TUTORIAL COMPLETO (PASO A PASO) SOBRE LA CONSTRUCCION DE UN CUCHILLO PROFESIONAL EN ACERO DAMASCO

DOCUMENTO ORIGINAL: BLADE FORUM

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/808140-Wheeler-s-Steel-*-Stuck-in-the-metal-with-you

NIK DEL AUTOR: LORIEN

RECOPILACION: QUIQUE SOLER

Notas de la recopilacin: Se han copiado solo las explicaciones y fotos del autor referentes al tutorial en s, se
han omitdo las preguntas de otros foristas y las respuestas del autor. Se ha respetado el idioma original.

01-10-2011, 02:22 PM Well Mr. Wheeler and I have been planning and scheming for quite some time, and we are proud to bring to you a most detailed and hopefully interesting WIP. I am sharing these images with ya'll as I receive them. I have no idea what the final result will be, all I've seen up to this point is Nick's version of the design which I sent to him many moons ago;

This pattern was cut from 1/4" plywood, and was based on a golok I have whose handle I modified to fit my hand perfectly. The shape of the blade is all me though. So, in other words, I have a knife with this exact handle shape, but the blade is pure fantasy. But not for long! This next pictures shows a process that I know at least a few knife makers follow. In Nick's words; "I like a knife to follow a curve... this one already did nicely!"

Now, let's get scientific, shall we? The use of measuring devices sets a solid foundation for a good knife;

Here's where Nick takes my design, and revises it to match his eye;

Reducing the original design;

the original is erased, leaving only a 'ghost' behind;

the drawing is darkened, with the original beside for comparison;

This is going to be a very detailed WIP. We both really hope you enjoy it!

MIG weld across billet, holding layers together prior to forge welding, (spot the husky hair);

weld prep on the handle... I don't want the handle to fall off this thing while I'm forging it down;

the billet with all MIG welding done before sticking it in the forge;

the billet in the forge;

the initial forge weld in the hydraulic press;

back in the forge after the first forge weld;

starting to draw (stretch) it out;

the billet has been drawn out a fair amount, that piece of 1084 next to the billet is the length that the billet started as;

back in the forge;

the billet drawn out to where it can be ground clean and cut into shorter pieces;

the billet has to be clean before restacking, here Nick's grinding the forge scale off with a 7" angle grinder;

piece of the billet cleaned up, showing that you can't see any pattern without etching it in Ferric Chloride;

a piece of the billet in the acid;

showing a piece of the billet after a quick etch in the acid, which shows the intial 21 layers, now one solid billet;

pieces fit together so they can be forge welded;

this is a dry weld. there will be no flux used when forge welding. Normally you want a weld to penetrate deep into the parent metal to ensure good fusion. In this case, the weld is just to hold the pieces together temporarily, and keep the forge atmosphere out... so the weld is sitting tall, NOT burned down deep into the steel;

forge welded, drawn out, and cleaned up;

a quick etch to show what the layer count is up to;

at this point, it's ready to be cut into 4 pieces and restacked, (spot the husky);

the billet before etching... again it just looks like a hunk of steel without etching;

quick etch to show layer count;

four pieces cut and ground clean, this will be the final stack;

MIG welded, again, tall and shallow weld just to hold it for a dry forge weld;

the billet in the forge, welded up;

starting to grind the MIG weld off the sides of the billet before forging the billet down;

grinding weld down w/angle grinder;

billet at final layer count, back in forge ready to forge down to knife-sized barstock;

drawing it down/out to barstock;

the final forging of the billet;

the stack on the left is what the billet started off as (minus one layer of 1084) and on the right is the billet forged/welded/drawn/etc to over 300 layers;

billet at final layer count, back in forge ready to forge down to knife-sized barstock;

drawing it down/out to barstock;

the final forging of the billet;

the stack on the left is what the billet started off as (minus one layer of 1084) and on the right is the billet forged/welded/drawn/etc to over 300 layers;

I want to make sure everybody knows that I am doing this project with Lorien because I thought it would be fun, and informative for him since he's getting into making knives. We're sharing it here, just for fun!!! I am not, in any way, trying to pretend to be an expert on any of this. I have no doubt there are other, and probably better, ways to do things.

But even with that said, I know I can put it all together and have a quality knife to send to Lorien once it's all done. We were meant to act, even if we make mistakes. That's why we put a sharp point on one end of the pencil and an eraser on the other end.

most folks have to forge the point of a blade down on the corner of the face of their anvil. This is because the face is usually the only part of an anvil that has good rebound. Nick's Nimba anvil is hardened over the entire working area, including the horn... so he can use that to his advantage. If you forge the point on a flat area, you make it narrower, but make it thicker at the same time. You have to flatten that out, which makes it a little wider again. This is the classic, "two steps forward, one step back" type of thing. By using the horn of the anvil, Nick can forge it down to a narrow point while only slightly thickening the billet;

If he wasn't taking pics, Nick could have forged the point down in one heat. Using the horn to knock the point down;

This is after the first heat;

Back in the forge it goes!

second heat, getting the point taken down more;

Close to a point, Nick had to stop and take a pic, but normally he would have smacked it down closer to shape, and flat;

Smacking the point down to make the blade look like a wharnecliff;

The point knocked down;

This is why Nick does it the way he does. When you forge the bevels in, it will push the tip up and back. It took quite a few blades before he could roughly judge what the initial "pre-form" blade shape should be in order to end at the final profile he really wants; If he wasn't taking pics, Nick could have forged the point down in one heat. Using the horn to knock the point down;

This is after the first heat;

Back in the forge it goes!

second heat, getting the point taken down more;

Close to a point, Nick had to stop and take a pic, but normally he would have smacked it down closer to shape, and flat;

Smacking the point down to make the blade look like a wharnecliff;

The point knocked down;

This is why Nick does it the way he does. When you forge the bevels in, it will push the tip up and back. It took quite a few blades before he could roughly judge what the initial "pre-form" blade shape should be in order to end at the final profile he really wants;

forging in some distal taper;

Marking (roughly) where the tang will start;

Using a drawing hammer to spread and thin the blade bevels;

It's getting closer;

The extreme radius of the drawing hammer really pushes the bevel out nicely, but it's not even remotely close to being flat at this point;

knocking the plunge cut area and dropped edge in;

Forging the bevels in;

Tweaking the shape;

Forging the clip in;

Getting there, it's REALLY easy to royally screw things up at this point;

