Rockeye Flipper for the TKI

L

Les George

Joined
Aug 22, 2008
Messages
212
Been thought a lot ups and downs with this piece, started out with a beta ti cored San Mai zirc blade. During Heat Treat I realized I had ground it too thin so I had to scrap it and I remade the blade in stellite 6k cored damascus

Zirc pivots, mammoth insert and a fine hand engraved back spacer with gold inlay by our friend David Riccardo

I really like the way it turned out and came together in the end..


















I only wish I'd have had time to get real pictures taken of it! :)

Thanks for looking!
Les
 
Those are REAL pictures and depict a very fine looking artistic tactical flipper. Well done and most enjoyable to view. I like the treatment a lot.
 
looks great. Very interesting contrast all the way around
 
Great job all around my friend.....quite the Ivory on that piece. :cool:
 
zirconium damascus and beta ti core? I didn't even know that was possible. I didn't know it was possible to laminate damascus to stellite, either.
Technological development is so off the hook these days.
 
Hi. Thanks for sharing this here.

Maybe you or someone else here could educate me on something. I was always under the impression that Stellite 6K is not hard. I read a post here at BF by Russ Andrews which stated that Stellite 6K will Rc at about 47 and is not hard enough for a general purpose utility knife. Is that your opinion as well, or not? I guess what I do not understand is if Stellite 6K is a low hardness material, why would it be used in the core layer of a San Mai blade? I am sure the answer is obvious and I am just not thinking well enough right now to understand. Anyway, TIA!!
 
I have never Rockwell tested any of it, so I won't comment where I don't know, but I did make my wife a kitchen knife out of 6k about 8 years ago.

In practical kitchen work it works just fine. I have noticed that she seems to like a more toothy edge more than a polished on on that knife. She says that the 6k doesn't stay "crazy sharp as long as the other knives, but it does stay good and sharp longer" the other knives she refers to are s30v.

It's a cobalt based alloy, whereas steel is iron based. So it feels a little different because you are not dealing with carbides that make steel cut like it does. That has been my experience with all non ferris blade materials that I have used.

The advantages in 6k for a blade are:

Corrosion proof
Non magnetic
Very high abrasion resistance

The downside is that it's softer than steel, so you can't pry with it. It would cut cardboard forever but a staple could ruin the edge if you hit it.

In this case only the cutting edge being stellite, the steel jacket stiffens it up and (the biggest reason) it looks cool!

I typed this on my phone, so let me know if I was unclear or missed anything and I'll try to explain it more better. :)
 
I have a stellite bladed folder that's seen a good deal of use. I would say that it cuts about as well as most high end steels I've used, and is easier to hone. I prefer polishing the edge bevel of most of the knives I have, but the stellite does seem to perform better and for longer with a rougher edge. The corrosion resistance makes for a stable edge that doesn't lose its keen-ness just from hanging around in pockets and other humid locations. I think it's a pretty awesome alloy.
Stellite-like steel, but lite!
 
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