Getting Ambitious... WIP

[Caleb Harris]

As a lot of you probably know, I've been homeschooled my entire life, and so have taken a variety of courses. My favorite highschool English course I took pretty early on; the One Year Adventure Novel curriculum, which is on (obviously) writing a novel in the space of a school year. The approach to English in this curriculum is a focus on that of story, rather than grammar. Anyway, it is through this course and it's community that I've met some of the best friends I've ever known, and the author of the course is an amazing and inspiring guy. So, wanting to push my skills, I decided "Hey, why not try a themed dagger?"

 

So that's what I'm doing. This is way out of my skill set but so far it's being one of those beautiful projects that just hasn't messed up yet (I probably shouldn't say that until after quench), and besides, I feel the need to get out of my comfort zone. I've done one or two daggers before, one I'm proud of, the rest not so much, so I did some reading and took it slow.

 

To start off, here's some of the sketches and associated video (excuse my drabbling off and otherwise ineloquence) before I started whacking hot steel. I'm going for a roughly 11-inch blade including ricasso, frame handle construction, a compass symbol (still not sure how I'll do that; originally it would've been a separate medallion sort of piece but I'm probably going to have it engraved), whatever other symbolism I figure out along the way, and still looking for some nice maple burl or something to shoot for the look of yellowed old paper. Fittings will probably be copper, oxidized a bit to get an aged look.

 

The latter photo is the cumulative design of what I'm going with. I suppose it's not the best way to go about things, but I generally start with a design then frequently make deviations if I get better ideas or need modifications as I go.

 

I tend to post most everything on instagram so a lot of this will be links to videos on there.

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BHSNP7fhCZD/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

 

[Caleb Harris]

First heat: https://www.instagram.com/p/BHSNP7fhCZD/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

Someone taught me this trick of forging not on the corner of the tip itself but behind it a little ways to prevent pinching in on itself. Doesn't work as well if you want a rounded belly but for a long taper it's beautiful.

 

Had some fun with the camera and put together a few forging videos. Beveling the dagger was tricky but thanks to a couple ABS videos of sessions with Kevin Cashen I got a pretty good idea of what to do. https://www.instagram.com/p/BHS3pvchEbH/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq
And guess what; I didn't corkscrew it! Forging this was a blast and went much better than I expected. One of those rare blades that happen exactly as you want it to. Afterwards I compared it to my original full-size design and I was millimeters away from a perfect match, with no guide other than a rough length. Sketching really does cement in your mind what you want.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BHTL_D4hJ68/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

Weirdly enough it was the tang that required some fighting to keep symmetrical; I got a little too ambitious with the hammer by the end.

And finally some normalizing with the recaelescence (or however you spell it) effect:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BHVCvEZhiKw/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

 

And forged and profiled blade:

 

[Joshua States]

Well then.

I haven't had time to check all the instawhatever posts, but I like what I see here. (even though I really do not like coffin handles....)

Very nice drawings and forging.

[Caleb Harris]

Well then.

I haven't had time to check all the instawhatever posts, but I like what I see here. (even though I really do not like coffin handles....)

Very nice drawings and forging.

Thank you. This one's getting fun

[Kevin Colwell]

nice approach to making this. I can't draw even little stick figures, but I like to have an idea of what I am making before I start. This should come out to be rockin'. Keep us posted along the way. There are a lot of pins in that handle, too. Use a spotting or stub drill first (I just screwed one up because I let a drill bit wander).

 

looking forward to more.

[Caleb Harris]

Okay, sorry about the lack of updating here. Just because I felt a big lack of draw filing in my extreme newbie days and because I really needed to make sure everything was even, draw filing is what I did for most of this.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BHZ14fXh6aU/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

 

I ended up cleaning it up on the 80 grit to keep sharp bevels.

 

 

Then it was on to heat treat. Good gosh this took me for a spin. First though a timelapse of my applying the clay. Due to a failed HT (I'll get to that in a second) the final claying was much thinner than this one.

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BHiv6mQBqi5/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

 

Then a video of the quench. This ended up failing: only the last two or three inches hardened, due to a variety of reasons.

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BHi94sVhiS0/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

 

But, the blade wasn't ruined. So normalize, reclay, retry, this time (as suggested by Cris) I did an interrupted quench, 4 seconds into brine, 4 out, 10 into the canola. That did it, thankfully.

