OMG... I made a knife-shaped *thing*!!

[Wrankin]

No more sitting on the sidelines - after way too much thinking and procrastination, tonight I went out to the garage and created my very first knife-shaped objects.

The design is a simple kiridashi-style utility knife that I pulled together from a lot of different examples that I found on the web. I haven't quite finished the profiling - I want to taper the handle down a bit, soften the corners and add a lanyard hole. Overall, I'm happy with the basic shape and size.



The steel is 1/8" 1084 from Aldo. Profiling was done using hand tools (hacksaw and files) and a Harbor Freight 1x30 sander. Heat treat will likely be done in a simple charcoal forge with a hairdryer.

A quick word about the HF 1x30 - I picked this up a while back during a sale. I didn't put a lot of faith in it but figured it would be good for cleaning up filed edges, shaping handles and maybe some basic profiling. Well tonight I took it our of it's box for the first time, mounted the included 80-grit belt and spun her up. I had already finished the profile and wanted to see if the grinder could help me start the initial bevel.

And did it ever - that little puppy can chew through some metal! I had to go grab a bucket of water when I realized how hot the work was getting. I was very surprised by how well it performed.

Finally, thanks to everyone here for all of your discussions, comments and ideas. I read them all and got a lot of great information. You convinced me to take the first step in knife making. So remember - it's all your fault.

[Ray Rogers]

Congratulations on your first blades! If you get the heat treat correct you will have more than just a knife shaped object.

However, from here it looks like you don't have any plans for knowing whether or not you get the heat treat correct. Maybe you skipped those details in your description but it appears you are making your blades and will soon attempt to HT them. Assuming this is your first attempt at heat treating - and apparently your first attempt with a coal forge which is not the easiest thing to do - you need to spend some time verifying your HT process. That means, make a few simple blades, follow a HT formula carefully and in a repeatable manner, test the cutting and toughness characteristics of the resulting blade, and then break the blade to see if the grain structure is as it should be.

Maybe you already have plans to do this. But, if you don't do it you won't really know if you made a knife or just an object that looks like one. Like most first time makers you will tend to baby that first blade and further distance yourself from really knowing what you have or have not created. With a kiridashi it will be easy to think you got it right even if you are miles away from the truth....

[Wrankin]

Hey Ray,

Thanks for the feedback. I'm certainly under no delusions regarding my ability to make the perfect blade the first time. One reason I chose this design is that it's fairly simple while still giving me some experience in shaping a piece of steel. I plan on making four blanks to take to heat treat.

I'll be trying to keep it simple by using a basic charcoal forge with a blower. In the longer term, a small propane forge is on the wanted list. As far as HT specifics go, I will heat them up (one at a time) until they are past magnetic, hold them there for about 10 more seconds and quench in oil (prob. warm canola). Check for hardness and then a temper cycle in the oven (I'll need to go check my notes on the specifics of time and temperature). All four blades will then have an edge put on them and tested.

Does this sound like a good approach?

Thanks,

-bill

[Crex]

Headed in the right direction. Agree with Ray on trial run test pieces before doing the real deal on the blades you made. Then you'll know what results you are getting ..... or not getting.

Another thing would be to go to the NC Guild Forum here on KNF and seek out a knifemaker near you for some FTF/hands on discussion and testing. Lot of very good makers in the R-D area of NC. You won't regret hooking up with this group......good people and you can learn a lot and learn a lot faster.

By the way, congratulations on your efforts. Got to start somewhere and keeping it simple is very smart when learning the basics. All this other stuff will come in a natural progression of things. Above all do not get discouraged and have fun. You'll get lots of help from the guys here as well.......there are no stupid questions just different levels of understanding.

[Hunter10139]

It's very cool to see another maker get started. I 100% agree with Ray that it's absolutely necessary to break early knives to see the grain structure. For comparison, break an old nicholson to compare grain size too. If your grain is similar to the file's grain you're probably on the right track.

[Ray Rogers]

Your general process sounds about right. To be clear though, you should heat treat and then test ONE blade completely. Then do the next one with whatever corrections were indicated by the last one. Repeat as needed until it's right. No point in HTing all four at the same time and possibly missing the target on all of them ...

