Doug Lester

A lot of great talent shown there. Doug

Others may not agree but I like to cool to black and check the blade with a magnet to be sure that phase change has occurred before returning the steel to the forge.. The magnet should stick to the steel. Doug

Ya, I guess it's one of those cases where you wish you could really examine the blade. Doug

Looks good. I see from your layout lines how you are going to deal with that bolt hole. My one concern is the thickness of the stock that you started out with. My impressions from the khurkuris that I have made from the car springs is that they're rather thick and might produce an overly heavy blade. But all in all I think that it's coming along nicely. Keep posting your progress. Doug

I agree with Charles. Especially #1, even though I wasn't able avail myself of classes.. Remember that Charles lives in a smaller country and isn't faced with traveling from central Illinois to eastern Arkansas or Montana or any other distant place. One thing that I noticed is it doesn't appear in the photos that you gave it much of a primary bevel. I'd try to take it up more to the spine. It's a must that you learn to make the steel do what you want it to do. If you haven't started a library, videos included, on knife making. I would suggest [i]The Master Bladesmith[/i] by Jim Hrisoulas to start with. Kevin Cashin has some good videos that you can find on the American Bladesmith Society store. Doug

Very clean looking work. They look like they would make you want to go chop some wood, almost. Doug

Love the handle and guard. I can't imagine the process of enamaling wood. The sword makes you want to pick it up to see how it feels. Doug

Top notch work The long one looks like it has some mosaic work in it. Doug

As illustrated by the museum picture, organic parts of a knife/sword rarely survive so it's hard to say that your selection of handle material is wrong. I agree that the handle of the knife is as impressive as the blade and I am handy to see that you chose to duplicate the stub tang on the blade. As you see from the museum photo, the size and shape of the tangs can vary a lot. The smaller knife is also quite impressive. You, sir, have real talent. Doug

The more I look at it the better it gets. Doug

Amazing little boot knife. Doug

Top notch work, Faye. I'm sure you sister loves it. Doug

Thanks. Doug

Great looking! What are the dimensions of the sword? Doug

Good job. I like the slight recurve to the blade. Doug