 

Put it in the toaster oven for tempering, went for about 4 hours, and I thought I was in the clear. No such luck. Warp, of course. I tried straightening outside the oven, something I should have sworn off, but I did it and it bit me. Took two inches off the tip, but thankfully clear of the clay. The blade is now at 9 inches including the ricasso. The warp was at the tip anyway, so that's not a problem, and the blade is safe, but it's thrown the dimensions off by quite a bit and I'm not sure if I'll have to start over or not. I'll do some sketching and see if the reduced length is okay. The silver lining is the shortened length means it may give me just the right ratio for a golden ratio handle to blade thing so it might work out. That, and the grain's pretty good.

 

[Timothy Artymko]

The tip breaking really sucks, but it's looking great! and that grain is something to be real happy about as well!

[Kevin Colwell]

I have sworn off of clay on double-edged blades. Forever.

[Caleb Harris]

I have sworn off of clay on double-edged blades. Forever.

I probably will too. At this point I've ground so much off it's probably too deep in now to show, but I'm not exactly experienced when it comes to clay quenches.

[Caleb Harris]

So got the rough grinding done and roughed in the plunges, now starting to move up the grits. I'm pretty happy with it so far, and I think I'll keep it. To be honest, I believe it's actually the perfect length to fit with the golden ratio in relation to the handle.

 

[Luke Shearer]

Dang, that's crisp! looking good.

[Austin_Lyles]

Looking beautiful sir. Keep up the good work.

[Dave Stephens]

Keep at it, man! Great project!

 

Dave

[Caleb Harris]

Thanks all!

 

Unfortunately shop renovations are suddenly up so this'll delay more work on the dagger, the blade of which is done in all but hand sanding and etching (so like timewise it's halfway done LOL). I've done a lot of grinding so I have no idea if the hamon is gonna show up or what. I'll also use this time to order some materials and the like. This tip and throat sheath is going to be tough; I am no leatherworker.

[Caleb Harris]

And back in the shop. During my shop-absence I ordered some stabilized cherry burl scales that very closely match the yellowed paper look I'm going for, so excited to get those. Also on the update, when I went to pick up some 1/16" pins at the hardware store, I found some 1/16" tube and that got me thinking, why not try setting some garnets or something? I used to be part of a local gem club and I got okay at stonesetting and cabbing, so maybe it's time to start that up again.

 

So after sanding the blade to 1500 grit I started prepping for the guard. I don't have any stock already in the right shape, so that meant casting an ingot. Always a cool process, I absolutely love copper. The first metal I ever worked with.

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BITuOX-Bf1O/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

 

So that's that for the ingot cast. Absolutely beautiful, nuggets of copper. Next I did some forging to draw it out, which I'm not done with. Have to be careful with constantly annealing and redoing.

 

Anyway, back to the blade. During this time I tried etching in vinegar, with no result. Yes it was cold, but it was for a good while and I'd expect at least a hint of the hamon to show, but nada. There's a variety of plausible reasons, but the edges are hardened up so I think I'll continue with it.

On that note, I'm liking the acid darkening quite a bit. Think a dark blade will look okay with brown copper fittings and light yellow-brown scales?

[Caleb Harris]

Actually on the note of the hamon, I'd like some of y'alls opinions. This is a photo of the tip just after it broke off, and you can see some little dark sections where the arrow is pointing, right under where the clay would be, but pretty shallow. Do you think this is ferrite, and the lighter section is martensite? If so, this could explain my lack of hamon showing up; I just ground too deep post-HT. Thoughts?

 

[Austin_Lyles]

Looks sweet! And I like your crucible. I don't think you can grind too deep to completely remove a hamon. Although... I skimmed through and couldn't find what steel you were using. From the cross cut, it looks to be fully hardened through. Generally with a hamon, I have large grain in the un-hardened portion and extremely fine in the hardened.

[Caleb Harris]

Looks sweet! And I like your crucible. I don't think you can grind too deep to completely remove a hamon. Although... I skimmed through and couldn't find what steel you were using. From the cross cut, it looks to be fully hardened through. Generally with a hamon, I have large grain in the un-hardened portion and extremely fine in the hardened.

Interesting... I'm using 1084. Perhaps the rutlands didn't have enough of an effect?

[Brian Dougherty]

OK, I shouldn't post things that I am not certain about, but I believe the 1084 from Aldo has relatively high manganeese content which would increase it's hardenability. If that is where you got your 1084, then it may have hardened deeper than some other steels.

