Speed and efficiency - please share your tips

[Wulf]

Sometimes I think I'm the slowest, most inefficient knifemaker on the planet. I will labor for hours over something other guys do in twenty minutes. Granted, a lot of that speed is earned through years of practice and experience, but some of it is also due to forethought, planning, and proper technique. And though I'm perfectly content to take my time and work hard to do things right, I also want to learn to work smarter. Being largely self-taught I've probably missed a lot of things that most guys consider pretty basic.

So with the goal of improving efficiency and increasing production, I thought I'd start this thread for knifemakers to share some time-saving tips.

I'll start with one tip that I really ought to heed more myself - keep your workspace neat and well organized. Time spent looking for the right tool under that pile of stuff on the workbench is time wasted.

And another tip that I have to remind myself of again and again, one that is repeated here quite often too - buy good quality, and use fresh belts! As much as I want to save money on grinding belts, a worn belt cuts slowly and can increase grinding time by a factor of 3 - especially when you have to fix mistakes, dips, waves and wobbles caused by an unevenly worn belt. How much is your time worth?

As I think of more I'll try to post them but frankly I am better suited to receiving advice than giving it, at least as far as efficiency is concerned So let's hear it - how do you do things more efficiently?

 

[jawilder]

My 2x72 grinder will remove wood and metal much much faster than my 2x42 Craftsman, even though I have outfitted my 2x42 with a 1/2 hp motor. Even if they both have new belts the 2x72 is worlds better and has saved me a lot of time grinding.

Another tip is to only grind to 120 before heat treat on Carbon steel and take your stainless all the way to mirror polish and cutting edge on stainless before heat treat. That will also save you a lot of time.

Clean your files often with a file card. You waste your time trying to file with a dull tool.
Jason

 

[parbajtor]

Have everything ready and prepped for glueing before mixing your glue and try to glue it all up at once (apart from bolsters on stick tangs where it's better to glue the bolster separately first).

Whittling/cutting the excess off is much quicker than grinding (and much healthier too)

Dry assemble everything first. Don't wait until glueing up to find out parts just don't quite fit.

Measure twice, cut once.

 

[skilldust]

Always keep your coffee where you can reach it. Jerry

 

[tryppyr]

Don't drink and grind.

Plan your work then work your plan. Changing your plan as you go along wastes time and materials.

Keep distractions to a minimum... stay focused. Leave the cell phone the dog and the wife/kids in the house.

Keep a large clock in the shop so you can track your time. Often we lose track of how long we've been doing something. Understanding where you spend your time is the first step to improving your efficiency.

Don't waste time reading anything I write.

- Greg

 

[Dave Behrens]

I don't know how long you have been making knives, but I noticed my "speed" increased naturally overtime. That being said, don't force it!!! Patience is the best tool in knifemaking. Slow is smooth-smooth is fast. True statement about belts. Worn belts cut slower, they can also cause uneven grinds(IME), as the whole belt is often not worn to the same level. Organization helps to a degree. One thing I do to help practice is work on several knives at once, one stage at a time. Usually only 1 or 2 designs at a time. Specials are done one at a time and take longer.
Example: 10 knives - I try to keep all 10 in the same stage, and it seems to go smoother and faster w/ better results.
1. Cut out design
2. Grind outline profile
3. Drill handles
4. Grind blade profile
5. Handle scales - drill holes first, cut out, smooth out, finish
6. Sheaths
7. Heat treat
8. Edge/s, cutting tests(cloth, wood, leather, rope/cordage, cardboard)
9. Level 1 Finish Work: smooth sanding, coating if desired(adds on 3 days for drying), attach handles, sharpen, finer cutting tests(paper/hair etc.)
10. Level 2 Finish work - cleaning/polishing/oil, final sharp/hone, final sheath fitting
11. SCOTCH



Disclaimer: Drink Responsibly. Don't drink and grind.

 

[Tom Lewis]

Keep a notebook and write down things that work and don't work for future reference. That way you will build on your knowledge and won't need to wonder how you did something several years ago.
For example, If you find going from 60 grit to 220 grit then 400 grit works for you. Write it down.
Several years ago I experimented with clay hamons. I took pictures and wrote down how I did things. If I want to make some more hamons, I have the pictures and the process in a folder to refer to.

 

[Russ Andrews]

D.E.Henry said that the most important tool in his shop was his notebook.

...No sense in learning something twice..

 

[Salem Straub]

When I need to work with more speed and efficiency, I envision how super bad-a$$ a Chuck Norris roundhouse kick is and I try to emulate that.

I used to have a Chuck Norris poster for inspiration in my grinding room, but it scared my grinder I so took it down.

Sorry, had to get that out. OK, sharp belts is a big deal, and hogging when I can- it helps with speed to not have to have something be perfect as you move along, i.e., pushing a nice-looking saber grind from the edge up to full height. Just know what "lines" you have to stay inside of, and rip the rest right off the blade/handle. Sharp belts will help you have to worry less about things like overheating pin heads.

If I really want to make a knife fast, or run a batch, I do it stock removal. I love forging but when it's not being used to advantage (i.e., an odd shaped, or highly curved blade) I find it takes more time and is ultimately harder on belts. Normalized forged stock is covered in thicker scale and is harder to grind than factory spheroidized steel. I do break down a lot of bearings and larger W2, W1, Cruforge into smaller flat stock, then anneal as much as possible and grind.

That said, I'm often not very fast and the reason is I have trouble focusing. It can be very hard for me not to "putter" sometimes.

 

[R. M. Perkins]

Ditto on the notebook. Keep a log of how much time you spend doing what on each knife. Then, when you complete a knife, sit down and go through the log to see what jumps out at you as taking too long and focus on speeding that process up.

Next, take a look at your tools and/or shop from time to time and see if some sort of modification might speed up a certain process ... like maybe a jig attached to your belt grinder for doing bevels or a fence for your bandsaw that helps to convert wood blocks into scales. Or maybe you waste a lot of time dragging extension cords around your shop, and a couple new electrical outlets would eliminate that waste of time. That kind of stuff.

Finally, there's more than one way to skin a cat. So figure out which way is the fastest, and do it that way.

For me, I've been making a lot of big Bowie-type knives with steel guards that have blade-slots through them. Now I could drill a half-dozen holes side-by-side and connect those holes with a needle file to create the slot. But having a forge, I can also punch and drift that slot in a fraction of the time that it would take me to go through the drill-and-file method.