Custom Knives

So a few years back I took a 'stab' at making my first knife out of some mild steal plate, hardened and shaped it. I found a lot of people liked the output. So that year I made 18 different types of fixed blade knifes and gave them out to my friends and family for Christmas presents, and I didn't keep one. but they were a success and make me want to make more.

To keep the record strait, I like knives and sharp implements. Do I used them for hunting or other such gore?: Never. I'm not a violent man by nature. Heck, I don't even own a gun, I'm just fascinated by blades.

These were made out of Stainless plate and some black walnut for the handles. the riveting was done with brazing rod. the top one's handle cracked when riveting the pieces. sort of a shame, but a learning experience.

I always wanted a sword. I found an old leaf spring, which is basically the right shape, a tough spring steal. I flattened the leaf, cut polished, used a chunk of steal pipe for the handle and wrapped it in leather. it was a fun project, I wish I would of taken pics of the whole process.

after many, many hours of hand sanding with 60,100,150,220,320,400,600,1200,1500 grit and then lots of patience with a polisher on a die grinder. I finally got it to mirror perfection.
Is it sharp?: oh ya. other than drawing blood from my hands while polishing it, I trimmed the front hedges with it. I wonder what the neighbors thought?

Two weeks a go I decided to make another knife for myself (ah, who am I kidding, I'll just end up giving it away too) Starting with another piece of spring leaf here is the steps I took.

I first cut the length to the size i wanted.

a quick once over with a wheel brush on my angle grinder to remove the excess rust.

I clamped down and heated up the bar to a dim glow with my acetylene torch.

and hammered on it till flat

with a sharpie pen i doodled out my basic design.

using a cut off wheel on my die grinder i cut out the basic shape.

i re-heated the blade and starting hammering the edge to taper the blade side. to do this with ease: it had to be cherry red.

next step was to start to define the edge. i lightly notched out where i wanted my lines to be.

using my grinding wheel on my angle grinder i make even passes over the surface.

working slowly on each pass help for consistency on the angle.

the nature of old leaf springs is that there will be a shallow center line where it's more pitted with rust. if ground carefully with a small grinding stone can make a nice trough.

a quick clean up with a flapper sanding dish on the angle grinder, makes it look decent.

some minor block sanding to get the bigger scratches out.

this will be the blade separator.

quick cut with the die grinder and it slides over the handle core

a couple quick spot welds with the MIG welder.

a small chuck of back steel pipe sloped at one end. and welded internally to the handle at the open end.

a large Steele for counter balance.

gotta heat it up to a cherry red to make the MIG welder weld it correctly.

cool it off in cold water clean up the welds and it's good to go. but I think i will dip the handle in that rubberized tool grip material. with all the weight in the back end it balances the blade about where the blade guard is.

I don't know if I'll put this one to a mirror finish yet or add a sharper edge to it, but i tried it out on hatching some fire wood and it worked out well, with out dinging the edge at all.