Why are gtinding jigs frowned upon?

This same discussion takes place with those who "sharpen freehand" and believe one has not mastered the skill of sharpening unless they can put a razor's edge on a blade by "rounding" the cutting edge on a flat surface; which makes no sense to me. I'm in those twilight years as far as my body is concerned, but my mind functions in the modern era.

Rick is correct, you haven't lived until you make your own steel.
 
Rick Marchand said:
If you don't start by locating the ore and smelting your own bloom, YOU AIN'T NO KNIFEMAKER!
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Man i've been reading this thread waiting for you to say this!

I think what is the most telling is there really isn't any of the "you aren't a knifemaker if you..." in this thread. Mostly just "DO WHATEVER YOU WANT TO MAKE KNIVES". So at least we all agree!
 
rybobales said:
Man i've been reading this thread waiting for you to say this!

I think what is the most telling is there really isn't any of the "you aren't a knifemaker if you..." in this thread. Mostly just "DO WHATEVER YOU WANT TO MAKE KNIVES". So at least we all agree!
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It's changed a great deal over the last 15 years. When I first posted on BF we were still discussing edge packing and orienting your anvil to the north south axis
. :)
 
I do like what JT said about pricing your work accordingly. For the guys that have been doing this for 10-15-20 years and those that feed their families with this craft it's probably difficult to compete with guys that are selling a good knife for under 200 bucks. Diluted market
 
valknut said:
Heck I'll be happy when the hobby pays for itself:)
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best of luck with that, lol... mine hasn't yet and I've been tinkering at it for over 25 years now. not saying it can't be done, and I fully intend on it one day, but it seems like worrying about money as a hobby maker makes it more of a job than the grinding and filing does (jig or not)
 
rustyrazor said:
best of luck with that, lol... mine hasn't yet and I've been tinkering at it for over 25 years now. not saying it can't be done, and I fully intend on it one day, but it seems like worrying about money as a hobby maker makes it more of a job than the grinding and filing does (jig or not)
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Hahaha yeah I understand that. If it atleast pays for steel and belts I'll be alright
 
valknut said:
Heck I'll be happy when the hobby pays for itself:)
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I'm going to say best of luck with that as well. Heck, I was just surfing the net around and stumbled upon the Beaumont horizontal grinder. Looks like I have another project I'm going to start building soon. Already got a motor for this one. Since I can mount it under a table I can use the open 2hp 3 phase motor I have. So much for taking it easy on making equipment and saving some dough....:foot: Already saving for a forge and parts to make it PID controlled. Oh, and need more belts., and handle materials, and epoxy, and kydex, and steel and, and, and, and, and, and, and.... Shoot I've got 10k spent and I don't even have it yet. I still need to find the money to buy the lumber so I can put the steel roofing on my shop I just was given.
 
valknut said:
Hahaha yeah I understand that. If it atleast pays for steel and belts I'll be alright
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I don't want to get off track... but that brings up an interesting conundrum.

Could it be that this sort of concession only adds to problem? On a very elementary level, if every maker conceded to just paying for materials, then that becomes the going rate as far as the market is concerned. It is a difficult problem. Retirees and hobbyists may not need to make a living doing this... they can afford to do it for the pure enjoyment of the craft. Many hobbyist are as equally talented as full time makers, so why would a potential customer choose to pay more for a knife from me, rather than buy a less expensive Mr. Hobby equivalent? Are we to demand that "non-working" makers ask more for their wares? I don't think that is realistic. There is no good answer. All I know is that it really sucks for folks trying to make a living at it.
 
I believe Rick is right, that for the full time makers living off of their work and supporting families in the big picture that hurts their pockets. I don't want to get in trouble for commenting out of my membership level I will keep it at this. My thought process is to attempt to charge fair market price because the people that I have leaned most from have been full timers and I am grateful for the passing of knowledge. And if I am going to take any food at all away from their tables it won't be by undercutting them. I dealt with that back in the early 2000's in construction to the point is was almost impossible to stay in business.

That's just my personal take on that situation. Lack of offering someone back the knowledge I learn here, that seems to be the only way I can truly give back to the "old timers" here and compete fairly for business. I've got long way to go though, most of mine have been given as gifts, are highly sub par to their work, and I can't seem to quit spending money on tools.
 
Rick Marchand said:
I don't want to get off track... but that brings up an interesting conundrum.

Could it be that this sort of concession only adds to problem? On a very elementary level, if every maker conceded to just paying for materials, then that becomes the going rate as far as the market is concerned. It is a difficult problem. Retirees and hobbyists may not need to make a living doing this... they can afford to do it for the pure enjoyment of the craft. Many hobbyist are as equally talented as full time makers, so why would a potential customer choose to pay more for a knife from me, rather than buy a less expensive Mr. Hobby equivalent? Are we to demand that "non-working" makers ask more for their wares? I don't think that is realistic. There is no good answer. All I know is that it really sucks for folks trying to make a living at it.
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When I say "pay for itself" I mean sell one knife, give two away, keep one for me. Not that I need to recoup the $23.82 in each knife I make itemized out to % depreciation on each belt used and grams of epoxy.

