Now what do I do?

[dull yet deadly]

Good eve all. I have been lurking about trying to absorb the knowledge here, and really want to try to build a knife. I have seen some of you make some pretty cool knives out of old files. I was at a garage sale yesterday and bought all in the photo for $2.00. Does anyone here have a good place to start for newbies? My main questions are, does file steel need to be heat treated, or is it already, and how would one that knows what their doing go about cutting and grinding from this point?
Does anyone know of a good tutorial, here or elsewhere? I have a pretty fair amount of hand and power tools, including a decent (I think) grinder, but no mill, forge, or other serious metal working tools. Any advice? Thanks in advance - Mark

 

[Jason Fry]

copy and paste this into google

file knives site:www.bladeforums.com

There are several good threads. Short answer is that there are two ways to proceed. One is to anneal, grind, heat treat. Two is to temper for two hours at 450-500 degrees and carefully grind, cooling often.