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long ago there was a guy on here names Dick Sexstone , he was the first guy I ever saw that would treat a knife as a canvas. He made a knife that wasn't just themed if was a picture, he had a technique he demoed at ashoken one year he called "die displaced damascus" that he used to make landscapes, in damascus. (among other things) the idea of patterning a picture is something that suck with me for a long time now. recently I saw Joshua Prince do a piece with a plug welded "moon", that gave me the idea to do a moon rise or sunset, I started playing around with this piece. (it took seve

Just finished this guy for my table at Blade show, 400 layer ladder pattern blade this some of the most chatoyant steel I have ever made, the video doesn't do it justice. Nickel silver guard, curly maple handle inlaid in silver in a pattern based of one of Bill Moran's knives . Knife is a full take down assembled with a twist pattern Damascus nut. MP PXL_20220519_172854535.mp4 PXL_20220519_173034584.mp4

This is the last of the giant bronze age dirks that I still had to finish (cast and finished 3 of them years ago). It's been held back by a lot of time being a dad, building a room for my daughter, extra pressure due to Covid restrictions on the family, arranging the wedding ceremony, having to restore my 70+ year old cargo tricycle to be used during the wedding and many, many other things in between that did not left me with time and energy to finish it. Many hours went into it of filing with tiny needle files getting in all the corners and surfaces, sanding, polishing. Now after nearly 3 yea

Early style knife forged from 5160, walnut scales and pewter bolsters

Phillip seems to be having fun:

I'm experimenting with using gallery wire for ferrules. Seems to be working so far...

I started in Oct 2018 with files and a map gas torch. I wanted to try first with something small so I designed a 3 finger fixed blade pocket knife 3 1/2 years later, I just finished my 60th knife Here is one of my recent projects. a traditional tanto

For disposal, can we just flush this stuff down the toilet?

The purpleheart handle is the 3rd, a take on a Japanese chefs knife. The cocobolo handle is intentionally rough and heavy, not sure what a good use for it would be, just playing around. Both are made from 1084 and were freehand stock removal. I have two more that are almost done, my first attempts at forging - not nearly has pretty, but functional I am happy with them, I am starting to understand how to cut in lines on the grinder. I only have a porter cable 4x36" benchtop with the 8" wheel and a harbor freight 1x30 right now. Working on building a 2x72. It is fun to dink aro

I'm sorry I didn't post this earlier. All the equipment has been claimed. Thanks guys. Dave

A box of handle blocks and scales turned up today after having given it up as lost some time back. Some beautiful Chittim, which is anew one for me along with spalted silver maple, spalted hackberry, rosewood burl, dyed cottonwood, maple burls, hickory burl, desert ironwood and yarran.

Getting there slowly. This has been a very challenging project.

Most use the gas stay or strut from a hatch back. Most car parts outlets have them. Use it upside down so the grit does not impact on the seal.

Have got a new design done that will cover the small knife/EDC hunter needs that was mentioned on a hunt forum . It is the Chamois Hunter with 3 1/2 inch 1084 blade and this prototype has Rosewood handles over orange G10 spacers and brass bolster. I used orange G10 pins in the handle. with the chamois Hunter, a Bird and trout with camel bone handles on the NitroV ss blade, this makes the second pair for the youth hunt comp.

The edge has to be honed after being sharpened to at least #3000. I do this with my #10000 water stone, edge first and very low pressure, often just the weight of the blade. You switch side every pass. I've done it with the #6000 side of a King stone with good result as well. Then I strop on a leather board with fine diamond paste. edit: not that it has any practical use... it's just for the fun of it and makes nice marketing vids Yet, I have found that a fine polished edge stays sharp longer with just the occasional strop.

I saw a user who made this tool, how much could it move as a load?

You can get hair whittling sharp with just a 30$ King 1000/6000 water stone. It's about the technique.

I learned just about everything I needed to know from a not-so-sober-Bowie when I shared a hotel room with him one night at Larry's hammer-in. There's a price for some knowledge.

