Want to appreciate your knives more? Try grinding your own!

scotchleaf

scotchleaf

Joined
Oct 23, 2006
Messages
2,232
I tried grinding my first knife yesterday, with a cheapo 1x30 grinder. Holy Sh! That is some hard work. And keeping the grind even is a pain!
 
Yep. When people question the price of a custom knife I wish I could usher them up to a grinder and say
show me an easier way.
 
When people question the price of my custom knives I ask them what do they want in addition to the free knife...

Well, I would if they ever asked. But they never do. They usually just thank me for the free knife. I have offered them a money back guarantee, but since there is no money involved it's a pointless and empty offer (no matter how sincere).
 
You are preaching to the choir here!!! :) Its a lot of fun though isn't it? The satisfaction of making something, then using a custom knife with proper heat treat and edge geometry- then it all starts to make sense.
 
If it was easy, everyone would do it. ;)

My advice is to start with a couple (dozen?) small shop/utility/EDC knives, with basic wharncliffe/sheepsfoot or drop-point profiles and blades no longer than 4". Keep It Simple, Son! :) *

There is no shame in cleaning up your grind lines with a file, either.

When you can grind those with confidence and minimal clean-up, you're ready to expand to pretty much anything.

Of course, some people dive in head-first and start doing larger blades, double edge blades, recurves etc. right off the bat and do quite well with them. But frankly, I think those cats are a pretty small minority.

*ETA: I see you're in Smyrna GA... Later this month (May 17th) a couple other makers and I are going to be supervising a Grind-In/Workshop/Seminar especially for people with little-to-no experience at the BeckerHead Gathering in East Tennessee, near Vonore. There's no cost to participants... steel has been provided by BF members Aldo Bruno from New Jersey Steel Baron and Chuck from Alpha Knife Supply. Grinding belts have been provided via a generous sponsorship from maker Todd Hunt, who will also be on-site to provide tips and guidance. Check out these links if you're interested:

Gathering

Grind-In
 
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Scotchleaf - I have basic equipment also - 1x30 & 4x36 and an angle grinder. We can make this happen and the pros here will help guide us along our journey with wisdom and constructive criticisms.
Just like terrio says with others, LISTEN & FOLLOW !!!

I have been listening and started another thread called "Project 14" not to hijack yours. We are on the same path !!!
Troy
 
Grind in sounds like a blast. I'm going to check my calendar. The videos of Entrek knives being made are amazing: the 1095 just melts away in milliseconds. [video=youtube;kvlKfzW12d0]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvlKfzW12d0[/video]
 
Scotchleaf,
I started filing old files with slightly better ones. So I know how you feel. LOL

For all of you newer grinding fools. There is no better way to shorten your learning curve and even make some life long friends, than by hanging out with some of us older grinding fools.

That was the thing that impressed me about most all of the custom knives makers I met back when I started in 96 was they willingness to share all of there knowledge expecting nothing in return.
 
after doing it a few years you get to the point of just going out to the grinder and making hardly even thinking about how ist done. im at about year 10 im sure by year 20 the knives will all but make themselves
 
butcher_block said:
after doing it a few years you get to the point of just going out to the grinder and making hardly even thinking about how ist done. im at about year 10 im sure by year 20 the knives will all but make themselves
Click to expand...

Then there are days when you mangle a blade or two and ruin a $50.00 set of scales and ask yourself. WTF?
 
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