Back in the forge...hey, it's starting to look like a knife! it's pretty darn close to his pattern at this point, so Nick cuts the handle off so that he can forge the tang down;

specialty tongs to hold the blade SECURELY while forging in the tang;

starting to forge in tang shoulders with the guillotine tool that Nick built;

Nick got wrapped up what he was doing with the forge/hammers and forgot to take a couple of pics, but the tang is now nearly forged to shape at this point;

Here it's forged to shape, but obviously is too straight for our handle shape and needs to be bent so it flows with the handle;

Checking the profile, it's pretty darn close. The distal taper is in, the bevels are forged in, the tang is done, and it's straight. It shouldn't take much grinding to make this into a clean blade;

It was normalized in the forge once. Nick was going to have to leave for his birthday dinner with Angi, but had pre-heated the

Paragon digitally controlled kiln, and stuck the blade in the kiln for a sub-critical annealing cycle;

Here it is, out of the kiln and sitting in a stainless steel cooling rack made just for this purpose;

"When I got it back to where it needed to be, the edge was off-center. Jerry Fisk told me several years ago about coloring the edge of a forged blade with soapstone so you can see if it's straight. The white soapstone makes the edge contrast with the spine. I use that trick, but color it with a silver pencil because I can see it better... took a pic of that too, and also the tool I use to get the edge back to center."

"Also, I like the flow of the knife as drawn, but after looking at the pics I drew that you posted up, it looks like there could be issues with retention on that big sucker with the handle as drawn. I drew up a little different design that still should flow nicely, but will help for a better grip. Lemme know what 'ya think!!!

Well, it's about time to do some grinding and salt bath work!

"

Well, what do I think? I like a kick at the butt of a handle for a large knife. It helps keep the handle from ratcheting forward in my hand during heavy use, and also allows for a bit more speed and leverage for quick snippy cuts. The kick generally will generate a bit of a hot spot, even if done right, but the control and safety are worth it. I have a small concern that in the drawing the swell at the bottom of the handle looks a little pregnant, but I've seen many pictures of Nick Wheeler handles, and the man has a talent for handles. Suffice to say, a drawing can only provide so much information. The proof is always in the pudding. I do like the shorter ricasso on the first design. It's not like you choke up on a big knife like this for the type of stuff it's designed to do, so maximizing the amount of edge never hurts. But then again, a wider ricasso may allow for a little more mass near the pivot point of the knife which provides more power and control. But then on the other hand, I often use that area of the knife to lift the stuff I just cut, (like prickly plants such as blackberries) and throw it to the side of the trail, and the dropped edge/recessed ricasso provides a grippy area to grab stuff. It's splitting hairs, but who doesn't like to think of this stuff?

1. this is the paper pattern sitting on top of the blade... I told you I had it close

Checking to see if I forged the bevels flat with a little Starrett straight edge. It's real easy for me to forge a blade and think it's flat... luckily, this one is;

the blade as forged sitting next to the paper pattern;

blade painted with Dykem lay-out die... this allows you to scribe lines in the blade and they'll be easy to see;

Scribing the pattern---I forgot to mention that I glue the paper to heavy craft-paper (think of the stuff Kleenex boxes are made of) so my pattern is not all floppy like it is when it's just the butcher paper;

This shows what needs to be ground off to get the desired profile...NOT to toot my own horn... but I'm compelled to admit that I'm pretty proud to be able to hammer a blade fairly close to a pre-determined pattern these days... I remember when I first started forging, I'd take a perfectly good bar of steel and mangle it into something that was the furthest thing you could imagine from what I actually wanted. This one was a little tricky for me because I hadn't forged this blade style in at least a few years.

Cleaning up the blade profile on the Burr King;

Cleaning up the choil area with the KMG and the tool rest;

Cleaning up the tang on the KMG;

The profile clean-up only took me 3 minutes because there was very little steel that had to be removed. knife profile cleaned up;

This is sort of unorthodox, but I hit the blade up against the 5" contact wheel on the Burr King (in line with the wheel) using a worn 60X ceramic belt to knock the forge scale off and it also gives me a quick look to see if there are a bunch of deep hammer marks left in the blade.

Fortunately it's pretty clean and the marks aren't too bad;

Now I go to the 9" disc and hit the ricasso to help see if the blade is straight and the edge is centered;

If I did a decent job forging, then the ricasso will be the thickest part of the blade, with the edge bevel and distal taper "fading away" from the ricasso, and the disc won't touch those areas;

Next I put the blade on the surface grinder and establish a FLAT ricasso. The sides of the ricasso being FLAT and PARALLEL will be the foundation for the entire build process of a knife in my shop. This will become quite evident as the knife progresses;

Here's a better shot showing how everything fades away from the ricasso;

I lay the blade on my large granite, machinist's surface plate (a very very FLAT surface) and then use a height gauge with a carbide tip to scribe a center-line (thickness) down the full length of the cutting edge and the spine. If the forging went like it should, then the edge will be centered. It's extremely difficult (theoretically impossible) to grind completely even, SYMMETRICAL blade bevels if your edge is not centered. I know many guys eyeball this, and do so with great results.... but I like a reference line and this one will be part of that foundation that I work from;

We got lucky, the edge is centered;

The clip is a little off center (0.020" sure looks like a lot when you're looking at it THIS close ) but it's easily within grinding tolerances so that it will come out centered and symmetrical. In a perfect world, it would have been right in the center like the cutting edge is, but this really is NOT a big issue. If it were, I'd get it hot and move it over;

Grinding first pass with a worn 60grit ceramic belt... This is quite similar to how Tim Hancock grinds. I can grind completely free-hand, but this is faster for me;

After 1 pass with a worn 60X belt... those pits don't look TOO deep (I hope, lol!)