Glued this together last night. This is a fairly faithful interpretation of what an authentic early 18th century sgian dubh might have looked like, though it's not a direct copy, more an amalgam of 3 originals. The steel is 1075+Cr, 3mm thick and 3 1/2" long, which I normalised 3x at descending heats and cycled a few times just around critical to drop the hardenability. The handle is elm, with simple basketweave carving, stained and given a single coat of finishing oil. The sheath is less authentic, as it will be used for hunting, so I added a belt loop and reinforced it with rivets. The secon

It's interesting. From the look of it it will use an enormous amount of gas to run it. It does have the look of thing built for shop that had certain regulations to abide by. It's very complicated and it doesn't really need to be. If it's all hard surface in the fire box, that is the first issue. It will be slow to heat to working temps, and expensive to keep at working temps. It probably was designed to run 24/7 so that you would only have to pay the startup cost once over several days. Out of curiosity, how big are the injector jets? For propane they should be on the order of

Two for neighbours kitchens. the General purpose kitchen knife is what my wife uses most and a good friend of hers wanted one. A handle of Dyed Karelian Birch sets it off nicely with the gold flecs of undyed wood highlighting the green. A 5 inch Cryo quenched NitroV Stainles blade. this one in trade with another neighbour has brass bolster, blue G10 liners under the impala jigged buffalo horn handle on the 7 1/2 inch cryo quenched NitroV Chef knife.

Amazon has multiple choices for sale. I searched " 6" gas strut" and came up with several pages. You can choose pressure in poundage as well.

Fiebing's leather dye , Med Brown. trick is to sand back between coats up to 800 grit then use 0000 wool and several coats of oil. MP

I used Buckeye Engraving, and am happy with what I got.

Thank you gentlemen. I sharpened the meat sword I was trying to finish, will stop to have my makers mark engraved tomorrow on the way out of town. So.....I made a start yesterday afternoon. Depth wise I was spot on, 45cm (17"), but sadly only 12cm (4.7") wide, definitely going with the 4mm D6. @Joshua States @Gerald Boggs get what you're saying, but don't take it so seriously, I fully expect him to carry it once if they're not walking too far, then just a cool and hopefully somewhat usable toy @Geoff Keyes that first one you mention is in the ballpark, except I can't

These are a few that I've made. Some of these are part of a proto run for a project that tanked. 8 proto's went to the fellow who convinced me to make them (4 long, 4 short) and then he promptly ghosted me. I'm still angry about it, but what can you do? The third from the top is the real problem child. I like the size and I like the wood handle and I like the shape under the head. The issue is that the curved cutting face puts the center of impact too far up the edge and it tends to strike too high. Top is a fantasy piece. I'm really waiting for someone to come along and

If it were me making this, I would just search “tactical full tang hatchet” and pick out one I liked and could make with the least amount of effort. Because in the end, a hatchet, tomahawk, or big kill knife, are just fashion accessories. I can only think of two situations where I could have used a hatchet, and that was in survival school and jungle warfare school. In the case of survival, not allowed, and JWS, we had issue machetes.

The reviewer makes mention of the lack of "dragons breath" as being a good thing. Perhaps for his use that's a good thing. If you have no flame out the door, you have what is called an oxidizing environment. There is free O2 in the fire box. This contributes to scale. Even in a fairly scale free atmosphere you can lose 1% of your material per heat. It makes for pits and holes and other sorts of issues. In particular, it makes welding operations difficult. If you have flame out the door, that is called a reducing environment. You are burning up all of the O2 in the fire box and

I have a septic system. If there's fish in there, I don't wanna know about it.

I believe that past a certain point, it should be called honing Speaking of honing, I believe straight razors honing techniques did help me understand how to get an edge this sharp.

We've kind of skipped all around the topic, but never had a truly dedicated thread. This one and this one come the closest.

Nope, never did.

