Brandon's Fantastical Journey to becoming a knife maker...

[brandon0403]

I thought it would be nice to have one thread where I put all my progress as I start out.

What I have to work with...

Metal cutting band saw from Harbor Freight (adjusted to cut square)



8" buff wheel powered by a 1/3 HP 1725 rpm motor (with green and white rouge)


Beaumont Metal works KMG-PL Grinder with 8x2 contact wheel, Knife Dogs small wheel attachment w/ .75" wheel, and of course the platen attachment and tool rest.



Foley 6" bench grinder and 4th generation Drill Press


Assorted Belts from USAknifemaker.com


And of course some steel from NewJerseySteelBaron.com (440-C, 154-CM, 1084, and 52100)

I have a question regarding the steel, the 1084 and 52100 arrived pretty warped along the length of the steel bar. Should I be worried about this waviness, is it normal? If it is normal I assume I will have to straighten any blanks I cut from it, any suggestions on how to accomplish this?

 

[brandon0403]

Preliminary Knife Designs

I have drawn up several designs that are appealing to me. Which one would make a great "first knife" template? Any suggestions or comments welcome, Thanks! (the line in each photo is 1" long)

 

[BonhamBlades]

That is one heck of a set up for just starting out. Can't wait to see your projects. I will be following your thread.

 

[Sean Jones]

nice equipment...tagged for interest also.

 

[Timy]

Nothing against Aldo, he has awesome supplies but every piece of steel I have ordered from them has arrived wavy and warped. Real pain for a new maker. Sending my stuff out for heat treat usually fixes this, but for at home heat treat its a lot of trouble.

 

[TacticallySharp]

So far all my steel from Aldo has been straight. I mainly purchase 1084 and a little 1095. Great shop full of tools to start with. Remember to have fun while doing this.

 

[Lagrange]

I started out with a bench vise and some old files. You have a much nicer array of tools to get you going. I suggest you choose a simple pattern for your first knife. The most difficult part to master for most makers is the bevel grinds. With practice it becomes easier. Pay attention to the details, take your time, and dont be afraid of failure.
Good luck and keep us posted.

 

[BrandonM]

Nice set up for sure. Better than mine anyway. Have you finished a blade yet?

 

[brandon0403]

Progress Saturday 10/12/2013

I picked the design for my first knife(s).



Marked up the steel and cut them out using the band saw.



Profiled the blanks on the KMG using a 36 grit Norton Zirc. belt.

This is a picture of a 1-2-3 block clamped to the tool rest with the small wheel attachment to do the small radii.




and... after several hours or grinding and cutting here are 4 profiled blanks with 4 more ready to be cut out and profiled.



They are pretty close in size, slight variations when I was using the small wheel attachment. Now comes the part i'm excited for and resentful towards... doing my first flat grind. Excited because I know I will have fun doing it and resentful because I know I will ruin at least a few of these carefully sculpted blanks.

 

[Steven Long]

Wow, you are off to a great start. You are right, you might be going through a few of those before you are happy with one. My pile of screw ups have gotten pretty big.

Keep up the great work and I look forward to seeing your progress.

 

[Shawn Hatcher]

Excited because I know I will have fun doing it and resentful because I know I will ruin at least a few of these carefully sculpted blanks.

Remember that knifemakers don't make mistakes, only smaller knives. Finish out all of those knives, even if you aren't satisfied with the grind. Finish everything you start. You will progress much, much faster that way.

 

[Gary Miller]

lookes very good. keep in mind that you are the only one that knows that they didn't turn out to plan.

 

[brandon0403]

Wow, you are off to a great start. You are right, you might be going through a few of those before you are happy with one. My pile of screw ups have gotten pretty big.

Keep up the great work and I look forward to seeing your progress.

It might take me a while before I have any too add to the scrap bucket, every grind I finish will be a success to me :001_smile:

 

[brandon0403]

Sunday update. 10/13/2013

I appreciate the encouragement fellow dogs!
I finally worked up the balls to do my first flat grind... holy cow is that fun!
Made a mistake the very first instant the steel touched the belt, I meant to extend the ricasso towards the tip 1/8-3/16", but instead I just ground the entire length of the edge. Oh well, I'm still really happy about how I turned out considering that throughout the grind my lines were all sorts of screwed up, at one point I had like 3-4 different grind angles going on at the same time. The picture is the knife ground to 60 grit everywhere. the edge ranges from .012 near the ricasso to .025 near the tip so have to remember next time to apply more pressure a I work the grind towards the tip. I was nervous spending all this money on nice equipment, afraid that as I started the process I wouldn't have as much fun as i was expecting. Needless to say the money wasn't wasted, this knife making adventure has been an absolute blast! As always thanks to everyone who stops by and safe grinding.

 

[brandon0403]

Sunday update #2 for 10/13/2013

Did 2 more grinds today. I think I'm getting better with each one, the one glaring issue with each is the plunge line, but there's plenty of time to work that out. Maybe in the future i'll invest in a guide to help train my muscles on what it feels like to grind straight.

 

[brandon0403]

April 5th - Shop update

It's been a while since I've updated this thread, so here it goes...

First below is a link to a Onedrive folder of pictures I will keep updated...
https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=B5DA1453B4E74CA3!10734&authkey=!AHN_FHJ3KZoSq9c&ithint=folder%2c.JPG

I've made quite a few additions to my arsenal of machines; a Grizzly floor model drill press with a xy milling table, a Grizzly flex shaft grinder, a Grizzly (kinda a theme for me as their showroom is only 1 hr north of my house) oscillating spindle sander, and last but not least an Evenheat KF-27 kiln with the RM3 controller.

I've profiled and ground a few dozen blades since my last update, and I'll get pictures up soon, but only finished a couple so far. The limitation to completing more knives was the cost of heat treating the blades, and yes I know the kf-27 was about 93 blades worth of professional heat treating I just couldn't shell out that cost for every knife I make especially with the posiblity that the heat treat might ruin the blade.

Since being laid off from Boeing in December I've enrolled in a local community college that has an awesome Precision Machining certificate program (we have a Haas VF3ss, VF2, and a Haas Lathe). This has been quite the opportunity as I have met 2 new friends that are interested in idea of making knives. With the encouragement of one particular guy I fired up a propane brush torch and hardened a couple of the 1084 blades I had ground. All in all the last 6 months have been a time of major change and growth to say the least.

 

[Shawn Hatcher]

Congrats on the Evenheat! It opens up a whole new world.