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Howdy again all. As usual it takes a few years before I pop back up. I've been able to keep making knives in between work projects, though it's few and far between. I haven't done a hamon in some time, and after acquiring a heat treat oven, it's been a little trial and error getting the temps right (they're still not there). Happy with how this one turned out though, but there's a lot to improve on. Thanks for looking.

Thanks guys, got this all wrapped up! A natural patina had started to develop from handling, but it was not very even, especially around the inlay. To restart, I went back down to bare metal with some pumice. I like pumice over something like aluminum oxide for polishing pieces like this with a hammer texture. I started with a brown heat patina, but thought it would look better if I went further with the oxide. This is after 4 or so heating cycles with cleaning between. This looks like black in photos, but is more of a dark brown-purple color. And here it is with the pivot set and some better lighting for the patina. The sky shade is less midnight and more “nautical twilight”, but I am happy with the effect. I look forward to seeing how everyone’s entries turn out!

A new Khazar style sabre I recently finished. Lots of fun details on a fairly rarely made item. Blade: 1062mm OAL: 1225mm Mass: 1083g (troddel and rings 17g) More photos and details at WinterCutlery.com

Here we are! Took a bit longer to film and edit than I expected, ran into a handful of unexpected issues and severe limitations due to how small my shop is. Turns out even with a 20mm lens, I still can't get physically far enough away to get the whole hammer in frame! At least not with the good camera... Also in the interim since last using it, all the settings defaulted to factory which I didn't catch the first time so I had to reshoot everything to get usable footage out of it. Either away it was fun to get the camera back in the shop and I'll likely do a lot more filming once the restoration is actually properly done. I'm waiting until the last bits of the linkage are made more permanent instead of the collection of shoddily welded bits and clamps on the brake. Also in watching the footage back it's much more obvious how not flat the floor is by the rocking. I'm going to try and sort out a shim or wooden platform to level things out a bit more. Also a curious discovery, the treadle is much more responsive from the brake side rather than the idle wheel side where I normally stand. In spite of going completely overboard on the material for the treadle, it still has enough torsional flexibility that the diagonal opposite corner to the brake causes a bit of spring action to releasing the brake before the eccentric can spin up. Also of note I swapped out the pulley on the lineshaft which connects the motor to the shaft to slow it down a bit more and have better traction for that belt. Ultimately I am still going to swap out the motor for a slower one with a larger drive pulley, and possibly some other modifications to the transmission setup but for now it is working well enough at (almost) full motor speed. Anywho, here's some footage of the hammer running! Now that I've put it to actual use on a few small production runs, I am confident that mechanically all is working smoothly.

I'm calling it a pocket razor. It was mostly an experiment in hollow grinding. Single sided, 1080, very hard, just a boiling water temper with a mosaic pin decoration. The scabbard is a plastic slip on blade cover, covered in a bit of ray skin. It will be on the table at SLT BladeWest next week. g

Most of the folks here know me as a maker, but you probably don't know that I'm a theater nerd. I've performed a bit, not well and not recently, but I have seen and continue to see probably 20 live shows a year. In Oregon there exists a repertory theater called the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, this year was their 91st year in production and I have been going since 1979. In September of 2001 we were in a KOA south of town and I was coming back to camp from the showers. Something was off, when I got to our camp, someone told me that a plane had hit a building in NYC. We were in shock, no one knew what to think. Then the second plane hit and we began to get reports that one tower was gone. 25 years ago this last Friday. Everything changed. The OSF canceled that days shows, we wandered around and huddled in groups, there were hastily organized meetings and prayers. The actors and management got together and decided to go on with the shows with a moment of silence before each show. We were cut off, pre internet we had news papers and radio and TV, but no one knew anything. 25 years ago. One of the things that happened was all air traffic in the US was grounded, the skies were empty. 29 planes, nearly 8000 people, were sent to Gander, Newfoundland, a town of about 9000. The passengers and crews knew no more than the rest of us, but they were helpless, far from home. The town came together, they fed and housed them for 5 days. The events at Gander became a stage show, "Come From Away". Friday, 25 years to the day, we sat in the theater to witness "Come From Away" on stage. I cried through the whole performance, I think we all did. I know that some of the actors did. Was it the best performance of the run? I have to think so. We didn't plan to be there that day for that show, it's just how our groups schedules for the year worked out. 25 years ago. There were people in the audience who weren't even born that day. I don't know what they thought, but I hope they realized something was going on. Thanks for listening. Geoff

black bear paw stamps for KITH project.

