Hello all,
A while back I found myself the proud owner of two BK14s. Being a bit of a tinkerer when it comes to knives I decided to modify them a bit.
One of them (well call this one "The First One") had been well used and looked it, with even a bit of a belly at the edge from prior sharpenings. The other one (well call this one "The Second One") was in very nice shape, not having been used much with only some finish wear at the tip, which made them both prime candidates for projects.
I decided I wanted to strip them both and do something about the edge of the heavily used one, but wasnt sure about much more after that.
This is what they looked like when I bought them and before any work was done:
The First One.
Youll notice the deformation on this one of the cutting edge towards the handle:
The Second One.
First they both went into a hot tank containing ARDROX industrial stripper (we use it to strip the finish off turbine engine parts). This is what they looked like after about three hours in the stripper:
After that they were rinsed with running water out of a hose.
After this The First One was done (for now).
However, The Second One was in for some more work. One thing I wanted to try was stone washing, and since I planned to restore the edge anyway, I figured any damage to it could be corrected. Turns out there was no damage done to the edge at all.
We use a stone tumbler to clean turbine blades, so into it the little knife went for a good four hours.
When it came out I was surprised to find that it had actually had a smoothing effect on the blade rather than the stone washed look I had seen before. Here it is next to the First One (on the right), which was only stripped.
The reason for this, I realized, is that the stones in our tumbler are actually used to restore a smooth surface on turbine blade after they are sand blasted during cleaning.
Still, I like the result.
After that I thought I would do a choil, but changed my mind because I believed that it would take up too much of the cutting edge, so I came up with this:
I figured that it would serve the same purpose as a choil and better complement the lines of the small knife.
I took it to the machine shop and about twenty minutes later a carbide end mill took care of business. This is the final result and I am really happy with it.
One word of caution to those that plan on doing something similar, the new blade profile means that the original sheath will no longer retain the knife. Im OK with it as I plan on getting a leather sheath for it.
I hope you have enjoyed the story. Feel free to post any questions you may have.
A while back I found myself the proud owner of two BK14s. Being a bit of a tinkerer when it comes to knives I decided to modify them a bit.
One of them (well call this one "The First One") had been well used and looked it, with even a bit of a belly at the edge from prior sharpenings. The other one (well call this one "The Second One") was in very nice shape, not having been used much with only some finish wear at the tip, which made them both prime candidates for projects.
I decided I wanted to strip them both and do something about the edge of the heavily used one, but wasnt sure about much more after that.
This is what they looked like when I bought them and before any work was done:
The First One.
Youll notice the deformation on this one of the cutting edge towards the handle:
The Second One.
First they both went into a hot tank containing ARDROX industrial stripper (we use it to strip the finish off turbine engine parts). This is what they looked like after about three hours in the stripper:
After that they were rinsed with running water out of a hose.
After this The First One was done (for now).
However, The Second One was in for some more work. One thing I wanted to try was stone washing, and since I planned to restore the edge anyway, I figured any damage to it could be corrected. Turns out there was no damage done to the edge at all.
We use a stone tumbler to clean turbine blades, so into it the little knife went for a good four hours.
When it came out I was surprised to find that it had actually had a smoothing effect on the blade rather than the stone washed look I had seen before. Here it is next to the First One (on the right), which was only stripped.
The reason for this, I realized, is that the stones in our tumbler are actually used to restore a smooth surface on turbine blade after they are sand blasted during cleaning.
Still, I like the result.
After that I thought I would do a choil, but changed my mind because I believed that it would take up too much of the cutting edge, so I came up with this:
I figured that it would serve the same purpose as a choil and better complement the lines of the small knife.
I took it to the machine shop and about twenty minutes later a carbide end mill took care of business. This is the final result and I am really happy with it.
One word of caution to those that plan on doing something similar, the new blade profile means that the original sheath will no longer retain the knife. Im OK with it as I plan on getting a leather sheath for it.
I hope you have enjoyed the story. Feel free to post any questions you may have.
Last edited:
). Looks really nice, thanks for sharing! 👍
