my first bowie

J.Leclair

J.Leclair

Well-Known Member
Hey all, A guy I work with asked me to make him a bowie knife. I figgured I'd do a WIP.
he wanted an 8" blade and a 4.5" handle. I started with a 3/16" X 1.5" piece of 440C and got the profile ground. didnt want to spend too much time in the shop tonight as it is valentines day and all.... good thing my wife loves me :D
here's where I'm at so far
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will work on the bevels tomorow
 
I got the bevels roughed in tonight, started with 80 grit then once I got them started switched to 120 grit. tomorow night I'll take it up to 400 grit and straighten up the grind lines, fix up the plunges and decide wether I want to file in the swedge / clip point.
here's where it's at
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getting there but still a bunch of work to do
thanks for looking
J.leclair
 
Keith Willis said:
Looks like its coming along good,keep us posted.

God bless,Keith
Click to expand...
Thanks, things are progressing nicely, so far.....
still cant decide wether or not to do the swedge clip, I think it looks ok as is and not sure how I would go about it with the shape of the clip.
 
Well, spent another night in the shop. made some good progress tonight. decided not to no a swedge clip on this one and went ahead and pushed the gring almost all the way to the spine. now remember that I use a 10" cone-loc drum sander to grind my knives so a full height grind on 1.5" stock takes some work (well for me anyway lol) here's the pics
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you might see in the first pic I have scribed in the location for the pin holes. have to find out what size pin stock and what material the customer wants. tomorow night will be doing some hand sanding, drilling holes and hopefully will be ready to send out for HT by the weekend.
thanks for looking
J.leclair
 
forgot to mention, this is the first time I have added a sharpening notch to any of my knives. Is it too small should I enlarge it with a bigger round file? I think I like the look but it seems it maybe out of proportion to the size of the blade... what do you guys think?
 
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The wife wanted me to take a couple nights off so no new progress. Tonight I will get the tang drilled out, and start the pre HT hand sanding.
 
So I managed to get back out into the shop tonight. Drilled out the tang, then got to hand sanding. Had a decent 400 grit machine finish on it but decided to take it back to 220 grit then 320 and stopped at a dirty 400. only took pics of one side as the both look the same anyway.
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Thanks for looking
J.leclair
 
package is in the mail on it's way to canadian knifemaker supply for HT. handle scales have been ordered and they are not purple! :p
still felt too butt heavy to me so I connected a couple of the holes in the tang. now ballance is about 3" forward of the plunge. handle scales should bring the balance back nicely. I also decided to sand out my flats a little better, and do a bit nicer 400X finish on the blade.
here's where it was at right before I packed it up.
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and this is what it's getting for handles
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It's taking shape nicely. The sharpening notch is not so scale. For a blade that size try >3/16. That handle material looks cool, what is it?
 
Seriously nice blade!!! Can't wait to see how well the handle scales come out, where did you get them? I've seen Maple Burl Dyed and stabilized on one web site, I think it was It's a burl, beautiful material. When you have that much color and figure it's kinda hard to decide where to cut the scales out, at least for me it was on a set of dyed and stabilized Buckeye burl I used for my personal EDC, it turned out pretty nice inspite of me! Great work! Looking forward to seeing it finished. I really like how you did the clip, makes it flow really sweet! Rex
 
Thanks Rex,
I got the scales from "That Auction Site". Even with the rather large handle size this knife has, the scales will be plenty big enough for me to shift them around to find the best spot for them.

Everything officially in transit today. Now the waiting.......
 
Got everything all done on this project. Just need to make the sheath.
here she is let me know what you guys think.
13"OAL 3/16" 440C, 8" Hollow ground blade.
Stabilized dyed maple burl handle sacles with stainless pins and thong tube

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It looks AWESOME!!! I would recommend a minor adjustment, counter bore the thong tubing gives it a cleaner look, and is easier on the string that is put through it. Do it very carefully with light pressure, if you decide to, that is. I woul dsay it is required, but I got called on it and once I saw the difference it made I understood why!
That is a minor nothing on a beautiful knife, really great job! The handle material looks great as well as the shaping you did to it, I know how tedious it is to get both sides perfectly matched and you really knocked it out of the park! Just BEAUTIFUL! I'm still taken back by the swooping clip, the gentle curvature is a nice touch, in fact I like it so much, I've added it to my next big chopper I'm planning on doing, hopefully pretty soon, it'll be a through tang, with a huge blade, I just love torturing myself. If I do make it the way I see it in my head it should be a sweet one! Again, great job, this being your 1st Bowie, I'd hang on to it...of course I want to keep all of my knives that turn out great! NOT a good habit to get into!!! I'm trying to only keep my serious goofups that can't be sold, you know the ones that have the glaring defect that the wife can't see for nothing. That's another argument for another day, really looking forward to your next knife, Rex
 
Thanks :)
The tube has been lightly chamfered with a small cone shaped dremel grinding stone. hard to tell from the pix tho.
 
I use my carbide deburing tool for my rifle cartriges it works excellent instead of flaring the thong tube . Very nice wood on a well made knife. Kellyw
 
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