I've been dithering about the final details, but for now. it's done (are they really ever done?). I still have 2 silk flags to make, but I have the material in hand. Scabbarded length 36" Just a hair over 2lbs OL 32" BL 26" Stacked cable pattern welded blade in a hairpin style from Tibet/Nepal Mild steel guard with copper washers Mineralized whale bone handle with twisted copper wire and copper caps Mastodon butt cap, through tang with a copper mounting ring Scabbard is a Doug Fir core, lined with lambskin Copper and brass throat and toe cap Walnut hanger attachment with cotton cord wraps, hammered copper decoration Wrapped in coarse linen doped with shellac. The beads are African, but the sort of trade item that gets everywhere. The carpet (if anyone cares) is an '80's era camp rug from the Afghan/Pakistan border. Very thick, all natural wools (the belief is that there were no dyes available in the camps, but these were being made as trade goods, typical Afghan gul designs but in greys and blacks) This is intended to be a common soldiers sword from the Western Frontier circa 1700-1800 with some field expedient repairs/refit Geoff

Finally put some work in for the rapidly approaching KITH

I figured I should probably get a move on this project with the deadline rapidly approaching I must admit that none of this is actually me doing anything other than assemblage of ideas. First, when I moved last year and now that I ( for the first time ever!) have my own shop and a space I fully control, the long unpacking process of 15 years or so of random shop related detritus has surfaced in strange and fortuitous ways. I have absolutely no idea when or why I forged this blade, but it is evidently the start of something eerily similar to what this folder will be. Although I have no idea what the original plan was, it should be just what I need. If I have time I would like to forge a new one out of something a little more special but as coincidence has it, I'm in the middle of, by volume, the single biggest commission I've ever taken on for a set of wedding party gifts that needs to be done about a week before the KITH deadline. So being able to take a little time out of the equation would be great although not yet critical. Whenever I made this little blade, I punched the hole as evidenced by the little bit of rag leftover in the hole. It is a little bigger diameter than I would, in modern day, like to use for the hinge but I might try the trick of riveting in a bit of bronze then drilling that out so it has a sort of integral bushing. That plus sorting out the tail for interfacing with the shell and it's all but done pending heat treatment. What I really have been thinking about are these two stamps I picked up at a flea market in Kyoto a few years back. Not sure what they were originally for but I keep seeing them as a motif stamped into the handle, either brass or bronze. The edges are too sharp to make me suspect they were originally for leather and the extreme mushrooming on the other end means they were definitely struck tools and thereby not for leather anyway. Best I can guess they were for some precious or semiprecious metalwork and this is the perfect time to bring them back into a working life. While Kyoto isn't quite the region where the Higokonami is from, it's still an ocean closer than anything else I have lying around. Design wise, I'm thinking of using one of the two on the tip end of the handle (in the closed position) either centered on the width or possibly the two combined with a little bit of each one hanging off the edge in empty space. I'll be doing some tests in aluminum to see how the pattern looks now that I have, just moment ago, gotten the treadle hammer to a rough but functional state. Onward! John

A quick update here as this one comes along: My time in the “big shop” has run out, but I got done what I needed to on this. I will do a bit of ornamentation, peen over the pivot and adjust the action a bit and then it will be ready!

Dang. The "All Activities" title gave it away. But this is where it ended up. "Kris-inspired" dagger is finished. I will probably still make a suitable scabbard. The handle is a wenge core with olive(beak), maple(neck/claws) and amazique(wings) inlay. Eyes are malachite beads. Hey, told you I am a woodworker... HandleView.mp4 FWIW, the damascus contrast still did not come out as desired. I even ordered a gallon of Gatorpiss Heavy and that did not did the trick either. But most antique kris samples are mostly black as well. Actually, the image below was my inspiration...

Some quick 120g grinding this morning to dust off the scale from heat-treat and some layers are poking through..