Then I put on a new 60X belt... this is after one pass against the new 60X belt;

after 3 passes;

At this point I want the plunges close, but the don't have to be dead nuts just yet. I am more concerned that the edge is centered and the plunges are fairly close so that I can match them up after heat-treat;

This shot shows the distal taper, but not very well. It will be more pronounced after final grinding is complete;

* a quick note from Lorien, (that's me); you might have noticed a shift in narrative to first person. I simply cannot keep up with Nick, this WIP is epic! I'm loving every moment of it. And really, this is best in his own words. I'm no editor, I'm a messenger PS. I finally got a chance to check out the pics I just posted and HOLY SHIT BATMAN!!! Hmmm...what's on today's menu? What? More knife making? Sounds delicious! grinding bevel with a 120grit ceramic disc on the 9" variable speed disc grinder. This allows me to check and make sure the bevels really are flat;

there was very little material to grind off for the clip, so I just rough filed them in for heat-treating;

the edges of the blade are at 120grit now, but there are sharp edges... mostly just as a precautionary thing, I go over the blade with a 10" buffing wheel and 240X Polish-O-Ray compound from Brownell's. This stuff can throw sparks! But it leaves the blade with nice smooth edges;

sitting on the bench, cleaned up with Acetone, and ready for its trip into the salt bath;

It's the salt bath.

this is what the heat-treating salts in a salt bath look like when they're at room temperature;

this is the salt up close when it's in its working temperature range... 1600F to be exact for this pic;

the blade ready to be dipped in the salt... note the leather welding jacket. 1600 degree liquid is not something you want on your skin!!! the blade coming out of the salt for one of the initial, high-temperature cycles. It was about 1600F in this pic;

an overall view of me pulling a hot blade from the salt; the blade out of the salt, up close;

the shadows entering the blade as it cools off after coming out of the salt; This is a digital temp gauge... it's just interesting to see how quickly the thing cross-sectional area of a knife blade cools off. This was after only about a minute and a half out of the high temp salt;

This is a shot of the digital controller up close as it was climbing back up to 1410F; The blade is going to have to come out of the salt bath, and go immediately into the vertical quench tank on the right. The quench tank holds Park #50 quench oil, and has a water heater element mounted in the bottom to help get the oil up to an optimal temperature range for quenching;

I lucked out and the camera timer just happened to click when I had the blade about half-way submerged in the quench tank; This is what a blade looks like out of the quench when you use molten salt to austenitize the steel... CLEAN!

close up of blade after quenching;

I had pre-heated the Paragon, digitally controlled kiln to 400F. As soon as I washed the salt film off of the blade, I put it in the kiln for tempering. By the numbers, 400 is a bit too low for the tempering, but I prefer to start at 400 and go up from there if the blade needs it.

I surface grind the blade with a 120X belt. It needs to be refined from the 60X belt anyway, but this also gives me a nice and

clean surface for a Rockwell hardness test;

Here's my Rockwell tester with the blade in place. It has been pre-loaded and is ready to pull the lever to get the hardness reading;

This is a closer shot showing the blade sitting on the tester's anvil, with the diamond penetrator (or indenter depending on which book you're looking at) pressed firmly against the blade's ricasso;

The blade was consistently testing at 61.5 - 62 C on the Rockwell scale. This is too hard for this type of knife, so it went back in the kiln with a bump in temperature. I like a big knife like this to be in the 58-59 range; The small dots you can see on the ricasso are the indentations left from the diamond penetrator being pressed into the surface;

As promised, moar pics! I didn't receive these before 4am. The actually showed up in my inbox just before 5am! Go to sleep Nick! Just because... I did the post heat-treat grinding free-hand ;

An up close shot of the same;

Smoothing out the spine of the blade with a 10" contact wheel. You can't stay in one spot, or you'll just create a groove/divot.

You have to keep the blade perpendicular to the wheel and moving smoothly;

You can run your fingers over a surface and feel for consistency. Sometimes you will feel things like this that you didn't actually see;

Cutting the choil in cleaner with a 220grit belt on the tool rest;

Checking the edge thickness after grinding with a 120X belt. It's at 0.030" when I took this shot;

The blade at a 120grit belt finish;

Hitting the blade on a new 120X ceramic disc on the 9" disc grinder. This will very quickly show you if your bevel is flat;

This is an up close shot of the 120X disc finish on the bevels;

such a handsome hound. It was obviously meant to be! (Nick adopted Shadow recently after the dog adopted him).

It's a lot easier to check things like the symmetry of the plunges if they're back-lit (for me anyway). A set of plunge cuts that looks good in many light sources often shows up uneven in light like this. Just a white sheet of paper works really well.

The back-lit plunges. These are awfully darn close. They can match closer though.

This shot shows how the plunge needs to be cleaned up anyway.

This is how I dial the plunges in that last tiny bit. It's a big piece of steel that's been surface ground and I filed a small radius on one corner, then checked it with a radius gauge. Put some adhesive on a piece of 220X paper, and you can sand into the plunge. The significant width of the block takes away the worry that you could sand a groove into the blade. I used to put a filing guide on the blade if I was doing this, but when you're taking off such a small amount of material, I have found the guide is not necessary.

The next step was going back to the 9" disc with a 220 grit disc... here's a close-up of that finish. Flat and smooth.

Okay I just gotta post these before I hop on my bike and try to ride it home. I have a half sack of ciders in me, (yeah I know it should be beer but I got this thing with gluten and well you don't really need to know about that now do you?). Anyway, I hope that these pics are in order and I just have to say how impressed I am with my ability to type at this point. Sorry to offend anyone, just please enjoy the pictures and Google 'Take Five' by String Cheese. Picking up where we left off. It's time to feather the edge in. It's currently flat ground, and is FLAT on the bevel. The current edge is about 0.015" thick. I go to the KMG with a slightly broke-in 220grit belt, and run it against the tiny little slack area between the top contact wheel and the flat platen. This is one of those things where I suppose it's good I can grind free-hand because I don't know how you'd do this part on the tool rest (although that doesn't mean you can't!);

Close up of what's happening with the above process. I am not worried that it's not feathered smooth yet;

Hooray for the Beaumont Metal Works (Rob Frink) rotary platen!!! Actually, I hated it at first because I wasn't really sure what to do with it. Now I LOVE it. With this attachment, it is very easy to blend that edge and feather it in nice and smooth;

Here's part of why I used to dislike it though. The "give" that it has is great for the main part of the bevels. However, I like nice and crisp plunge cuts, and I could never get the rotary platen to go down into my plunge cuts. You get a faceted look like this;

Enter the "GATOR" belt. This is a structured abrasive belt. I pretty much hate them for everything else, but LOVE them for this. Because of the backing, and structure of the actual abrasive, I can run the belt right up into the plunge and smooth out those facets in the last pic;

Making a pass against the rotary platen with the Gator belt;

With one single pass, almost all of that has been smoothed out. I used to do this part completely by hand with sand-paper;

Now many makers have seen or read about SR Johnson using cork belts with amazing results for his hollow ground knives. I

tried it with hollow ground blades and it worked exactly as Steve explains it. However, with big, flat ground blades they didn't work for crap (for me anyway). Then I got the idea to try them with the rotary platen and some Brownell's Polish-O-Ray. This is a well worn (as per Steve's instructions) 220 grit cork belt loaded with the 240 grit buffing compound;

Ooooooh... SHINY!

