A wip "The Black Label"

Shane Wink

Shane Wink

Well-Known Member
This is a WIP for a design I have been tinkering with for some time now. Before We proceed any further I am a new maker so if you see a mistake please let me know. The design is based on my love of dropped handles and drop points and will be my goto blade for wilderness skills. In the past I have made 4" D2 and O1 blades and they do very well for bushcraft but I like a slightly larger one and set out to design just that, plus here in Louisiana we hunt hogs with them and anything else that gets close enough to us :nothing: I help a Lt of mine with his gator lines in the fall and he is adamant that he wants to use the blade to get one. Like the beginning to all great redneck stories this one is well under way and picking up steam as he refuses to listen to reason so later this fall in Sept we will see. Till then I hope you enjoy the post and feel free to comment.

shane

specs:
52100 12"OL 3/16ths thick
6.5" drop point blade
4.5 dropped handle
1.60" wide
flat ground with convex edge
chamfered choil
tapered tang from 3/16 - 1/8th at butt
I may powder coat but we will see.

For the HT on this blade I plan to use the info provided by Kevin Cashen; Aldo's 52100 is not normalized just annealed and made from roundbar stock so I will begin with two normalizing sets to relieve any stress and normalize the structure, Heat to 1475 soak for 15 min and quench in parks 50, temper at 400* and test with RC files going up 25* each time till around RC of 58.

Since this is the first 52100 blade I have done I will do testing on the blade when done to see what kind of performance I am getting and what needs to be addressed. I will be using a HT oven for the HT and temper set up with a PID.

Here is the knife after profiling and grinding to .050, hand sanded to 220 and will finish hand sanding to 320 tomorrow at the fire station. Over I am pleased with it and still need to finish sanding the spine, drilling the holes and tapering the tang. I plan to round over slightly the edges till after HT then sharpen them up.

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Looking good. One thing does seem out of place. In the picture near the center of the blade there seems to be a flat section. Is that there or is it just something reflecting off the blade? If it's some sort of an irregularity I'd go back and take care of it. One of the hardest things that I had to learn, and still battle with, is close enough is not close enough.

Doug
 
Hehe that is the reflection of the couch pillows. I started with 100 grit and progressed through 150 220 and 320 now using a sanding block and a planner blade to smooth the surface after grinding. I place the planner blade on the paper and roll it down to clean the plunge cut up.
 
Lookin good! I have a blade of a very similar design on the bench right now.
 
I was able to grind out 2 more blades for testing. One in 5160 and another in 52100. I will do another in 5160 so that I have 2 of each steel and compare them to each other when done. I also tapered the tangs of the two 52100 blades and extend the tapering two inches past the ricasso to add a bit of weight forward. When the handles are on them there will be just a slight amount weight forward to the blade. I like my larger knives tapered in this way and usually forge it in. Just a final bit of hand sanding to do and these two will be ready to heat treat. It will be two weeks till I can get back in the shop to grind the other 5160.

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