The tent is up!

It wasn’t today, but I etched a knife I had last week. This thing has been kicking around for a year or two. Vaguely kukri like. This might go to the raffle at the hammer in if I can get a sheath done.

Starting to build stock for a small show. A couple Forged In Fire judges are putting together a small thing in Culpepper mid-November, should be fun.

Some projects call for the shine.

I've been finding an hour here and there to work on the liners. Still pretty rough, but slow and steady will get there. Layout and initial work gets done with the liners clamped together. The idea is to have the vines mirror each other on each side of the frame. When the rough-in is done and the excess area removal started. I reassemble the handle to see how it looks and where things need mor work. Still a long ways to go on these.

Continuation... The missing piece was now the scabbard. For typical Kris, this is a straight wooden sheath with a rather massive boat-shaped top piece that can be simple or richly decorated with carvings, metal inlays, jewelry etc. I am not sure about the purpose of the heavy top piece but since the weapon is usually carried in a broad sash belt, this may prevent it from slipping through. I copied the shape from a similar weapon but gave it my own inlay decorations. This is bloodwood base material with maple and acacia inlays: After carving, assembly, sanding and finishing: That's it folks. Ready for the next project (after the hammer-in trip).

Typical me, I get a great start on something and let it sit until it is almost a crisis to finish. I filed the shape to the thumb rest while listening to my favorite NFL team get absolutely trounced. Then I managed to get the blade heatreated. This one will be pretty easy to finish grind and get to a final finish. I've been practicing a bit with the engraving. I'm terrible at it, but I got tired of doing little lines and curves so I've started practicing the actual text I want to put on this knife. This is the first couple of attempts. There is some improvement from the first (larger) attempt to the second. Maybe if I do this a dozen more times, I'll be able to finish the knife without making a mess of it Reminds me of when I was a little kid. I'd draw some scribbles on a piece of paper and ask my mom if it spelled anything.

Finished up the troddel.

I resent that accusation! I'll post some soon, catching up on the 50,000 emails that came in over the two days I took off. Bill said he'd send video highlights as well, but he's got over 400 hours (!) of video to edit.

Just starting a new set:

Last night I worked on shaping the brass trim strip to the sabre handle profile, first I annealed the brass (have to say using Google search for general questions has provided a wealth of info--it searches all sword making/metal working references!) Then I hand bent the strip to follow the shape of the wood, re-heating and annealing where bending needed a little more give or had to go in another direction--using clamps. I'm very pleased with how it worked out. Did a test solder of the trim piece to the brass plate that will be sandwiched between the tang and wood handle piece. Eric, thanks for the suggestion to use scotchbrite to take the sharp edges of the etch off--will try this when back in the shop.

Slowly but surely getting there! Hopefully the title makes sense now, some silver ten zogan to dress up the handle and give the knife its name pictorially. Still left is patination and setting the pivot. I usually do this chemically, but left all of that setup in the States with my family, so I will try out a heat patina to protect the copper and give some more contrast to the silver.

You can certainly try rewelding it. Vinegar alone should work, not sure why the salt? Clean the seams with a wire brush, flux, and try. As an absolute last resort, if the delams are open, pry them open further and pack with sugar mixed with cast iron filings. Do this hot. The sugar adds carbon and helps hold the iron filings in the crack, which also adds carbon. The higher the carbon content, the lower the welding temperature. Doesn't always work, but when it does it's a neat trick.

Quoting Josh from back in July, never realized retirement would be so busy. Was crazy busy with work right up to my last day. Retired August 3 and have not stopped working on projects (the one's I told my wife "when I retire"). Have spent a lot of time in the wood shop but no time in the metal shop since last year. Hoping to get some work going soon, but the room renovations are taking all my time now. As Josh also said "you guys are rocking it". I decided to stop early today and catch up on this forum. @Joshua States I was back 7 pages...🤣.

For the raffle. Two with felt markers and one with carbide scribe tip. Oops, that was supposed to be in the hammer-in thread...

Well, it's coming, like it or not! This year we'll have Clark Ironworks presses and forges, the steel guy from last year, and KMG for sure, don't know about other vendors. As usual, we're woefully unprepared, but somehow it'll all be okay!

