I thought it worked on paper but its not in metal.I left a lot of metal on the back end on purpose. The big dot near edge is where I thought it should go, the little spot in towards the middle is where it appears to need to go, the stop pin that is.Do I need to take the blade down by.25 and make it skinnier ? Then remap the stop pin ? I need to cut the blades back side off at the blackened area ? And will the lock go where Its marked ?


Dave

and as always thank you.

http://www.baldcowboy.com/images/a.jpg

http://www.baldcowboy.com/images/b.jpg

http://www.baldcowboy.com/images/c.jpg

Hello Dave.
Here is simple sure way to test out your designs. Transfer the blade and the outline of the liner with the pivot hole to some thin arborite or Formica. Cut these out and with a 1/8 drill bit place the blade over the liner, and see how they fits or what needs changing. You can now find a spot where the stop pin should go. Make only one liner from this pattern for one folder, and make the next side using the first one and not the Arborite or Formica pattern. This may help, I hope! Frank

Everyone has their own methods for handling this issue, I suppose. My method, as shown in my tutorial, would say that you are worrying about the placement of the stop pin too soon. The stop pin placement will be determined by how the blade sits after the lock is cut and the knife is nearly finished. In other words, it's the last major part to go into the knife.

The extra material at the back of the blade is left there to facillitate this operation. As you follow through the steps of the tutorial (ALL of the steps, in sequence) you will see that this problem solves itself. When the knife blade and lock have been adjusted so that the blade sits in the handle as you want it too all that remains is to install the stop pin. Closing the blade on one liner, as shown in your pictures, will show the approximate location of the stop pin by the location of the relief you cut in the blade to receive the stop pin. When you open the blade with a pin in that position, the lock will NOT be able to engage because the material at the rear of the blade is too long, and that's exactly what you want. The pin can be placed ANYWHERE in that vacinity. Bring it down a little bit if you feel it is too close to the top side of the handle. Move it back, forward, up, or down if that allows the blade to close a little closer to the full closed position (you don't want it to be fully closed at this point).

Then, drill the holes and install the pin. The blade will almost close into the handle. When opened, the blade will almost allow the lock to engage. At this point, I like to carefully open up the notch first to let the blade slowly settle into the full closed position. After that, start removing the material at the back of the blade until the lock engages. Work slowly and carefully. It's hard to go wrong if you do all the steps in that order....

I am going to make a kydex copy and see how it works. I do follow your site for the most part Ray. I was setting up to cut the lock and noticed the pin placement and became concerned. I ll follow through with both and see how it plays out.

Thanks

Dave

Good, I hope you'll find both techniques useful. I have done the plastic - paper- sheet metal parts approach before and it does help. Making an aluminum prototype uses that technique to its maximum effectiveness...

I made the first two designs out of alum. but I am better than that now !:lol I did the plastic thing, ended up cutting a .25 off the blade width and cutting lots off the back to get it to work....which wont work in long run. I think some of it, is the rake of the thumb rest back of the blade area.If its too step you end up with lil area to work with back there. I like my handle design but something is messed up in the blades design. I am going to try to re engineer the blade to work with the handles I guess. :mad:


:censored:


Dave

I think I figure it out. This should work..right ?

thanks

Dave

Yes, that should work as long as you follow the process we discussed a few posts back. If you simply try to drill your holes where your pattern says to drill them and cut the blade to the size indicated then there is a chance you could get a loose fit because no one does these things perfectly. The fit could also be a little tight but that can be adjusted - that's what following those steps we discussed guarantees, that the fit will be too tight so that it can be adjusted.

As for the aluminum it's not about being 'better' than that. It's about not having exactly the kind of problem that you are having now. Aluminum is relatively cheap and fast to work. If the blade, liner, and handle all work out to your satisfaction then you have a perfect pattern to use for the real knife. If not, it's easy to re-design and make a new pattern. Then, if you use your aluminum pattern AND place the stop pin as discussed above your chance of success on the real knife is virtually guaranteed...

I am still trying to find "my design" and I took it as use alum for your first folder not everytime ya design a new one..my bad. :) I dont use the low grade model for anything other than to see IF it will work. I still fit the rest of the parts by hand.
Thanks to all for the help

Dave

I still make an aluminum prototype every time I come up with a new design, even after 10 years of making these things. In fact, one time I spent about 4 hours and made a new model prototype and added some paint to it so it looked more like a finished knife and took a picture of it. Sent the picture to some of my regular customers and had orders for six of the new model by the end of the day - before I had ever built one of the knives. But, I knew I could build it because the prototype functioned correctly and it's parts would be used as patterns for the real knives .....