tuesday...

 

[zipp37]

I really like this WIP. The top one reminds me of a blade I was working on several months ago. Nice stuff.

 

[wolffbite]

Just a quick update. No new pics worth posting yet unfortunately..

I started my new job (painter for college pros) on monday, and I've been logging 12 hour training days... so shop time has been pretty much nil for me. Friday rained out so I figured I would spend some time finishing up the first 2 and getting them packaged up for heat-treat. So the O1 knives are going to be shipped off this afternoon (or tomorrow depends if work gets washed out again which this downpour suggests).

I'm sending them to Rob over at Knifemaker.ca, I emailed him several weeks ago and he said about a week turn-around once he gets them so I am quite pleased with that. He's a very helpful guy, and his wife is extremely quick to process orders and respond to other questions so big thumbsup to them

I'm still having difficulty with drilling my S-30V. I probably goofed when I cheaped out and bought universal carbide bits (not specifically for metal) and I chewed one up while managing to only get one complete steak knife drilled. I have since gone to Jantz and ordered a couple carbide bits (ouch on the price..) and a proper countersink and hopefully those will be the ticket for me... I also have a feeling that my cheapy table-top drillpress is a culprit in this foul-up. It's a single speed (probably far too high speed) so that is what is probably killing my bits.

So a couple questions on that then...
Should I use a drilling lubricant? If so... is there anything readily available (say, in my house or garag)/cheap?
Would using cordless drill cause me any greivance? It's really my only option for now since it will give me control of the drilling speed.. I know it would be hard to keep is 100% vertical, but as long as I go slow should I be ok?

If anyone can chime in that would be great, thanks in advance.