I thought it would be fun to explore some Japanese handle making tools! I apologize if I get any terminology wrong, still working on memorizing it all. My plan is to make a smaller 2" or so Japanese Plane (Kanna) complete with the dai but no chip breaker(from my understanding that was a later introduction and it should still be functional without), A handle or scabbard chisel (Sayanomi), and a marking knife (Kiridashi). The plan right now (if you followed my KITH last year you know how good I am to sticking to plans..>_>) is to forge the Sayanomi out of some 1085 round bar I

I would be interested in a more detailed overall photo, especially the front door. Just from that, I found several pictures similiar online. Johnson gas makes several kinds of ovens/forges/heaters... and is still in business 100+ years later. You could definately contact them, and learn more about it. Especially how it was originally configured, and what it was made to do/ handle. https://www.johnsongas.com/product-category/industrial-furnaces/forge-furnaces/

I saw that on IG and was wondering about the plug. Looking good, Matt!

I remember Dick doing that. Very cool project, Matt, always great to see you here.

That looks more like a dedicated heat treaters oven than a forge, and looks like it would run on the oxidizing end of things, not unlike the old Johnson trench forges used for repointing jackhammer bits. Maybe a glassblower's oven? Geoff has good advice. The solenoid was just to cut the gas if electricity went out, which doesn't make much sense if there's not a forced air source for the thing.

Impressive.

Wow, holy hamon landscape! Looks great!

Been practising a little. Still a long way to go, but this one kinda looks like a scroll.

Some more work... Turns out an 1/16" drill bit is just the right size for 14gauge copper wire.

The forge body is 4 fire bricks that can be found at tractor supply or ordered onlinehere. https://www.fleetfarm.com/detail/united-states-stove-company-single-firebrick/0000000249442?gclid=CjwKCAiA1uHSBRBUEiwAkBCtzZJMEfhYV6vX7HNwhz-HHXM19gjboLq8XWd9yQFLrxvlBP-qXZa04hoC-oEQAvD_BwE Then you will need 2 pieces of angle iron 8 inches long with 1/4 inch holes drilled about 3/4 of an inch in from the ends in the corner of the V. And you will need 2 pieces of 1/4 inch threaded rod 12 inches long and 4- 1/4 inch nuts and washers. You will need a 3/4 inch or 1 inch concrete bit also to d

This piece is massive, I believe that is an 8" (20 cm) caliper for scale (I can never find anything when I need it). 8" overall is a about 3.5 inch blade length. Is that what you're after? Geoff

And finally a few glamor shots. This was technically a commission, but mostly a labor of love. The customer has been a friend for over 40 years, and his eldest son is the only person I have held as a baby other than my own children. (Babies are oozy messes and I don't like to touch them) There wasn't a very big budget to work with, but I felt compelled to fill in the gaps on this one a bit. Thanks for following along!

I made the bolsters out of nickel silver. I simply superglued a couple of patterns to a bar of stock And cut them out... I superglue one of them to the blade, and drill through the holes in the tang for some pins. Then I superglue the other bolster in place and drill back through the first bolster to put matching holes in second one. You can see the two drilled bolsters here after I had taken them off the blade. I like to ream pin holes when I want to make sure the pins disappear

I forget how far I stretched this out in the welding pass, but you can see the bar here: I ended up with a weld flaw in the middle of the bar that I could see as a shadow. However, I had way more steel than needed so I forged this down closer to the final width of the knife. I mostly created the profile by grinding, but I did have to do a bit of forging to get the shark fin how I wanted it, and to get the distal taper in such a way that I wouldn't loos all the 304 by grinding it in. I watched closely on the last forging steps to make sure I wasn't g

Bought small wheels a about a year ago .....been practicing on a couple of blades. If you prefer beating them in ...do that ....If you just like everything about blades ....buy them right away

1080/ 15N20 crushed W's eyed with Stainless fittings and maroon micarta scales.

Here is the link to the video. I hope this helps anyone who wants to get into this craft and dose not have a lot of resources such as welders and steel. The reason I used the hard brickbis because i have a pallet of them I won at auction for dirt cheap. This whole set up I have about $15 into it.

Tempering is such a low temperature operation that there are many ways to get it done. If you plan on doing swords on a regular basis, it might be worth it to build an oven. Ceramic fiber insulation and a stove pipe would work with either resistance coil or an element from an electric oven. I jury rigged my oven with a controller so it is pretty accurate. Jimmy has come up with a plan to use the heat treating forge, drum type with propane torches for tempering. Heating sand or glass beads, there are many ways to accomplish the task. The first choice is the kitchen oven, but swords quic