In a shocking turn of events... my first attempt at forge welding appears to have mostly worked... i can cut off the delams. I'm honestly amazed i thought my welds weren't going to take. Charcoal at melting hot heat no flux of any kind 60 grit sandpaper the pieces in the stack, 5 piece stack. I never let the steel get below HOT HOT i dunno what colour, blazing orange with sunglasses on? the first ten or so hits i hit it real gentle a few times then put it back in the forge. Really excited.

All this talk about making a TC from scratch reminds me of an old blacksmith saying: "Why buy something for $50 when you can make it yourself for $75?"

Today in my diary of a bladesmithin' noob, i quenched this W1 long knife - was over 10" blade, in warm/hot salt water. It was a warp which in tried to correct with a wooden mallet when i pulled it from the water. tip broke off. grain pretty coarse. i had normalized four times. This was the first one i shaped with a file prior to heat treat, and, i regret nothing. sanded it a bit, no cracks i can see... yet. often my blades have cracks which i assume come from the harsh water quench. The insanity keeps me doing it this way. Anyhow, i'm feeling very lucky that i made this knife overly long, and only the tip broke. Next time to fix a warp, i think i'll stick to gloved-hand straightening or just re-quenching it after straightening. A few hours later... Had a second break during a straightening attempt. Steel grain is very coarse. I would have thought my four normalizes would have meant it would not be this bad, but, they could have been too hot, i might've really blown it up overheating for the quench, many ways this could go wrong. As i look at my broken blade and come to terms with the fact that i'm going to need to reforge part of it and try to seriously reduce this grain size, i appreciate more and more all the veteran bladesmiths, as the more i try and fail, the more i realize how significant subtle differences in time and temperature are; knowing when to stop hammering the steel, making sure not to overheat it by knowing when to move it. I keep trying and hoping i will get the hang of it, as i did with several other skills in this craft. Still a long ways to go, but not in a rush. I think this is the first activity i've done that feels like true "recreation" as in, i come away from it refreshed and feeling like i can focus better on my day job and the like.

I started the filing process on the thumb pad and also rough ground the blade. I used a jeweler's saw to cut in the relief for the tang in the back of the handle, then filed it to final length.

Or do this step at night.

What Brian said. Doing this outside in the sun makes it nigh impossible to tell how hot you really are. Anything you can rig for shade will help.

There is nothing wrong with primitive, so don't let that worry you. Judging temperature by color in the sunlight is extremely difficult to do. Very experienced smiths will often burn up a part trying to forge in the sunlight. I suspect you are getting the blade too hot during normalization, and for too long. The grain grows faster at higher temperatures, and you want to avoid spending any time over the transition temp for most steels. Look up decalescence and use that is your temperature guide for the transition temp. It might be very difficult to see the shadows form in sunlight even with your muffle tube. You'd find this much easier to judge if you can create some deep shade for yourself.

Kurt Cobain......brought it to the fore for me.... I heard that song for years before I understood what it was referring to ... "Here we are now ...Entertain us" ..... Us boomers didn't know how lucky we were to live before the internet.... we had to seek out knowledge on your own.... now 'Knowledge" is a thumb prompt away on a tiny screen... I know one 18 year old who has little use for the internet and lives and works in the physical world...... I handed him a "tang saw" that I had made to clean out a slot to receive a tang , and a pair of calipers .and a file ... a few hours later he handed me his copy that was within a .001" ..... I smiled cause I knew he was capable of accomplishing it ..... There are newbies who are learning on their own but I do agree that the majority of the next generations are more aligned with Nirvana ......BUT like in Fahrenheit 451 there is always going to be a few living out beyond the end of the tracks keeping the knowledge......

I think the one on the right has more information.....are you being judged on your work or the photo? I'm assuming this is a catalog that goes out to the public to attract attendees and potential buyers? because your invited this is not a photo to be accepted to show correct? if I was a buyer I'd want to see as much of the work as I could .....especially if I was depending on the photo as to wether I would want to attend the show to see it live....

A36 usually has enough manganese to make a water quench a bad idea. If you can find a low-Mn 1020 that might do it.

