Slap back to reality

S

Sharp_newbie

Joined
Aug 12, 2007
Messages
701
Wellll. as a VERY new knife maker (i would hardly call it that) i have come to the point of realization. something that needed to be said to myself...

"YOUR NOT F-ING DAN WINKLER!!!!
YOUR NOT JERRY BUSSE!!! "

i came to the realization that maybe i have been going to fast with making knives. i skipped steps 2-4 and went straight for 5. i got a bit cocky in my youth and decided that just because i spend X amount of time studying pages from the great Knife makers forums and reading articles about heat treat that i must be a god at building knifes. well this is me humbly saying that NO i am no master.

So what i am going to do to correct this is go back to the basics. i am going to build 4 knifes, one at a time. the four knives will be of the same design, no file work, no convex grind, no fancy anything, no thought of how i can make it more cutting edge etc. first knife will be good, second knife will be better, third knife great and forth knife should be a beauty. taking it one step at a time i will ensure that i get good at all of the small (very crucial) steps in making knifes. then after the four are done, and i am proud of the final result, i will redesign the blade and add a "challenge" to the design and perfect it again.

getting the pattern then...

Every man has to start at the bottom of the chain, i doubt any of you great knife makers on this forum one day picked up a piece of steel and then BOOM build a knife with God like qualities. i just had to fail to teach myself this i guess.

but all is good, because i am determined to be a true knife maker. it has become and addiction to me and i will not stop until it is perfect.

I just needed to slap myself, and start again at the bottom.

thank you for listening to my rant.

and thank you all for all the help past and future :)
 
hahaha and i totally forgot to put the point i was trying to convey down... sorry guys i'm a bit tired,

a challenge to all newbie knifemakers, is to take it slooooooooooow. make a simple design, then keep at it until you perfect it, then build up from there. it will be a lot slower going, but i think in the end more rewarding, more educational.

time will tell for me. but i think its pretty sound advice from someone learning the trade.
 
I'd like to offer a suggestion, if I may. Take it for what it's worth and then decide. My quality stagnated for a while. I was making ok knives, but I wasn't getting better.

For years I had made each one of them one of a kind. I decided to concentrate on learning skills by repetition. To do this I picked a style that I was fairly good at, but instead of making them one at a time, I made a dozen of them. I cut out 12 profiles, not moving on to the next step, until I had all twelve of them identical. I then drilled the pin holes in all twelve of them, before moving on.

I did each step on every knife before I would permit myself to move onto the next step. This helped me master each step, one at a time through repetition. Where I saw the biggest jump in quality was in my grinding. By the time I got to the last knife, I was very confident that I could make it just like the eleventh knife.

When I finished with the project, I had twelve knives completed. They all had different bolster and handle materials, but the overall shape was identical.

Just a thought on what helped me make a leap when I began to stagnate.
 
my files, is what makes me take it slow, har har :)

It can be a little tough to stay humble when, even though a newbie, an expert compared to the rest of our family and friends.
 
No, you are not those people, but you can be just as good, or better, if you really want to be. You seem to have the desire, now if you can just keep it, the sky is the limit.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top