When I sell a $150-$200 knife that's funding expanding what I am capable of by buying new equipment, or paying for lost materials in experiments. But I try to be careful about looking around to see what knifemakers are selling similar works for.

I could give knives away to friends and family forever and not regret a single one. But I can't sell knives for the cost of materials for a number of reasons, chiefly that I'd have too many to make because demand would be so high and no capital to invest in furthering my ability or capabilities.

Also, I have enough customers in my area to keep me plenty busy, I have no need to compete online with a wider market.
 
I had a discussion with Stacy regarding this. I don't NEED the income, but I want to make sure that I am not selling too low out of respect for the craft and out of respect for full timers. The people i am currently selling to are friends, family and folks they know. Most, if not all of them are not regular buyers of custom knives. Perhaps once these folks see the possibilities they will consider more purchases from other makers. I certainly refer people to other makers when i get requests for something i am not set up, or currently skilled enough to do. I probably do more educating on what is available out there as far as materials and design then i do selling anything. If and when i grow to offering knives to the general public, my prices will reflect that. At the end of the day, people will only pay so much for an item. The guy who is only willing to pay $40 bucks for a Chinese knife at walmart, is not buying a $100 knife regardless of how it's made, or who makes it. I have seen plenty of knives I would be ashamed to admit I made let alone try to sell even for $50 being reported as sold to people happy to have them. That market is not a quality maker's market. If you make what people want, and have decent business practices, success will follow.
 
Kevin McGovern said:
I had a discussion with Stacy regarding this. I don't NEED the income, but I want to make sure that I am not selling too low out of respect for the craft and out of respect for full timers. The people i am currently selling to are friends, family and folks they know. Most, if not all of them are not regular buyers of custom knives. Perhaps once these folks see the possibilities they will consider more purchases from other makers. I certainly refer people to other makers when i get requests for something i am not set up, or currently skilled enough to do. I probably do more educating on what is available out there as far as materials and design then i do selling anything. If and when i grow to offering knives to the general public, my prices will reflect that. At the end of the day, people will only pay so much for an item. The guy who is only willing to pay $40 bucks for a Chinese knife at walmart, is not buying a $100 knife regardless of how it's made, or who makes it. I have seen plenty of knives I would be ashamed to admit I made let alone try to sell even for $50 being reported as sold to people happy to have them. That market is not a quality maker's market. If you make what people want, and have decent business practices, success will follow.
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First of all I'm not knive maker . But I make some knive and give it as gift .To my brother, close family , to my friends , friends of friends and so ....So , some of my knives are now in various parts of the world ,USA , Europe , Australia ....... What is interesting , what I learned from that is this .......... reaction of those who saw my knife was amazement ........they did not believe my brother ,friend.... to whom I gave the knife THAT someone somewhere can make knife :)

What I'm saying is this ...custom made knife world is small ....very small ! Probably not 10% of people around the world know that there are hand made knives .People to who means nothing that handle of knive is from expensive ironwood and blade is made from 20$ for inch stainless damascus steel .And probably they don t worry about whether the blade is free hand grind or with jig :)
 
Kevin McGovern said:
I had a discussion with Stacy regarding this. I don't NEED the income, but I want to make sure that I am not selling too low out of respect for the craft and out of respect for full timers. The people i am currently selling to are friends, family and folks they know. Most, if not all of them are not regular buyers of custom knives. Perhaps once these folks see the possibilities they will consider more purchases from other makers. I certainly refer people to other makers when i get requests for something i am not set up, or currently skilled enough to do. I probably do more educating on what is available out there as far as materials and design then i do selling anything. If and when i grow to offering knives to the general public, my prices will reflect that. At the end of the day, people will only pay so much for an item. The guy who is only willing to pay $40 bucks for a Chinese knife at walmart, is not buying a $100 knife regardless of how it's made, or who makes it. I have seen plenty of knives I would be ashamed to admit I made let alone try to sell even for $50 being reported as sold to people happy to have them. That market is not a quality maker's market. If you make what people want, and have decent business practices, success will follow.
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I started this knife journey three years ago and went into it full bore, I bought almost every piece of equipment you can think of and funded it by selling my entire knife collection which was around $25k.... I really didn't think it through until about a year in and I looked at an empty pelican case but a whole garage full of equipment and materials. I wondered did I just throw away my knife collection and will I ever recover the funds. I have a very good career and this is just my hobby but I was still worried if I'd ever be able to make my investment back.

I'm happy to say that I made my money back and a lot more within my first full year of doing custom orders and my books closed after only been open for a couple days. I priced my knives pretty high because I didn't want to make many, part of that is because I didn't want to take business away from some of my maker friends that did it full time. I quickly found out though that there are always buyers and people that want to collect, and what I do doesn't really affect other makers. If anything with my prices it helps other makers raise theirs.