And that is why I now like cork belts again.

Back to the 9" disc with some 320 grit paper. I also took the pic at a specific angle. A fella emailed me about the tapered disc. This disc has a 1 degree taper (Beaumont Metal Works). The REASON for this, is when you're sanding/grinding long blades like this, the blade does not make contact with the "uphill" side of the disc. Many folks (myself included) envision a tapered disc as a big cone, that you couldn't possibly get something flat on. However, the taper is so slight, I have had ZERO problems with that, and I like it very much. You can clearly see I'm making contact on the left (downhill) side of the disc, but it's clearing the other side. That gap is exaggerated because of the distal taper in the blade;

Finally, all finish ground (except for the false edge);

Plunges match now and have a nice, tight radius. Looking at the pic it looks a little high on the left side, but it's just because I was holding the knife in one hand and the camera in the other and didn't get it looking straight onto the edge;

Now if this thing won't cut... then it's a giant piece of crap right?

So I make a few passes of a Norton India stone;

A couple more passes on a DMT diamond stone;

The obligatory arm hair shaving picture- LOL;

I like this little test better than shaving. A thick edged knife that's got a polished edge will shave hair, but it won't spin these little curls cutting cardboard (IME anyway);

I'm really wondering who adopted who here!!! LOL....Shadow wanted to check and see how things are progressing; There, in the middle of the pic. I KNOW that Alder that's part-way in the creek has been down long enough to be dry and hard, but not long enough to be rotten; That handle was a joke, but I decided to try it anyway! LOL;

I started getting kind of bored with this after awhile. Plus my fancy smancy handle came off;

The edge doesn't feel to be effected at all;

Wood is pretty easy... for just about any knife, but I've found that old, hard antler is a heck of a lot more abusive test media. Shadow thought it would be better if he did his own testing with it! ;

I start off with some soft, choppy strikes to see how it goes;

Once it looks like everything is holding up fine and it's still sharp, I start hitting it hard enough to cut through the small tines

with a single blow. I've tried this with a bunch of factory made knives and all of them either crinkled up or (more often) it knocked big chunks of steel out of their edges;

I put a black background it to make it easier to see, then kept whacking on the antler;

No edge damage at all... no crinkling, no chips, and it's still sharp. Hooray, we haven't done all this work for nothing!!! Now that I know it will perform like it should, it's time to start hand sanding. This next post underscores the value of taking time from your work to enjoy life. Mental health requires this nourishment, and improves productivity!

I think the next bit of photos are more detail oriented. I really don't know how to explain what's going on without explaining too much, lol.... so, it is what it is! This diagram is how I approach the first steps of hand sanding. I usually start with the spine of the blade. If the direction of sanding changes as you go up in grit, then you'll make sure you get rid of all the previous grit marks;

Sanding the spine of the blade;

This is the spine sanded to 500 grit. It's also easier for me to make sure there are no divots in the surface this way;

The spine sanded up to 800 grit, in line with the blade;

Sanding into the choil with a chisel edged sanding block;

This pic shows why the chisel edge block is needed... I can get right into that tight corner with it;

This sketch shows my approach to sanding the ricasso. It's been surface ground FLAT, and I don't want to mess that up. I very carefully sand the ricasso at an angle;

Sanding the ricasso;

The ricasso sanded to 800 grit. The area not sanded will be where the guard and handle are fitted to the blade;

Here's a stainless steel fixture I built for hand sanding blades;

Ok, enough warm fuzzy stuff- Back to work! This shows the sanding fixture mounted in the vise. There's a reason for everything you see. The T-shape of the fixture makes it very rigid, and makes it easy to clamp a blade down securely. The symmetrical shape on the end of it allows me to put the curve of a blade's belly right near the edge of the fixture, but still keep ME protected from the knife point sticking out;

The tapped holes are for screws that can be turned up to push a piece of 1/4" thick micarta up against the blade. There's not much point to a rigid set-up, if the distal taper in a blade allows it to flex all over the place;

This pic shows how the entire blade is supported from underneath, yet none of it is sticking out to where I'll stab myself. And I have done that, so I needed to make it idiot proof!

This little sketch shows what the machine finish is currently like on the blade;

This sketch shows how I'll progress through the grits so that I can end up at a very clean 800X finish. I was going to do 600X, but I decided to try this and see how it goes; Here's a big sanding block I made from some James Todd G11 Burt Foster told me about this sandpaper trick (Rhynowet paper) He sprays it with adhesive, lets it sit for a minute, and then can apply it to a sanding block;

Going to town with the big sanding block;

Took a step back from sanding for a second to take this pic;

I also sand with a different block that I pinch the paper around;

Working to get all those scratches out!

I don't know if this will show at all in the pic, but what I'm trying to show is that you need to hold the blade up and check for a nice and smooth bevel. It's easy to think you have everything flat, smooth, etc... but when you look at a blade this way, it's easy

to find flaws; Same as the previous pic, just from a different perspective;

The blade hand sanded to 500 grit;

I don't know if this will show at all in the pic, but what I'm trying to show is that you need to hold the blade up and check for a nice and smooth bevel. It's easy to think you have everything flat, smooth, etc... but when you look at a blade this way, it's easy to find flaws;

Same as the previous pic, just from a different perspective; The blade hand sanded to 500 grit;

^the slow season is the only reason that I have time to provide this pleasin! Some of these are probably of very little interest to most collectors, but since there seems to be more makers looking at the

thread, I figured I'd throw them in...in case they can help somebody out. This is the new light fixture I made yesterday. The bases is rectangular tubing with the ends welded up, and filled with sand for stability. The arms adjust so I can get the light right where I need it;

This shows how you can move it to just about any position you'd need; Here's an overall shot showing the new bench work system I came up with. I made the center part for something to do in TIG class at school. It's sort of the standard knife maker's vise, but I don't like it quite as well as what I've been using for the last 16 years, so I wasn't even going to use it. But then I realized I could mount the base, and use it to hold many different things securely to the bench;

Here's a Panavise, that I really didn't have a good way to mount to the bench, because I don't use it often enough to dedicate bench space to it. I made a stem for it that's a piece of schedule 80 pipe welded to a piece of plate. The pipe has a groove turned into it so it won't get marred up when locking it down in the base; This shows the Panavise mounted in the base;

Here is the new blade sanding fixture I made yesterday. It's similar to the other one, but was made to utilize the universal base;

Here's the sanding fixture in place;

Sanding away on the new fixture. This is MUCH more comfortable to work on, and it is VERY VERY rigid. There is no flex in the blade or fixture at all;

The new light and the new sanding fixture both being put to good use

This pic shows the new 800 grit scratches as they come in over top of the previous 500 grit scratches. We're not done until ALL of the angled scratches are GONE.

