Knife 12 and Sheath 4

A smaller blade this time, but designed in what feels like it is becoming my "signature style".

The blade is a Bowie shape, defined by the curved cutting edge and the straight back, which drops down to the pointed tip.  This one features a hidden tang stainless steel blade with a hickory handle, brass guard and blue insert behind the guard.  The handle has a slightly curved back and is polished with beeswax to give it a rich lustre.

Dimensions are:

Blade: 100mm long, 30mm high, 4mm thick (4.0" x 1.18" x 0.16")

Handle with guard: 100mm long, 33mm high, 24mm thick (4.0" x 1.3" x 0.94")

Overall length: 200mm (8.0")

The sheath is made of the same leather as the previous ones, a very simple wrap-around style, which I moulded to the shape of the handle. This provides a snug fit that will not slip off accidentally.

Enjoy the photos.

Knife 11

Wanting to try something a little different, I chose a dagger design for knife number 11.  As you can see in the photos, the knife is symmetrical along its length, with the double-edged blade tapering down to a central point.

As before, I used O1 tool steel with a full tang, meaning the tang is the full size of the handle and can be seen all the way around between the 2 scales attached to the sides.  The scales are English Oak and the guard is brass.  The 2 smaller pins are aluminium and the decorated large one at the end of the handle is made of 3 brass pins set in epoxy resin inside an aluminium tube.

The original design I had planned did not include a guard.  I wanted to just leave the scales on the tang, but when it was 'finished' it reminded me of a St. Bernard dog that had lost its whisky barrel ... good, but missing something important.  So I had to find a way of making the guard in two halves and attach them to the sides of the knife.  Tricky, but I think the result is acceptable.

Dimensions are:
Blade - 160mm long (6.3"), 30mm wide (1.18"), 3mm thick (0.12")
Handle - 110mm long (4.3"), 30mm wide (1.18"), 20mm thick (0.79")
Guard - 62mm tall (2.4"), 20mm wide (0.79"), 6mm thick (0.25")
Overall length - 270mm (10.6")

Although the blade has been hardened I have not put a sharp edge on it.  Not required as I do not plan for it to be used, but to remain a decorative trophy knife.  The oak scales have been treated with beeswax and buffed to bring out the natural beauty of the wood.

Enjoy the photos.

Bevel lines marked on the blade ready for shaping

Double score lines to mark the centre line of the blade edge

Rough bevels ground onto both edges on both sides

Blade has been hardened and sanded smooth

Scales glued and pinned in place

Completed knife

Handle, showing the pins

Handle, showing the full tang

Knife 10

If there is any silver lining to the grey cloud called Covid-19 that we have been living under for the past 16 months, it is that I have been able to spend much more time enjoying my hobby in the workshop than in the previous few years.  Followers of this blog will have read about some of the results.  Here follows another.

Although knife number 9 did not actually happen because the blade broke as a result of being too brittle, I am keeping it in the register as a learning experience, which makes this one number 10.  I studied a bit more about heat treatment to learn what went wrong the last time and it comes down to the fact that I was over-zealous, making the blade much too hot in the forge during the hardening process.  I estimated that it went up to around 950-1000°C (1740-1830°F), where I should only have taken it to around 800-830°C (1470-1530°F) before quenching.  This time I paid more attention and got it much closer, monitoring the magnetic transition and watching the colour change.

The blade profile has a sharp edge along the bottom (obviously!) and also half the top edge, making it quite a lethal weapon, if one wanted to use it for that purpose.

This blade is O1 steel again, the guard is polished aluminium and the handle is Walnut.  Dimensions are:

Blade - 190mm long, 45mm wide, 5mm thick (7.48", 1.77", 0.2")

Guard - 93mm tall, 30mm wide, 6mm thick (3.66", 1.18", 0.24")

Handle - 110mm long, 47mm tall, 30mm wide (4.33", 1.85", 1.18")

Overall length - 306mm (12")

The handle is treated with lemon oil polish, which gave it a rich, dark brown colour without losing the beautiful grain.  What the photos don't reveal is the smooth, tactile feel of the wood ... readers will just have to take my word for it when I say it feels wonderful!

Enjoy the photos!

First shaping of the blade, using my home-made bevel jig.