[Wrankin]

Well, I finally did my first heat treat. It took a while to get to this point - life has a tendency to get in the way sometimes. :-/

In any case, I did two blades. The first was one of the kiridashi the I posted about earlier in this thread. The other is a simple little clip/drop point based upon one of Dan Comeau's patterns. The steel is 1/8" 1084 from Aldo. The larger blade is about 7" overall length.

The forge is a standard two-brick design with a furnace cement liner. It seemed to work well enough, although I probably should have given it a little more time for pre-heat before the first blade - I had issues keeping the blade tip from overheating due to a hot-spot where the burner came in. The second, larger blade had a much easier time getting a nice even heat.

Quench was done in warm canola.

They are both just finishing up an hour in the oven at 400F.

[Ray Rogers]

Before you go nuts polishing and trying to make them pretty, put on a crude temporary handle and test the daylights out of them. This is your first HT, odds are it isn't perfect but it could be satisfactory...or it could be a disaster so test them ...

[Wrankin]

Absolutely, Ray. It's all part of the plan.

One question - On the small blade, I may have overheated the tip a bit. Is there an obvious sign that this has happened? I'll probably break the tip off later to look at the grain size, etc - but is there something external that will let me know that this happened?

Thanks for all the help,

-bill

[Ray Rogers]

Oh, probably not. If it was much darker, blue or black, that would be a sign but its not. At this point, the best way to figure that out short of breaking it is to do those tests we mentioned and don't skip the ones where the knife is stabbed into some soft wood and twisted out (or even pried out sideways)...

[WNC Goater]

Originally Posted by Ray Rogers

Oh, probably not. If it was much darker, blue or black, that would be a sign but its not. At this point, the best way to figure that out short of breaking it is to do those tests we mentioned and don't skip the ones where the knife is stabbed into some soft wood and twisted out (or even pried out sideways)...

Wait! SOFT wood? Heck, I've been using Maple!

Guess my blades are okay.

[WNC Goater]

I like that drop point. It should make a nice usable knife! I look forward to seeing it finished.

[Doug Lester]

Yes, it's going to be a little hard to avoid a hot spot with a two brick forge like that. If there is a port in the back side of the forge you can stick your blade through the hot spot and start heating the thicker parts of the rear blade before you start heating the point. You just have to work the blade back and forth to get a even heating of the steel.

Doug

[Crex]

Ray, I think Bill was referring to overheating in the forge as he reached the critical pre-quench temp. Maybe he will clarify. Still the answer would be the same - testing will be the "tell" at this point.
Doug has the best solution for a forge that small, backdoor is really helpful.
One of the problems most often incurred with the two bricker is keeping the temp low enough to reduce the problem of overheating. If you forge your blades the simplest most noticeable indicator will be the size and quantity of the scale flakes on your anvil. You should only be getting a fine minimal dusting on your anvil at the point you are hammering out your initial bevels and smoothing your surfaces.
If just using the forge to HT, you are going to have to watch your colors and test with a magnet. As the steel approaches/reaches non-mag on the temp rise (important), take note of the steel's color at that point. The color just past the mag will be just a shade brighter - usually a dark red - not orange. This is the color you want the entire blade for quenching. A bright orange tip/edge is way over the temp you want and yes, you have then overheated the steel. Only real remedy is to pull it out and re-normalize the steel a couple of times before attempting again.

Bill, realizing the pic of your forge setup is probably not the way you have it when set up and working, I would still suggest one thing. Always set your fire extinguisher away from your forge in the direction you would take flight if something should go wrong. Reaching across a fire to grab one never works out well.
Good looking knives by the way. Hope the testing goes well.

[Wrankin]

Hi Carl,

In regards to the fire extinguisher you make a good point and I agree 100%. In this case the picture was taken as I was in the process of pulling everything out and setting up. While I was working, the bottle was within reach behind me (away from the forge) and there is a second extinguisher by the exit door to the side. But thanks for bringing this up - fire safety should always be top priority when working in an area like this.

The forge is just being used for HT. I used a magnet to test for critical temp. I think that the big challenge was that I didn't realize how fast the metal would get hot. The tip of the first blade (the kirideshi) definitely went well past critical before I realized it and pulled it back out. The second blade I was more careful about keeping it moving back and forth and got a decent even color throughout before quenching.

It's definitely a learning experience.

-b