Suggestions Welcome....grinding into the spine.

S

Shane Csepp

Joined
Oct 21, 2019
Messages
83
I am currently making a BBQ/Carving knife for a friend of mine as a wedding gift. It’s sort of a last minute idea as the celebration is July 9th.

I made a mistake and ground into the spine while trying to freehand grind rather than use my jig like I normally do. I switched to a Full Flat grind in hopes to cover it up, but it did not work as planned.

Now normally I would scrap this and start over, however I do not have any material that this knife would fit on and I wouldn’t be able to get more and finish in time. Do any of you have a suggestion on how to “fix” this so it doesn’t look like an obvious screw up? I considered shallowing the bevel angle and grinding into the spine a bit on both sides to make it seem intended, but I don’t know how that would turn out. It obviously won’t be exactly what my original plan was either way, but I would still like to try and finish it and be presentable.

Thoughts??
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Dunno how thick it is, but you could grind the whole thing thinner on that side, till it's all flat, then re do your grind and re-center the edge.
It'll only work if you've got enough thickness left though! Good luck!
 
Take an 1/8" off the spine then regrind the bevel.
 
It's .125" stock. the scratch looks to be about .015" deep. Obviously a noticeable divot when looking down the spine.
 
I've used the new surface grinding attachment to remove a little bit of metal on the side which was ground a bit too deep. It's a PITA to do after HT & takes some time, but it gives you a nice blade. Symmetry can be affected, but it works well enough if it isn't too deep.
 
I think I may be able to grind that side down so the blade is roughly .100" thick total and regrind the bevel on that side. Might be the best option at the moment. Wish I had a SGA for something like this....
 
I’d go with Sbuzek’s suggestion. Probably the simplest way to correct. I’ve chased mistakes like that before and wound up with scrap. Make sure you’re plan is mapped out very specifically before heading back to the grinder.
SBuzek said:
Take an 1/8" off the spine then regrind the bevel.
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Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith said:
Flatten that side until it is gone and regrind the bevel.
Click to expand...

For those of you that suggest flattening and regrinding the bevel, would it be best to flatten both sides the same amount and regrind, or will the bevel angles work themselves out by only flattening one side? Seems like by doing one side, the geometry would be off center?
 
You would have to flatten that entire side, not just the bevel. Then you’d have to recenter the grind.
 
Flattening only the one side with divot. Then you'll have to work on that side bevel to move the edge back toward the center. Might not be able to get the edge perfectly centered, but it'll be darn close. The total blade thickness might wind up being on .100" or so but that will work nicely.
 
Thanks everyone! I drew a rough sketch of it and it should work out to flatten and grind again on the screwed up side only.

Am I correct that the bevel angle will be different on one side vs the other, but that the edge should still be somewhat close to center?
 
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No, once you flatten the side until the divot is gone you regrind the bevel on that side the same as before. Ths will push the edge over back to center and make the two sides identical. The width (spine to edge) will be minutely less, maybe .100" at most.
 
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