Texas Butterknife WIP

[jawilder]

I love seeing other WIP's and know this is nothing like Nick's, but I'll post it anyways.

It started with a bar of 1/8"x1.5" ATS-34. I didn't have a design in mind. I just let my muse take me wherever she pleased and this is what I came up with at first.

I really didn't like the design all that much and asked for suggestions HERE

After a bit of playing on the Craftsman 2x42, this is what I came up with

I know you're supposed to draw the design first and shape the blade second, but I did it backwards.

I drilled out 1/8" holes in the SS guard and I am filing it out here to get a good fit

I am not good at eyeballing dimensions, so I scribed lines on the under side of the guard to get a rough shape.

Pressure fitting the guard onto the tang. Sorry I didn't get any pictures of me filing down the shoulders of the blade.

good fit

 

[jawilder]

The man I made this knife for sent me a box of Brazilian Rosewood that was cut down about 100 years ago. I chose one of these for the handle

I sent the blade to Heat Treat at Texas Knifemaker's Supply and it is ready to sand. I had machined sanded it to 400 before the HT so there won't be as much sanding afterwards

I put it back on the Craftsman 2x42 to knock the scale off and get back to 400

Hand sanding using a piece of G10 as a backer and WD40 as Lube. I went through 320, 400, 600, 1500 then to the buffer.

 

[jawilder]

Now is time to shape the hardware. The guard is shaped on the disk grinder. Thanks for the advice to use duct tape to hold the little buggar still!

At this point the tang is too straight to have any angle to the handle. I heated the tang and bent it on the vise. It was about 2AM and I woke the wife and kids with the slight banging :foot:

I didn't get any pictures of the next step, but I welded 1/4" all thread onto the end of the tang. I used the OxyAcet rig int he background to weld the pieces together.

The butt cap is 1/4" and drilled half way through then tapped with 1/4" tap.

Here is the knife and guard fitted together. The fit was very tight using a granite serifice and sandpaper to ensure everything is extremely flat

I really thought I took more pictures of this. I really wanted to get one of everything ground to shape and taken apart... Oh well.

Here is a rough picture I took this morning of the finished knife

Thanks for looking. Comments welcome
Jason

 

[Czechmate]

Looks great, lovin the rosewood handle.

 

[Jim Rehrer]

I really like the shape of that blade!
the whole knife flows very well!

 

[RayseM]

Proportions & craftsmanship look great. I'm sure your client will be very happy with it. The cap & guard are nice refinements.

 

[tonimang]

Great Job!!

 

[jawilder]

Thanks everyone for the kind words