KITH 2016

Just a refresh post on a knife I made over a year ago for a knife in the hat draw 2016.

Paring knife

Liked the last project so much that I have decided to make a pair of knives in a smaller version. Strongly considering making one with a stabilized and dyed Maple handle in a lighter version and bundling with the other knife in a two blade sheath.

Glory shot of the little ones in the furnace, removed before heating up and will be back in once the 600C temperature has been reached. That is the minimum temperature that a Condursal treated knife can be introduced to heat.

 

 

 

Post heat treating pose, no clean up needed after hitting with compressed air during plate quench.

 



Pinless Handle Experiment

Attempting a Pinless handle, creating separate post from the KITH 2017 post so everything in one subject is together.

 

Bolster and pommel are in place and ready for polishing and final shaping.

 

First step of fitting the wood slabs is creating a template from masking tape and second step is put the tape on the wood blocks then cut close to the correct shape.

 

 

Ideally the wood will be a snug fit so essentially the scales will stay in place without glue. In a perfect world the bolster and pommel curves will hold the wood but as you can see here I messed up a little on the Pommel.

 

Some more progress.

Wood glued on and preliminary shaping done.

 

 

 

Have a few scratches to fix on the pommel and bolster where I hit them with the sanding belt. a quick buff in these pictures at 800 grit to see what the handle will look like.

still have to go over everything with the 1200 and 2000 grit before waxing and giving the whole blade a final buffing.

 

couple test shots before sheath construction which is usually not as fun as it sounds. Figuring out a style to match the blade takes me way to long.

 





Skinner

A project a friend asked me to make for him based off of a knife he lost years ago. Forget the type or original company, old age and no notes to blame.

Blade is CPM 154 stainless steel, tempered back to a 59-60 HRc and cryogenic quench for 12 hours for improved wear resistance.
Handle is a curly maple that has been stabilized and double dyed with purple and green and in the natural yellow color and it makes for a odd looking handle material.

One of those cases of an experiment with colors being stranger than first thought.

 

 

Still some cleaning up to do like getting the wax off the blade and buff one more time. Also have to figure out what kind of sheath to make for it.