I've yet to have one customer complaint about my prices. The knife market is one of the rare ones where the makers can dictate price.
 
I'm just starting out as a hobbyist, I've ground a grand total of three knives so far, and I used a jig for all three. What I've found is that you need to do it free hand when you're removing that last 10% of metal. The jig removes so much of the feeling of what's going on. When you're just hogging metal off it's great because it makes sure everything stays even and straight, but when it's time to refine/polish, especially post-HT, you really need to be able to feel that the blade is flat against the platen, how warm the metal is getting, how and where on the blade the belts are cutting, things like that. It's easy to over-do it with the jig, it gives you a false sense of security and you can't make minute adjustments on the fly.

At least that's what I've found so far.

If, in theory, you sat down and calculated the EXACT angle you needed to set your jig at, and you had a way to set your jig that was accurate to at least once decimal place, and you managed to remove exactly the right amount of metal and not cut too far into or not far enough into the blank, then you could, in theory, grind the entire knife on the jig. In real life you'll probably over or under shoot like I found myself doing and have to finish freehand. It's intimidating until you actually do it. Once you do it, even if you fail miserably, then at least you truly understand what it's about and do better next time.
 
That's some very interesting points of view. My disability is my only income which isn't much but pays the bills. I'd like to give away my first 50 or so knives most of them to guys on BF to review and tell me what to change. Im always on the exchange looking and learning and some guys just low ball their knives and I can never seem to figure out why. This is not a means for me to provide for my family it's something to do to help me feel important in life. A way for my son to learn hard work and dedication from watching me. It's my own little place in this world that I intend to be the absolute best I can be. If that means that 1 knife funds 20 more cool. If not. I'm still having fun. The last thing I would ever want to do is disrespect this craft or other makers especially ones that shallow knowledge so freely.
 
I spent countless hours building custom gunsmithing fixtures to ensure accuracy and found that no matter how well built human error and lack of patience
can ruin expensive materials. I realized I am the fixture and everything else is an extension of my skills. I have a few fixtures for knife making for drilling, machining, but
have yet to use one for grinding I just take my time free hand seems to be ok so far.

Patience to learn and know your own skill level will go a long way either using a jig/fixture or hand grinding. Doing your very best on every project is what we all strive
to accomplish. Your goal of 50 perfect knives is ambitious for give away...maybe 5 really good ones to a select few for gifts/critique that way you don't break the bank.

Mike
 
The "pricing thing" is one of the hardest things a knife maker can do. I have a simple formula I use because I know what my time is worth. Me personally would rather give a knife away then cheepen it over and over by dropping the price down over and over. Surprisingly I do give alot of knives away but not because thy won't or don't sell but because I enjoy it.

What it comes down to is quality. If your a new maker or old dog price your work in accordance to the quality you provide. Take pride in your work and know your skills and time has value.

Ok enough of that lol.
So onto the "Jig" topic - man oh man why did I have to start thinking about jigs. My mind has been going non stop with designs and fixtures all morning. It started as a what if you could have a fixture/setup that alowed stright grinding and then still holding the angle let you sweep the grind to the tip. All kinds of things have flown through my mind from cams to tracks as well as tracing plates. But to complacated I thought, I just need robot arms. Hum not bad pricy but not bad. Ok to crazy let's make it more simple. Robot arms I control manually, ok that could work. Need to be simple to build and infinitely adjustable. Then it hit me, could it work I wondered. There I am holding an imaginary blade watching its movements in my minds eye as I grind. Yes I thought it could work. So now onto the drawing board to remove this festering splinter from my mind. Thanks guys for causing me to do this
 
JTknives said:
The "pricing thing" is one of the hardest things a knife maker can do. I have a simple formula I use because I know what my time is worth. Me personally would rather give a knife away then cheepen it over and over by dropping the price down over and over. Surprisingly I do give alot of knives away but not because thy won't or don't sell but because I enjoy it.

What it comes down to is quality. If your a new maker or old dog price your work in accordance to the quality you provide. Take pride in your work and know your skills and time has value.

Ok enough of that lol.
So onto the "Jig" topic - man oh man why did I have to start thinking about jigs. My mind has been going non stop with designs and fixtures all morning. It started as a what if you could have a fixture/setup that alowed stright grinding and then still holding the angle let you sweep the grind to the tip. All kinds of things have flown through my mind from cams to tracks as well as tracing plates. But to complacated I thought, I just need robot arms. Hum not bad pricy but not bad. Ok to crazy let's make it more simple. Robot arms I control manually, ok that could work. Need to be simple to build and infinitely adjustable. Then it hit me, could it work I wondered. There I am holding an imaginary blade watching its movements in my minds eye as I grind. Yes I thought it could work. So now onto the drawing board to remove this festering splinter from my mind. Thanks guys for causing me to do this
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Hahaha sounds like your trying to be robo cop JT
Check out DD work rest grinding jig. Probably the best on the market
 
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