Schempp Knives

Jose Reyes

Jose Reyes

Joined
Nov 14, 2001
Messages
1,152
Hi all,

Here's a better picture and more info on Ed's san mai camp knife. PhilL took the picture for me and I think he did a great job, thanks! First the photo...

orig.jpg


Ed patterned this knife as a competition blade but at 13 oz. it's quite a bit lighter than most. The weight makes it better suited as an all around camp knife but hampers it's ability to quickly cut through 2x4's during that portion of a competition. The blade is a little short of the 10" allowed, has a deep recurve, integral guard and sacrifices about 3/4 of an inch in order to accommodate a finger choil. The butt of the handle has a steep drop to allow the knife to be released with the wrist in stroke and not cantilever against the palm or butt of the hand. The false edge along the spine of the blade brings the weight in closer towards the cutting edge in order to resist rotational forces and keep the blade from twisting in your hand. The rubber handle is affixed using over a dozen pins made from o-ring material and are glued in place. There's also a metal fastener in the center of the handle in order to comply with competition mandates.

The blade consists of pin striped 1080-15N20 damascus over a 52100 core. The damascus was thermal cycled several times before being welded to the core. The finished billet was then thermal cycled 3 times in the forge then 3 times in the paragon oven. The piece was triple quenched and triple tempered. After the first two tempers it was soft back drawn into the low 50's Rockwell C scale. The edge is in the 60-61 range. The blade has been used in two competitions and performed well other than during the 2x4 cut.

Hopefully Ed will drop by to correct any mistakes or make any additions he deems necessary.
 
Nice looking cutter and thanks for the information about the knife's construction.
 
Serious Steel!
a little confused by that lanyard placement though
 
Here's another knife used by Ed during the 2000 OKCA rope cutting competition. If memory serves he won by cutting through 8 1" ropes. Here's the photo, once again taken by PhilL.

orig.jpg


This blade started out as 30 layers of chainsaw chain bedded in 1084 grit and CPM 3V powder. It was drawn out, cut, stacked and rewelded 4 times, yeilding about 1900 layers. The last process was to twist it once. The steel was heat treated in salts and oil quenched, then drawn back to RC 63.
 
Wow, Those are two bad looking cutters - thanks for showing them.
 
This is the last of Ed's knives in my collection. Photo by PhilL.

orig.jpg


I improperly modified the handle and had the knob on the end snap off. Ed repaired it for me using ironwood and a mosaic buttcap. The blade is san mai construction using 304 stainless over a 52100 core. The guard is made of mokume. The original handle, along with the dimensions and some other info can be seen here.

http://bladegallery.com/shopexd.asp?id=91&photo=1&size=n&websess=47835444630139

PS If any of you have any of Ed's knives you'd like to share please feel free to post in this thread.
 
Thanks for the replies guys. Sorry for the late response but I left for work after the first post and had a meeting shortly after getting home this morning.

I haven't asked Ed about it but I imagine the placement is due to the steep drop in the handle. There's a hole at the bottom of the handle though so maybe a longer lanyard with some kind of spring button lock, like on a jacket, to tighten it against the wrist would be better.

I haven't used the single pass rope knife, or had a chance to use the small camp, but I did use the big one and it made quick work of several large limbs and many branches. Hoping to put it and the new one through some tests and take pictures, but I need to find out when a good time to visit a friend would be. That's the trouble with living in NYC, you tend to get arrested when you walk to the park and try to cut down a tree... :D
 
The forward lanyard was suggested by Sal Glesser as he observed these big blades working forward in the cutter's hand as your grip is shocked and vibrated lose with each impact of the 2x4. If you look back on articles about the cutting competitions there are several pictures of people competing holding on to only the end of the handle. These previous competition knives all had rear lanyards. Warren Osborn was the first to utilize this suggestion and it proved worthy as along with Warren's atheletic ability which is significant lead to a 2.97 second record 2x4 cut. This concept has changed the design of the knives to be competitive...TT'ke Care...ED
 
Hi Ed,

My only concern would be a propeller effect if the blade somehow slipped from your grasp. I seem to rememebr Jerry Fisk mentioning this either on this board or at one of the Blade shows. Maybe using two lanyards would help eliminate both both aspects? Anyone have any thoughts on this matter? I was actually able to wrap the lanyard around my wrist then pull the end of the loop over the end of the butt to secure the entire piece in place. I'm not sure if it would effect the cutting technique but it probably eliminates the chance of having the blade slip from your grip.
 
Cutting can be dangerous. It is best to do some easier cuts to warm up or to learn. If the knife becomes dislodged from your hand you have an adventure going to happen whether it is a forward or a rear lanyard...Take Care...Ed
 
Ed Schempp said:
If the knife becomes dislodged from your hand you have an adventure going to happen whether it is a forward or a rear lanyard...
Click to expand...

LOL, Ed, that's true. I use my knives very gingerly compared to you competitors so I'm not really worried about it for myself but was more curious. Has anyone ever seen this phenomenon happen though? The accidents I remember hearing about are usually guys following through too much and chopping themselves on the leg...

PS I also wanted to add that with the shape and drop of the handle itself it would be pretty hard for it to slip out of the grip in the first place...
 
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