I didn't really need to, but I took it to a clean 800 grit;

Here's an overall shot of it at 800X;

I like to mark exactly where the clip/false edge is going to be. I can eye-ball it, but I use a reference line whenever I can because it makes things easier for me. I don't know anyone else who scribes their clip in, so I have no idea if or how anybody else does this. It may look complicated or like overkill... but it only takes about 5 minutes to do. The blade has been sprayed with Dykem again. Since my ricasso is FLAT and parallel, I can clamp it to a 1-2-3 block on top of my granite surface plate. I take a piece of wood that's flat and square on one edge, and put it up against the blade, then trace the blade profile onto it;

Then I mark where I want the clip, and grind down to that line with the tool rest squared up to the belt grinder;

Go back to the granite plate, put an angle block up to the blade point, and then put my piece of wood back in place. Now I can scribe my clip profile on both sides and the line will be EXACTLY the same on both sides;

Close up of the scribed line;

Don't want to mess up the blade finis, so a strip of paper tape will completely protect it while finishing out the false edge;

This is the set-up I made for grinding clips. The original idea for grinding them like this came to me from Mike Vagnino. This is the current adaptation I've developed after learning the idea from Mike about 10 years ago;

Grinding the clip/false edge in. This is certainly not fool proof... you can mess a blade up real quick. But it works very well once you get some practice in. I didn't have to take much off since the clip had already been roughed in;

Here it's almost down to the scribe line;

These two pics show a "high tech" method for checking for symmetry in the clip that a fantastic maker named Roger Dole showed me about 13 years ago. You put the point against a callous, and then flip the knife side to side quickly. If it's off, it's easy to see doing this. It was getting pretty darn close at this point;

The sides are definitely not the only concern though!!! The false edge needs to be centered with the thickness of the blade, just like the cutting edge is. It was getting real close when I took this shot;

Done grinding the false edge. It's been ground with a 120 grit belt, then a Norax belt and now it's centered, symmetrical, and ready for hand finishing. I leave the tape on to protect the rest of the blade;

A new support I made for hand finishing clips/false-edges. It fits into the universal base system too;

Here's a pic of it in the receiver;

Here the blade in place on the new support. There's a reason for this one being different. It allows me to rotate the blade, so that I can put the clip grind at a comfortable angle for finishing it out. This gives good blade support, but it's not as rigid as the fixture for doing the main bevels, but I don't push as hard when sanding the clip;

Here's a sketch showing what happens when you put one clamp on a big blade, turn the fixture at an angle, and then start sanding. You end up pushing the blade right off of the fixture!!! The solution is that little black dot. Two of the screws in the

fixture have the ends of their threads ground off, so one can be extended up and act as an anchor against the blade, helping to keep it in position while finishing; Close up showing the screw/pin in place;

I start finishing out the clip with die-makers'stones. I readily admit that this is something I still have not gotten a real good handle on, but I'm trying to learn. Here I'm running the stone against a diamond sharpener to get it flat (they're soft and wear quite fast). I like the stones for making sure the clip bevel is very flat and smooth;

Running a stone against the clip;

Working 400X stone against clip (note I put magic marker on the bevel to make sure I'm working on just the right area);

All done with the stones. It works up a slurry which makes it hard to see what you're doing (for me anyway!);

Here's my "clip sanding stick" it's surface ground nice and flat on one side, and also ground down narrow so I can use it to sand

clips that are not a straight bevel;

It is VERY important that the abrasive paper be TIGHT against the sanding stick. If it bows out around the stick, then it will wash out the sharp grind line where the clip meets the main bevel. So I glue the paper to the stick with spray adhesive. Use the paper like it's free! ;

Sanding the clip out with the stick;

Here the clip has been sanded clean;

I read somewhere once that Buster Warenski wanted his bevels so sharp and crisp that the grind lines could cut you. I TRY to do that with my stuff. Here, both the entire blade has been sanded to 800 grit;

Same thing, different angle;

Here's the blade at it's current state, next to the pattern to see how it's coming along;

It is extremely important that the guard be angled, or not, just right. I don't like just using a square, because sometimes I want it just off of square. So I use a piece of O1, draw a guard on it, and then clamp it to the knife blade to figure out just exactly where the guard shoulders need to be;

Scribing the line with a brass scribe. I don't want to cut a line in here yet, because my next step is to heat this with a torch... so this is just for a raw guide line on where to heat the ricasso with the torch;

Mike Vagnino taught me this trick. Hold the blade over a bucket of clean water. Pinch it near the dropped edge... once it gets too hot to hang onto, slowly lower it into the water (just the edge.. not tang and all);

Here's a closer shot of what's going on. I want to make sure the tang and the area where the guard shoulders will be cut in, is softer than the rest of the blade. It was hard to get a clear photo with the torch going; Letting the blade down into the water, right up to the plunge cut;

Before I can do it again, I like to take off the oxides that are a result of heating the blade. It's not something that has to be perfect, I just need to color off, so I just skim over it with 1500 grit paper on the ricasso and a buffing wheel on the tang;

Here's a shot showing how you can really dial in where you take the heat with this method that Mike taught me. I did the heat/sand cycle 3 times;

I've never gone back to the Rockwell tested after doing that, but for whatever reason I decided to try it out on this blade;

I was a little surprised, it drew back a little softer than I would have guessed. Right around 46-47 C; I thought this shot was interesting because it clearly shows how the diamond penetrator was pushed much further into the ricasso this time around (being softer now) than it did when the blade was at 61 C as in the earlier photos;

it's me, Lorien; in Mark Knapp's thread on his mesmerizing daggers, he noted that the recipient of one of them, almost tearfully, said, "you did this for me?". That really struck a major chord in me. There is a lot of love in creation. And the bonds of friendship bind tightly in moments or times of creation. Although I have no hand in making this knife, this knife never would have been made if I didn't get into knives. Sure, others like it probably would. But this is 100% custom made for me. Butch Beaver said something about this that rang true in Murray's thread on one of the man, (and his wife's) knives. Something about a pantograph, and not that I agree 100%, but that doesn't mean it can't ring true. Anyway, I am finding this to be a truly surreal experience, having just gone through this same process with another man who's become a true friend over the course of his creation of a knife for me- Magnus Axelson. I actually feel a little overwhelmed these days, as all of this unfolds. I like making friends, but I didn't expect that from this process. The depth of these friendship, especially considering not having met personally, is quite astonishing to me. And very welcome .

