Gerhard Gerber

Said it before and I'll say it again, looking at the WIP and the rough assembled knife compared to the finished product there seems to be some magic happening inbetween.

The doc said he could stop eating red meat, but knowing what we're like all the gains would be erased by one overindulgence She recommended he donates blood

He's fine, thanks......will show off his sheath once done. He was also diagnosed with Hemachromatosis........too much iron in the blood, so I see some teasing coming!

Possible, Mike did most of it in his coal forge, we squared the last bit using my gas forge. it's about 0.5", and in the case of the oil and water it was in for a while....long enough for sure. The kiln is brand new, used by many in this part of the world, and going on other results no reason to doubt it. Klin to oil is 2 seconds at the most. My Google-Fu was not strong enough to find out what steel is used by Land Rover, there's a heap of info out there about the colour codes of the springs, but nothing about the steel used. I believe he wanted to make chisels for somebody that turns bowls on a lathe. I don't agree with the method of the steel. but not my circus. We used 830C as is suitable for 5160. I did not think of trying to snap it, it was a long day of forging, many beers were consumed, and by the time we got around to HT the sun was down and the beer finished Tested with a file, I got the impression it hardened, but not much. Considering the last quench was in water makes me suspect the steel is unsuitable.

My Dad (72) is busy building a monster sheath for the knife I made him, fire steel loop, little pouch on the front and everything..... So yesterday he's busy working on the sheath, checking the fit of the knife.......and he drops it.... I don't have to fix the tip, it pegged into his calf....blood pooled in his Croc, blood everywhere, two stitches and a Tetanus shot. It was this knife: https://www.bladesmithsforum.com/index.php?/topic/38188-dads-design/

I missed this post but I saw the knife on Facebook this morning.......simply stunning Wes!

All I can say is thank you again bladesmithsforum.com Not sure who gave the advice, but white-out as solder block and a brass chisel for cleaning up just saved me hours.

A friend wanted to make tools from Land Rover coil spring, he straightened it, we squared it up, folded it double and did the heat treat in my kiln using the parameters for 5160, quenched in oil and it did not harden Repeated and quenched in water, still no joy. At least.......not as hard as I would expect it to be......

Amen brother, my 3rd retrenchment/redundancy in a row, currently on a half-day/half-pay contract until October and no prospects.

I sharpened, or at least attempted to sharpen the two 14C28N steak knives Friday afternoon using my Lansky......the steel won, I resorted to the belt grinder and of course recurved the one blade slightly..... Saturday was spent on the couch, partially due to a stomach bug that seemingly doesn't want to let go...... Also in a bit of a funk because my knives are not selling. Fortunately the feedback is positive, but the shop where they are on display is mostly frequented by locals, and the economy in general is in the toilette.......no disposable income for handmade knives.... Ran straight into the fact that larger blades are just exponentially more work and my pricing is wrong....and 11 pins are too many most likely .........and I have to find work because a half-day contract and making knives in the afternoons seemingly won't cut it....

@Mike Krall thank you very much for the advice and additional information, much appreciated!

You absolutely cannot go by this, but FWIW O1 tool steel has a distinctive spark that to my eye is more orange than most and instead of sparks bursts has a kick at the end of the sparks.....if that makes ANY sense.

Arise necro thread...... I've been struggling to find info on normalizing 5160, at least info that makes sense. Came to the conclusion that I'm mixing up normalizing and annealing........although I still struggle to understand a normalizing temp higher than the quench temp....oh well, those are the facts. I have 3 large cleavers in 5160 that I treated rather badly with a hammer, and I would like to normalize them properly before HT. I'll be using the digital kiln because it's accurate and has proven to be rather economical as far as electricity is concerned. the only logical way I can think to do this is set the kiln to 870C, wait till it's up to temp and then put the blades in 1 at a time (they won't all fit)......but for how log? BTW the first 5160 blade I heat treated in the kiln looked like a carbon balloon when I peeked at 820C, I was worried about decarb, but it came out hard and I've never before had such nice even temper colour.

Sorry to interrupt the language lesson.......but I was shown a picture yesterday that immediately reminded on this year's KITH.... It's basically a folding blacksmith knife with the tail curved up & over and acting as a backspring with the very tip interfacing with a notch on the blade like any old slipjoint. Very cool I think, and I want to try and make one ASAP.

I've been working with a neighbour on occasion, Mike is more into tool making and he's taught himself much more of the art of smithing than I know. He helped me forge out some leaf springs to get more stock for making cleavers, and one one occasion he brought along a farrier's rasp to test whether we could clean up the sides. It does work, but not great IMO. I didn't check the state of the rasp before we started, but it was pretty much done for after out testing. I got the impression if ate the steel but skated on the scale......not 100% sure, just my impression.