Making a Knife

Hey all, me and my friends are thinking about making knives, Starting from a file and working up to a real knife. I was just wondering if anyone had done this and if so could they give me any pointers... I will be following Greenpete's method of making a single beveled knife and the use This method for the handle. I was just wondering what size holes to drill in the handle and what size brass stock to get and basically all of the details of how to make a knife that aren't said in these videos. Thank you all

Jace

I can't answer your question but looking at the handles- WOW! That is freakin' cool how they make those. And be sure to check out the link in that thread to another person's photo page of handle materials:
http://s185.photobucket.com/albums/x45/shadetrees/?start=all

Hmm... makes me wonder what to do with my Mk3 handles....

Thanks for the inspiration!
Jason

The denim handles idea is awesome! Wondering if that process could be applied to revolver handles or even Model 1911 grips?

I am certainly no fan of a single bevel knife unless it is a draw knife. However, if it works for you, give it a go, you can always change it later if you find it to be as unsatisfactory as I do.

As for the handles, Resin is a mighty handy material to work with. The method described is fine for pistol grips as well. As an alternative, you might also try it using different epoxies, varnish, shellac, gorilla glue, etc. Hey, it's all good. (Hint: RTV silicone can make for some great "comfort" grips)

Well I really like single beveled knives in the Scandinavian fashion so that is kinda the look im going for here.

No worries, I've used such knives in the past regularly, so if it works and you are so inclined, it'll at least be a good learning experience. No one can knock that.

I think it would be easier to make than a micro-bevel also with an angle grinder and a metal file.

The size of the holes is not really important. It´s basically a question of preference. I made a couple of knives (from 440C though) and used 3 mm brass pins or even some brass pipe 7 mm outside diameter and 1 mm wall thickness. I would recommend to use a small size for the brass stock. It tends to add a considerable amount of weight otherwise.
Make sure that the material for the handles is soaked well and any excess of resin is squeezed out. Pockets of resin will not only look ugly they will also weaken the material.It is important to press the resin through the material. If you try to soak it before application you might end up with air pockets. That will ruin your handle. I used this technique to make handles of paper. I works pretty well. If you make the handle right on the tang you can avoid gaps caused by a slightly uneven tang. I also tried to mold a handle with resin filled with graphite. That worked well too and looked really nice. It was too brittle though.
Try to design the shape of your handle and make a model of cardboard first. That way you may ruin the cardboard model and start over with little effort. A slight error in the design can make the knife really uncomfortable to handle. The same applies to the blade. I discarded some of the first of my knife designs and it was worth it.

I watched the youtube stuff on creating the knife.

It might be a lot easier to start from flatstock that a file. His first few steps seem to be working toward making his file like flatstock. Why destroy a file too?

I like the handle from resin. Not sure how easy working it into shape would be.

Yeah but I have like 30 file laying around for free and I really don't know were to get ground 01 flatstock in less than a week.

If you're going to use the angle grinder on the files, you really don't need to anneal them first. Hardened or soft really doesn't matter to the angle grinder. And since you are going to heat treat afterward you don't have to worry about drawing the temper out when you grind it hard anyway. The only problem about leaving them hard is drilling the tang holes and you can spot anneal with a propane (mapp gas is even better) torch. Heck, if you really want to anneal the files first you can just use the torch anyway. Temper starts to draw (on most tool steels) around 450 degrees, so the torch will do it.

I'll second M_A_X about the cardboard model. Draw out the blade style and handle shape on cardboard and cut it out. You can fine tune the handle shape on cardboard, but it's hard to do after you've made the knife.

If you're not going to make the jigs that GreenPete uses to hold the desired angle when doing the final file work, then you might want to wait and grind the profile for the handle AFTER you've ground and filed the edge bevels. That way you have straight (parallel) edges on the file to clamp in the vise. Then tape up the blade good and grind the handle shape. That will also minimize the anguish of wasted work if you mess up the blade grind.

Greenpete put oil on the wet/dry sandpaper when he sanded off the scale. I really don't know why. That will just make the paper load up and not really cut very well. Use water with a little bit of soap in it to wet the paper and keep it open and cutting.

I've made a bunch of mycarta, including denim. I've used the techniques shown and they work pretty well (now I use a 12 ton press). One thing I don't really like is using the fiberglass resin. You've really only got 10 or 12 minutes before it gels too much to get a good squish. So once you start, you have to be quick to get a good wet out of all the pieces and everything stacked and squished. It's an ugly race. I also don't really like fiberglass resin because it will eventually yellow and it will always smell a bit like fiberglass. That technique works best if you're only making enough for one set of scales at a time.

Good luck

@ fiberglass resin: do you know of any alternatives??

Also I really don't follow anything in the 3rd paragraph could you please put it in more laymans terms as this is my first knife.

Thank you for taking the time to write it all up though!

Check out a book by Wayne Goddard titled "The $50 Knife Shop"

In it he explains quite alot about inexpensive knife making.

Best of luck with your knife project.

Joe

thanks, i know that they have lots of knife making books in my local barnes and nobel so i will have a peek and see. But thanks for the recomendation

Here's probably the simplest, most straight forward example I've seen.

http://hossom.com/tutorial/jonesy/

(Gives you all the info and approximate cost)


Just my $0.02, I’d skip making the Micarta on the first knife. If you’re set on using micarta, you should be able to find slabs for about $8.

I found greenpete's website (greenpete is the one who made the video) and found The tutorial to go with the video! It answers a lot of the questions I had! Yay!!

This would be a fun project this summer.

It sounded like I dislike the fiberglass resin more than I really do. It works, just have everything ready and work fast. I used it for the first several sets I made and it worked o.k. Definitely the cheaper way to learn. I use an epoxy resin, Max CLR, with a long pot time. That stuff is pretty expensive, but it's very clear, and the longer pot time (time before it starts to set) lets me use thinner cloths. I've made some scales that took 42 layers to get 1/4" thickness.

What I meant in the 3rd paragraph is grind the blade shape and the bevels first. If you grind everything out first (have that nice knife shape you want) and then mess up the blade when you grind the bevels, you wasted a bunch of time. Plus, it's easier to clamp in the vise flat before the handle is ground.

Thanks for the Clarification!!

Files do not have an eternal service life. After the file is worn out it would be too valuable to just throw away. A long time ago old files were reworked to have a new sharp (but slightly thinner) file. This profession however is about to become extinct. As files are usually made from good steel the worn out pieces might as well be turned into knives. Some woodworkers used to grind old files into cutting tools for the lathe.
The texture of the material will not allow for a really sharp edge for most files, however.

Thanks I think If this whole project turns out then I will be able to atribute a lot of the success to all of you!! Thank You all!!