The blue colour is "steel blue", which allows marking the lines without damage to the steel.

Both bevels roughly shaped.

Rough shaping of the guard and handle.

Basic shape smoothed off.

Handle curves roughed out.

All assembled, handle smoothed and polished.

It doesn't always work

Proof that I don't always get it right ...

This was a blade that I started ... did the basic shaping and hardened it, but then decided I did not like the look so I put it aside for another day.  A couple of weeks ago I decided to use it.

First I heated it in the forge and allowed it to cool slowly in an attempt to remove the hardness.  Then I re-shaped it to something I was happier with.  I re-hardened it (I know that part worked) and then tempered it to remove the brittleness, or so I thought.  Today I started to clean it up with Emery paper.  Looked like it was going fine until I saw a crack in the steel.  No way to recover from that!  😡

I was not sure at what point the crack had been induced.  I was able to snap the blade in two in my bare hands with very little effort.  I put one part in the vice and gave it a moderate tap with a hammer.  It snapped in half with no resistance.  So clearly the blade was still very brittle, proving that the tempering process had not worked.  In the second photo the blackened area shows where the crack had formed.

On the positive side, at least it happened now before I finished all the polishing and the assembly of the handle.  Now I know that I need to learn something more about tempering hardened steel.

Knife 08

I took inspiration for my latest knife from the Japanese Tanto, meaning "short sword".  The style traditionally had a blade length between 150 and 300 mm, often with a slight curve and always with a firm scabbard (sheath).  Originally used by the Samurai as a stabbing weapon for close contact defense, the Tanto later evolved to become more ornate as other swords gradually gained popularity on the battlefield.  Eventually the Tanto found favour among women due to it's small size and was often worn as an accompaniment to ceremonial dress.

I chose to make a small Tanto out of an old file that was worn and damaged, which I repurposed for the blade. I first had to remove the hardness by heating it in the forge and allowing it to cool slowly, after which it was easier to cut and shape before re-hardening.  I kept the blade shape very simple because this knife is all about the external appearance.

The handle and scabbard are cut from a single piece of English Oak.  The handle was simple enough with a hidden tang, but for the scabbard I first had to cut it on the centre line down its length.  Then I used my router to cut a blade-shaped recess in each half, just a little over half the thickness of the blade.  Next step was to line the inside of both recesses with soft leather to prevent scratches on the blade.  When I glued the two halves back together there was a leather-lined slot just big enough to fit the blade snugly.

The guard is made of 6mm brass (0.23") with a thin aluminium spacer behind it, matching the aluminium cover surrounding the blade slot.  At the end of the scabbard and the handle there is a thin decorative plate of brass.  After assembling, shaping and polishing all the parts I applied lemon oil polish to the Oak to protect it and enhance the natural appearance of the wood with a rich shine.

Dimensions are

Overall size : 227mm x 24mm x 18mm (8.9" x 0.9" x 0.7")

Blade : 117mm x 15mm x 3mm (4.6" x 0.6" x 0.1")

Handle : 99mm (3.9")

Enjoy the photos!

 

Walking Stick

For many years I have had a "Moses-style" walking stick that I sometimes take with me when I go walking ... no lies!  Who would have thought?  I mean, what else would I do with it?

A few days ago I thought the walking stick could be enhanced by the addition of a wrapped paracord grip.  As is customary, I first researched a few methods on YouTube and then started to weave.  The long blue/ black/ white section in the middle may look like it is just wound around the stick, but as you see from the photos, each row is interwoven with 5 links into the previous and subsequent rows.  This style is called the "Fish Scale".  The style of the two silver-blue and orange/ black/ white collars at each end are called the "Headhunker's Knot".

The grip is very comfortable to hold and I think good to look at as well.  Now I need to go for a walk to try it out.

Solid Mercury

Actually it's a bar of high tensile steel, but it looks rather like a capsule of solid mercury inside a block of maple wood, which has no marks, cuts, splits or joins.

So the question is, "How did it get in there?"

Drill press adjustable vice

So now I have sharp drill bits, but I have always struggled with securing my work pieces accurately in the drill press.  Last Christmas a friend gave me a gift voucher from Amazon, which I have used to solve this problem with a vice attachment for my drill press.

