My first knife from scratch...sort of

Sean Jones

Sean Jones

Well-Known Member
Here is my first knife from scratch...sort of. A little background. I did two kit knives before this one. One turned out OK the second one turned out abysmal and I scrapped it.

Then I tackled a knife from scratch using an F-150 leaf spring. After grinding and grinding and grinding, I gave up on it and went and bought some 1095 and started on this.

I copied a template that Great Lakes WaterJet, Inc. posted online from here for this project

I made a huge number of mistakes on this but always seemed to be able to sort of salvage things. For instance I never planned to have both Oak and Rosewood for the handle material. But I cut the last of my Rosewood too small and had to fill in somehow. The same with the brass for the lanyard hole. I cut it way too big. So I cut down some 9mm shells and pressed them in.

OAL: 12"
Blade Length to Ricasso: 6"
Handle: White Oak on the ends and Rosewood in the center. Sanded to 400
Lanyard Hole: Brass from 9mm
Steel: 1095
Heat Treated at home
Tempered (sort of) at home

Let me know what you think. It's not viewable in the photos I uploaded but there's also a slight warp in the blade. No matter what I did to get rid of it, it kept coming back.

Any comments appreciated. Sorry about the poor quality of the photos. Need a better camera.

Thanks

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Rob Nelson said:
Good job! Tell me how you did that 9mm brass for the lanyard tube? I think that's cool!
Click to expand...

I drilled out the lanyard hole to where I could gently press a shell casing in just a bit. I then cut the 9mm shells down, one for each side, just enough to fit. It was mostly a fit and file process at that point. Then pressed them into place with a vise, drilled out the primer pockets and cleaned them up.
 
Interesting. I was impressed with the inginuity of using the shell casings...I might give that one a try.
Everyone has made mistakes...I do all the time, it's part of being human. I think how you recover from your mistakes is what sets you apart from others. I've made some mistakes that I thought were game enders. If I couldnt figure a quick and simple fix I put the unfinished work in the drawer with my blanks. I see that mistake every time I open the drawer (quite often), sometimes I pick it up and look it over real good and put it back. In nearly every case I was able to come up with a fix just by giving it time and a some thought.
An old man told me that a mistake is not a mistake until you present your finished work to someone else uncorrected.
 
I would say for your first scratch-built knife you did a good job and I'm sure you learned some things along the way too. Cool idea using the 9mm shells. Keep building!
Bruce
 
Thanks for the comments. I appreciate it. I'm hoping I get more time to build some knives this summer. I'm finding this strangely addicting.
 
looks good. as with everything you learn from your first (currently in that process with my first knife). mistakes will get fewer and smaller as we learn. great thinking for the 9mm brass for the lanyard hole
 
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