Well, the lighting is better on the handle detail, so that's something. It's not as good on the blade detail, though. Can you send them both?

Thank you Spencer! I find that I've read way more about this than i've had practical experience/hours trying it, when i read your post, it occurred to me that i didn't interrupt my quench soon enough, and probably ended up mostly cooling the blade then whacking it in a hardened state. I remember going into the quench planning on pulling the blade out quickly, but when i'm actually on the ground trying to do this, i think my mind gets tied up with all the multitasking, other issues arise - i often start running out of charcoal, all the brain power i have goes into trying to get a thorough even heat, it is really quite an art, what you folks do, and I do suspect it takes a great deal of insanity to continue? if so i will do my best to stay crazy. At least a little bit. Canola oil - logically i know you are right, and i spend more money on less important things - but i'm still trying to wrap my mind around buying enough canola vs buying pickling salt as salt is cheap and canola is, i suppose arguably cheap, but much more expensive. I'm currently playing with the idea of learning to do simple forge welding so that i can effectively lower the carbon content of steel i have by welding it with A36 mild and ending up with a 0.55-0.60ish % carbon steel as i can only buy 1045 or 1075 and nothing between those. the goal would be to "make" a steel that is good to water quench. Logically i'm sure it will be more expensive than just buying enough canola oil, but logically i also know i'm pretty illogical! I really appreciate you taking the time to post here and help advise me because as i read through your post it helps solidify those concepts which i one day hope to pull off effectively

Nice to see your progress! Your doing what you can with what you have- and probably everyone has broken a few 😀 If you can get a gallon or two of canola oil, that might help with the stress of the steel. I know that’s not what you said broke the blade- but it will be less harsh than even warm salt water. It’s what I use and it hardened 1095 for me, which is somewhat similar to W1. Another thing: I don’t know if you know this, but it’s worth noting. If you are cooling the blade “fully” or letting it cool all the way in the water, I wouldn’t try to straighten it. You obviously want to let it in the quench long enough to harden, but you can pull it out while it’s still piping hot and straighten it then. You have a window where it will move although quenched. If I see a warp right out of the quench, I’ll put it in my vise to cool. Or you can cautiously hammer it (scary!) or wear gloves.

Raw silk sword bag. Hand corded cotton that is then four strand round braided with hand made four corner tassels.

Hehe, you both responded in the time it took me to type an edit! I'll have to pick up my game! 🤣

Some micro pics. Top photo is of the top surface after wire brushing. The largest spacing of the secondary arms is about 1/32 of an inch .

Others have chimed in with great info. I just want to reiterate a couple points. Welded joints (oxyacetylene, TIG, or capacitive discharge) are very good, easy to do, and highly recommended Really watch out for all your connections and introducing unintentional metal combinations. Check a few known temperatures every time you build a new TC setup. Boiling water is great for this. A generic voltage reader works, but I HIGHLY recommend getting a dedicated device to read the output voltage and automatically convert to temperature. Looking at charts or entering formulas while dealing with things at temp isn't fun; it just adds to the stress of the moment. One like Josh linked is great. I use an old controller that had the controller aspect fried, but the readout still worked. It was being thrown away, so free was great.

The irregularity on the bottom of the ingot was refractory material. The crucible is made of two clam shells glued together with refractory. The pieces must have fallen to the floor before filling with metal ….and adhered to the hot floor before they could float away.

I can't improve on what Jim said. My motto is "People are stupid." Myself included! See Gerald Boggs' thread on "raw pure iron" for an excellent example. All we can do is educate where we can, and let the idiots be idiots where we can't. As another saying goes, never try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig. Exactly. And Amanda has good points as well. Every year at my guild we get maybe 8-10 folks who want to make knives. Most of them stop showing up after two or three meetings when they find out it's not as easy as it looks. But there's always one or two who stay. We had a kid who started showing up with his parents when he was 12. They'd drive an hour over the mountain just to bring him. He mostly just watched, but as we encouraged him he started working on it seriously. Last year (10 or so years after he started) he graduated from the American College of the Building Arts in Charleston, SC with a degree in decorative ironwork. This is his sole-authorship senior project: There's always hope for the future of the craft, you just can't let the idiots bring you down.