I'm hooked! I love this community, and I so enjoy the friendships that I have made over the past few years. I feel like the time to name this knife has almost arrived.

sorry so late fellas and sistas, just got back from the thursday night mountain bike ride. A little sore, I ate it hard Now that it's time to put in the guard shoulders, I put the piece of O1 with the guard drawn on it, back on the knife, but this time with a more substantial clamp;

This came directly from Tim Hancock. I fought for years with the file guide moving around while trying to clamp it down tight. I don't like putting the guide metal to metal with the blade. Then Tim told me about using post-it notes. They will stay in place AND protect the blade;

Since my blades have a distal taper that starts right after the ricasso, and I like short ricassos... this doesn't leave me with much of a flat area to clamp the file guide to. This sketch shows what happens when you clamp a file guide down on a tapered surface;

I've messed with a lot of things to alleviate the problem in the previous picture, and here's what has proven to work (and it's ridiculously simple) 3 extra post-its above the plunge cut, where the distal taper starts;

This sketch shows how the file guide comes together with the post-it note shims in place;

Now I can just butt the file guide up to my piece of O1, and the guide will be right where I need it to so that my guard shoulders will be right where I want them; Now to make sure that the file guide came together like I drew it in the second sketch, I take the highest quality, FLAT tool I have in the shop (a Starrett square head) and check it with light coming in from behind it;

Close up of the same;

Over to the KMG we go, to grind down the tang/ricasso closer to where we want the guard shoulders to be (with a 60grit belt).

I do NOT grind all the way to the file guide with this set-up;

Here's a 10 cent tip. If you put the guide onto the blade the way I did, you can put it on the KMG tool rest with the screws of the file guide facing up, and still get the tang in between the platen and tool arm. If the blade were turned 180, the tang would hit the tool arm;

Here it's been taken down pretty close to the file guide with the 60 grit belt;

Chalking up a chainsaw file. This is important to me. When you file the shoulders in, the filings can get clogged in the file, then you'll drag them across the blade shoulders. That filing can dig down into the shoulder and leave a deep mark... deep enough it WILL show when you fit the guard. Ask me how I know this away from it; If you add chalk to the file, the filings will just fall

Filing the radius into the guard shoulders;

Here's a close up of the same;

I'm going to go to the disc sander now, but here's a quick tip for makers. If you have a disc sander and don't use 3M feathering adhesive you NEED some!!! Most adhesives will stick and/or tear the paper... the 3M adhesive allows you to take the paper off easily with no mess!

Here I'm sanding the tang down with the 9" disc. For something like a framed handle, you would be more precise to surface grind this, but for a knife like this, the disc works very well;

I don't sand right up to the guide, but it's MUCH easier to do this with the file guide still one, because I can't accidentally go too far!

Now I hit the actual guard shoulders with the 9" disc and take them right down to the file guide;

This probably isn't necessary, but then again, neither are half of the things I do Just to make sure that the guard shoulders are nice, flat, and clean, I use this surface ground square bar and self-stick Mirka abrasive;

Sanding the shoulders with the surface ground bar and the abrasive paper

Before I feel like I'm done with the guard shoulders, I like to take a Starrett straight edge, place it across the file quide, and then drag it over the guard shoulder. If you feel ABSOLUTELY NOTHING as you pass over the guard shoulder, then you know it's flat and taken down as far as possible;

I like to check with the Starrett square and the high output fluorescent light in the background. If there's any gaps, you WILL see them doing this;

Since I still have the file guide one, and still can't accidentally sand/file/grind past where the guard shoulders are, I go back to the rotary platen. I can clean up the tang, as well as take down any sharp edges on the tang;

Here's the tang sanded nice and smooth with a 120grit belt on the rotary platen;

A nice, clean, and smooth tang;

Here's a shot showing the fresh guard shoulders and cleaned up tang, ready for fitting a guard;

John- HA!!! That's funny you asked that, because I took this pic but then didn't send it to Lorien. This particular file guide is a real bear to open. I made this brass chisel to pry it open, and it works very well without marring up the guide. I'm glad you pointed out that it's an Uncle Al file guide too!!! I absolutely intended on putting that in a caption and just got ahead of myself and didn't do it. Al's products are top notch!!! I'll be brutally honest though, I think I still like the old style one I got from him better than this one.

BTW- I have a lot more pics... just gotta get them edited and emailed to Lorien

This sketch was an attempt at showing why I don't cut the guard shoulders in until I have the blade sanded up near its final grit. It's too easy to roll the corners/sharp edges of the guard shoulders if you do a bunch of hand sanding AFTER cutting the guard shoulders in. If you do roll them, the guard will not fit as well. It can create shadows that will make it look like a bad fit, even if it is a good fit. IMHO ;

I've gotta' sand the small burr off created by cutting the shoulders (and a little bit of oxides left over from differential tempering. This sketch is to show how important it is to lift up at the end of the sanding stroke, and not let the block roll that corner;

Sanding the burr and the oxides off the spine;

It's kind of hard to see, but there's a small burr created when cutting the guard shoulders in. That has to be sanded off, or it will interfere with the guard fit;

Sanding that burr off;

Here's my high tech method for figuring out how much guard material I'm going to need

Cutting the 416 stainless steel barstock with the horizontal bandsaw;

Here's what most 416 looks like when you buy it;

If there's ANYTHING in my shop that I would consider "cheating" it would have to be the surface grinder.