Edited July 26, 2016 by Brian Dougherty

[Austin_Lyles]

1084 is not ideal for hamons (not much ashi or activity) due to the manganese, however it should take one at the very least. Perhaps it was the rutlands.

[Caleb Harris]

OK, I shouldn't post things that I am not certain about, but I believe the 1084 from Aldo has relatively high manganeese content which would increase it's hardenability. If that is where you got your 1084, then it may have hardened deeper than some other steels.

Yep that's where it's from. See with the rutlands or the steel I'm not sure about what the real effect is. I still have the broken tip so I could probably sand that and try etching it to see the effect

[Emiliano Carrillo]

Yeah I've had no luck with getting a good Hamon on 1084 from Aldo, and I always use rutlands. I've done the same routine with 1075 etc and gotten fine results I was always under the impression like Brian said that the manganese is just too high to get a good differential heat treat.

 

This is looking great by the way Caleb! I like your ingot casting setup and the crispness of your grind lines!

[Krateros]

this looks great so far.looking forward to see this finished.

[Caleb Harris]

Long time no update eh? Heh.

 

Here's the pieces for the dagger, you can see I've drawn out the guard a bit

 

 

What started to happen was instead of a square rod I started to get a diamond shape, rather than correct it, I decided "heeey why not?" and ran with it. So here's the roughly forged guard.

 

 

Fitting the guard after cleaning up the face a bit...

 

 

Now here I started to run into some complications. The piece I'm using for the frame is too thin to drill for a threaded rod brazed to the tang, so instead I'll do a bolt through the handle rather than a pommel nut. The head of this bolt will be the compass symbol, which originally I had planned to be engraved into the ricasso.

“In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable

 

Eisenhower right?

https://www.instagram.com/p/BIXwcXThGCP/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

 

Anyway, here we are with the shaping of the guard. Lots and lots of filing, planning, marking, and more filing. All the geometrical planning on the guard makes me feel like Peter Jonsson.

 

 

It's not too hard, just the tough part is getting it symmetrical and slowing myself down so I don't rush through it.

 

 

Fun fact: most of the shaping was over one afternoon, and here in the CA valley it was roughly 110 F in the shop. So my sweat started bleeding the dye from my shirt (blue) so I suddenly noticed my arms had that blue-green tinge. Exactly the same color as the skin's natural acid reaction with copper. Not knowing if I was going to get copper poisoning from the tons of filing and sanding I was doing, I got worried for a bit until I figured out it was the shirt.

 

ANYWAY, back to the guard. Once it was shaped I used the slit dremel bit with a strip of sandpaper trick to sand the thing to 400...

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BIa1O_ABVCJ/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BIc49mZh9L5/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

 

...then wire brush it for some texturing.

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BIc5W_dBq3m/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

 

Now funny thing about the above video, is somehow it seems to be extremely popular compared to anything else I've posted on instagram. My average will be 150 likes or so, and views roughly 500. For some wacky reason, the plain video of me wire brushing the guard is at 18,000 views and 350 likes, and counting. I don't understand instagram at all.

 

Anyway, I then started work on the bolster piece. I decided to do a Japanese style construction for it: carve the two halves then stick 'em together.

 

 

Also I'm starting to regret going down to 1/16" for the pins, I snapped two bits just drilling the bolster.

 

The pieces all fit together. Unfortunately the guard wasn't completely flat so that's coming back to bite me for the fitting now. Got some reworking to do.

 

https://www.instagram.com/p/BIc9FP2BXS4/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

 

And finally the wood for the handle came in. I was going for a yellowed paper look and found some nice stabilized cherry burl that matched it pretty darn close.

 

 

Now I need some advice. I want to get it darkened all around the borders of the handle, sort of like this: http://oneyearnovel.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/OYAN-LOGO-parchment-190pxH-final.png

Any suggestions for getting that darkened border look? Maybe a couple gentle passes over a flame?

 

 

 

 

 

[Caleb Harris]

Now working on the frame. First to grind flat:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BIoJuhIB8VX/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq

After cutting out for the tang, epoxying on the spacers (kydex) and fitting up the tang, this is what I had thus far:

Then I went back and cleaned up the bolster pieces a bit. The sixteenth inch pins are tight, but I don't want to risk making it too easy. It requires some firm tapping to put in the pins currently.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BIrYsNeBw_Z/?taken-by=bladesofbelaq