With this device the workpiece sits in the vice clamp on top, and the middle and lower decks have screw threads to move the vice left-right or front-back.  The mechanisms were a little loose when it first arrived so I spent a few evenings cleaning it up, smoothing off the rough edges, aligning and greasing everything.  I also had to fashion a wooden base plate to secure it in place below the drill because the bolt holes did not align.

The original depth gauge on the drill was weak and had snapped off some time ago but I repurposed the bracket by fitting a long bolt, which now makes it possible to lock the drill tight at a set depth.  Like this I can keep both hands free to move the workpiece, converting the drill press into a small milling machine.

Now I just need to try it out.  Enjoy the photos.

Drill bit sharpener

One of my pet hates in the workshop is blunt drill bits.  Unfortunately this does occur so the blunt bits need to be re-sharpened occasionally, unless you want to spend a fortune on buying new bits all the time, which I do not.

Over the years I have struggled with trying to sharpen bits by hand, with varying levels of success.  It is extremely difficult to get the technique and the angles just right and trying to do this on a grindstone is also tricky.  Previously I have owned 2 different devices that attach to a power drill and spin a small cylindrical grindstone which the manufacturers promise will give perfectly sharpened bits every time.  Yeah, right!  The one broke and the other was absolutely hopeless, so both ended up in the bin.  Back to square one.

Thanks once again to the internet, after some research I have considered the pros and cons of various devices and sharpening techniques.  Not wanting to buy another exorbitantly priced sharpening machine, I decided to make a jig that will allow me to hold the bits in exactly the right position while using my belt sander to do the work.

I knew that the optimum angle for the cutting tip of a drill bit is 118°, but that's not all.  What I always struggled with was rotating the bit just the right amount to get the other angles and surfaces correct.  I learned that I could avoid this by tilting the bit upwards at a constant 22° angle in front of the belt.  So this is what I did.  See the photos below.

The work table on my belt grinder is adjustable for position and angle, so I tilted this to 22° relative to the vertical belt surface.  I took a scrap piece of wood and secured another wooden strip below it so that it can slide sideways when slotted onto the top of the work table.  On the top surface I secured another strip of wood at exactly 31° off perpendicular in the horizontal plane.  So together I now have a positioning jig that will hold the bit at an upward angle of 22° and 31° to the side.  The last detail was to file a groove in the top strip so my fingers can get up close to hold small bits nice and tight.

So far it seems to do the job just as I need it to.  I have sharpened all my bits with consistently satisfactory results. 

From the side.  Work table tilted up at 22°.

Guide block on the top angled at 31° to the side.

10mm drill bit for illustration purposes.  (0.4")

When sharpening I need to hold the wooden jig and the bit tight in this position with both hands.

5mm drill bit in position.  (0.2")

Note the use of the finger groove.

1.5mm drill bit in position.  (0.06")

I would not typically try to sharpen such a small bit, but it's nice to know I can.

Nice, clean tip surface.

Sheath number 2

Ok, so they are out of chronological order, but all criticism shall be expressly ignored!  This is the story of sheath number 2 that I made for knife number 5 (see previous post on this blog.)

I used a similar approach to sheath number 1, but the design is a little different.  The main body of the sheath and the belt loop are much the same, but the securing clip is different.  The size and shape of the knife guard is such that the clip can fold over it to keep it in place.  The whole sheath is made from a single piece of leather, so did not require pieces to be stitched together.

The first step after cutting out the leather was to cut the recessed groove around the perimeter and then punch the holes for the stitching.  Next I had to attach the press stud.  This was tricky because I was not sure of the exact position for the male side on the body of the sheath and there was no second chance if I got it wrong.  Then I did all the stitching around the edge and to form the belt loop.  The stitching pony came into play again for this part and performed admirably.

The last step was to apply the decorative design on the securing clip.  For this I chose one of the design punches that came with the kit.  For the design to take hold permanently, it is best to soak that area of the leather in water first.  This makes the leather soft and supple, but it also allows it to stretch easily.  Unfortunately the securing clip did stretch a little during this step so it is not quite as tight as I was hoping, but it still works fine.

For only my second attempt at leather working, I think the result is quite satisfactory.

Enjoy the photos!  I also included a video showing how I do the Saddle Stitching with the sheath secured in the pony.