This is why, after one quick pass on the surface grinder, the 416 is this clean;

Checking the thickness of the ricasso with a Starrett micrometer;

Going to the decimal chart to show where the approximate thickness of the blade is, compared to the size end mill I want to use to mill the slot. It's always better to use an end mill under the final size you want, and then mill the slot out to your desired dimension;

Just for kicks, I wrote out the simple math you have to do to figure out how much extra material I'll have to mill off in addition to the diameter of the end mill itself; Here's my high tech guard lay-out technique! LOL You could get really into this, machine the 416 square, use and edge finder to make sure you mill the slot EXACTLY in the center of the material, etc. But I'm "making parts for parts." So I don't need to do all of that. I just need a slot that is a precise width, close to the length... and close to the center of the material;

Milling the slot;

I mill the handle side of the slot oversize, so that I don't have to fit the entire thickness of the guard to the blade. It looks quite a bit off center in this photo, but it was only off by 0.005" which is not going to matter as this progresses;

I flip the guard over, and mill the top side of the slot. Here I'm checking the dimension with a Starrett inside micrometer;

This is the slot as machined. Machining it this way, I have a 0.030" thick area to fit, rather than the entire 0.370" thick guard;

Here's one of my doo-dads. This is a block of micarta with a center post machined into it, and two rare earth magnets. I use a few of these. They allow me to hold the guard material securely, and make it easier to exert even pressure;

The magnets work very well! This is one of the many reasons I like 416 ss, it's magnetic

First fit... that little bump you can see is indicative of an area that needs to be filed down a bit;

Gotta drive the guard back off;

I'm trying to show where the guard is hitting. It's easy to see in person, but I'm not sure how well it will show in this picture;

It's getting closer... this is a lot of back and forth. Drive it on, take it off, file, sand.... repeat/repeat/repeat;

Closer yet ;And a little closer. There's a lot of stuff going on in between this photos, but it's just similar steps as those leading up to the first fit;

Even though it looked pretty good from most angles, there was a TINY bit of shadow at the corner where the guard meets the blade. Hold it up to the high output light, and the gap slaps you in the face;

Took it back off, did a little filing/sanding... and there it's seated tight, no more gap.

I tried taking some pics showing the guard fit after I was happy with it, but I had to dump the photos from the memory stick. And I decided grabbing 2 hours of sleep was a pretty good idea too. Whewe! Good as new! (which wasn't that good, LMAO! ). Mike, I have a theory, but I could be wrong. As you know the end mill leaves the slot with round ends. I mill that undersize, so that I HAVE to do some filing on the ends of the slot so the guard will go back up to the same spot every time. I file the ends of the slot, then do that first trial fit, and ALWAYS have a little that needs to be filed off. Which is the area I circled in this pic. I THINK that the little bumps are simply some of that extra guard material being displaced (it's gotta go somewhere). I tried to get a good picture of it (and wasn't successful) but there were 4 bumps around the guard that all corresponded with those areas that needed to be filed down.

Those areas can be a real issue with a differentially hardened blade, because if the ricasso is really soft on such a blade, the guard material will keep its shape, and displace the blade steel instead!!! And that's a real bugger to fix. After dicking around with it, I got it to where I was happy with the fit. I distinctly remember the days when I was shooting for no gaps in the fit, but as you get more practice in the goal turns into wanting absolutely no black lines or shadows in the fit up. I'm not sure how well it shows in the pic, but this one is tight as a drum and I'm pretty happy with it;

Now this is a million dollar trick that Tim Hancock and Mike Vagnino taught me, and I'm pretty sure (don't hold me to it) that Buster Warenski told Tim about it. I'm not trying to spread rumor or misinformation, just give credit where it's due ;

Okay, so that last pic didn't make sense right? Well I hope this one will. When you're dealing with precision ground surfaces that are parallel, and centerlines for lay-out and reference... you don't want your guard to be off of square. If you hold a mirror flat (and firmly) on top of the guard, then eye down the spine of the blade--- If the guard is square to the blade, then the reflection of the spine will be perfectly in line with itself. If the guard is canted, the reflection will kick off to the high side.

Yay... this one is square

Time to fit up some spacer material- thin copper and black G10 from my friends at Alpha Knife Supply.

This need to fit well, but there's no super precision required here, so I just lay-out the lines with a ruler and the tang width/thickness as a guide;

Got our lines all drawn in;

So I have fought, and fought, and fought with how to cut and slot spacer material. Most of it will tear the teeth off of a bandsaw, and getting the slot in the center can be a ROYAL pain. I've tried things like various dremel bits, drill bits, fixturing the pieces and machining the slot, etc. Then I bought this el-cheap-O jeweler's saw off of ebay for like $20 with the blades. It is like a miracle for cutting spacers!!!

Drill a quick pilot hole in the corner of where you want the slot to be;

Sawing out the hole. Of course you have to take one end of the saw blade out of its clamp and feed it through the hole, then clamp it back down before you can saw anything. It cuts this stuff like it's butter;

Here are the slots sawn out... it took me far longer to take these pictures than it did to saw these out. A few light passes with a

file and they'll be golden;

Marking stuff like black G10 for cutting can be an exercise in frustration. Here's my super simple fix--- slap some brown paper tape on it. Then use the copper spacer as a pattern;

Little bit of filing to true up the slots;

Running the spacers over the rotary platen real quick to take off the burrs;

Quick sand on the granite surface plate to make sure the spacers are flat;

Marking the pattern for the handle on the block and figuring out where to cut the block for the front of the handle;

I cut the front end of the block, then took it to the 12" disc sander to square it up;

This particular wood will burn really easily, so I decided not to use the disc sander on it and true the front of the block by hand. This is a little jig I made for just such an occasion. It's basically a big block of micarta that has been machined so it can be used as a slider to keep a handle block square to the granite plate. There is a relief machined into the bottom of the block, so you can pass over the sand paper without the jig touching it... only the handle material will make contact with the sand paper;

same thing, just different views of it;

Normally I would just sand the block face like this... sand paper glued to the granite plate, and sanding with smooth pulls. The jig works better if you need to take a fair amount of material off;

Checking the face of the block with the square head while it's back-lit. It needs to be FLAT;

Laying out the tang now that the front of the block is flat; The tang all laid out;

Here's something I came up with that I really like. This is a surface gauge... basically it is an adjustable height scribe (like a height gauge) and I have taped a sharpie to it. I put the handle block on the big granite surface plate, then set the surface gauge/marker to draw in my lay-out lines on the front of the block;

Close up of the handle/tang lay-out;

Laying out the tang thickness on the front of the handle block;

Here's the front of the handle block, all laid out for the tang; Lining up the handle block in the mill using a long center drill as a guide;

I use the center drill to start the holes. If you just drill down into an angle surface like this with a regular drill bit, the bit will walk and not enter the block where you want it to; I like to drill the handle blocks like this using wax as a lubricant. It helps to keep the drill clean... super dense hardwoods have a tendency to load up in the flutes of the drill bit really fast;

With some woods like this, I keep a nylon brush there to help clear the wood from the bit as it's drawn back out of the block; After drilling two holes that match the profile of the tang as closely as I can get with two long straight lines, I have some webbing between the holes that has to be removed. I like these Zip bits in the Foredom to make quick work of it;

I chase it a little more with the hand drill and the long drill bit;

At this point, I move to the John Perry broaches. I have two of these from John, and they are absolutely amazing tools. I can't believe I did so many hidden tangs in this shop with OUT John's broaches;

Hogging out the rest of the material for the tang with one of John Perry's broaches;

Filing the sides for a little clean-up;

The tang hole starting to clean up pretty nicely. This is before the first try fit;

Here's the first try fit of handle to tang;

fancy way to check the depth and see if we're getting in there deep enough

Getting closer;

I drew a reference line right after taking the previous photo... drawn right across the tang to show how deep it was in the handle block. In this picture I'm laying the tang down using that line as a reference. Fortunately, it looks like it's going into the handle right where we need it to;

Getting closer still

... more work with the broach and file....

Closer... more broach and file

I got this last email from Nick at 4:33AM Soooo close... but I gotta get some sleep!!!

Sorry about the teasing, but I get up at 6am or sooner, check my inbox for the anticipated emails from Mr. Wheeler, download and save them, then upload them all to photobucket. The amount of time, (overall) that consumes is about an hour including my computer's and Photobucket's capability to get the job done. Then I have to get myself and the rest of my family ready for school and work, do the laundry and dishes, feed myself and ride to work. This morning I had to visit the post office who just hired a new clerk. Long story short, it takes me about 3 hours all told between receiving the pics and posting them up. Just in case you were wondering Now, some words from our sponsor, (after I asked Nick if it was ok to swing it around for a bit) which I take as good advice Time will tell whether I follow it or not ;

"Oh sure... I make 'ya a $1250 knife and you're going to go scratch it all up! LOL Nah, it will be yours to do with as you please... I just had figured I'd step it up with the degree of knife after you said you were going to pack Jason's knife for trails. It's obviously been made to have the heart and soul of a combat worthy knife... but with the face of a cover model "

Okay... I've got a lot of pics to send I forgot to send these. I took some pics of a spacer sanding block. I make various versions of this as I need them, they are super simple to make, but are SOOO helpful when sanding spacers. Essentially, you're just using the lip machined into the block to catch on the spacer when you pull sand it. It also makes it MUCH easier to put even pressure on the spacer;

This is a shot of the spacers all sanded smooth and even;

Back to the next shots, getting the handle fit up. When it's hitting somewhere, but I'm just not sure where, I'll color the tang with a marker;

Then clamp the blade down, shove the handle block on, remove it, and see where the ink has been rubbed off the tang and consequently deposited in the tang hole of the block;

Back to the broaches. John's broaches definitely deserve another photo here!

Whewe... it fits.

Put it in one of my glue-up fixtures so I can check the fit;

Same thing, closer shot;

The knife in the fixture---back-lit so I can make sure there are absolutely NO gaps;

Next step I do, is make a guard template. Here are some from the last handful of knives I've made, along with a piece of 1/8"

thick micarta that will be the guard template for this knife;

This is the process for making the template. It may seem like a lot of extra work, but I can make a template very fast, and it REALLY makes it easier, for me, to make sure the guard is symmetrical;

Machining the micarta blank FLAT on one edge;

Next step...

Milling the notch (1/2 the blade thickness); Here's how the template goes in place, before shaping the outside profile;

Marking the template length;

Cutting the paper template out;

Here's the paper template... I ended up taking just a little more off of it after this;

The paper template has been transferred to the micarta template (with paper tape added to make it easier to see the line;

Grinding the micarta template to shape;

Scribing the template onto the guard. It's a mirror image, so you simply scribe one side, flip it to the other side, and scribe again;

Guard with the pattern scribed on;

Here's the guard by itself, with the pattern scribed onto it. It is definitely symmetrical doing it this way, and the blade is exactly in the center of the guard;

Rough cutting the guard on the bandsaw;

Here I'm setting up the tool rest on the KMG to 87 degrees. I dont' want to grind the guard down at a perfect 90 degrees to the top and bottom. It will make it easier for the handle shaping process to have this little bit of angle set in now;

Taking the guard down to the scribe line on the KMG belt grinder;

I've placed the guard against a square, so it shows how the guard will flare out just a little TOWARD the handle once it's all put together;

I sketch a line on the guard, for a rough idea of how it will be shaped;

Since the guard isn't a square chunk of steel anymore, I can't just throw it on the bandsaw and cut it. I have this simple little fixture that I can use to hold the blade and guard, then go to the bandsaw;

Rough sawing a chunk of the guard off. I like to get some of the bulk of the guard off BEFORE glue-up, because cutting/milling/grinding a large amount of bulk off afterward will cause a lot of heat build-up that I don't want;

Here's a large piece of that bulk, sawn off;

Making progress, ready for the next step

Here's a diagram for my next step. I like to use the broaches to cut pockets in the tang hole, for epoxy to fill and grap onto. This is NOT the same as drilling out a huge hole in the handle and just filling it with epoxy. This allows the epoxy to not only act as an adhesive, but also a mechanical fastener... kind of like a barb on a fish-hook;

This is a narrow broach I made for cutting the side pockets;

Using the narrow broach in the corners of the tang hole;

Setting up to broach a pocket in the middle section of the handle;

Once I got the pocket work done in the tang, then I get to play with fingernail polish LMAO I'm using it as a resist for the etch. I worked hard to get the guard to fit just so, I don't want to etch the area the guard will fit up to and then have it not fit anymore;

Here's the basics for how I etch a blade like this. Distilled water, Ferric Chloride, and a small tank to submerge the blade in. The two small tanks I've been using for 10 years weren't big enough for this blade, so I had to make a new one today.

Time to make sure the blade is CLEAN. I like scrubbing it with hot water and Liquid Ivory soap. This is the same thing I do for cleaning a clay-hardened blade prior to etching;

Clean, clean, clean...

Clean and rinse... NO FINGERPRINTS!!!

Ready for a quick dip. I like to dip the blade for just a few seconds and then pull it out the look over it. If we somehow missed some oil, or dirt, etc. then it can interfere with the etch. If you catch it RIGHT AWAY it won't be an issue. If you don't catch it, and let it stay on the blade while it's etching, it could be a big problem;

Pulling the blade out after a few seconds to check. It looked good, so back in it goes... I leave it in the echant for 5 minutes, after which I'll take it out and check it, then go back to the utility sink and scrub it with dish soap and a blue paper towel again;

Here it is after the first 5 minutes. At this point, the blade is pretty much black;

Close-up of the same;

This is the blade after a total of 3 runs through the etching solution, with a good dish-soap cleaning between each etch. It's really close to just being black at this point;

Back to the sanding fixture we go. I need to sand the oxides off that are a result of the etching process. I do this with a steel sanding stick, 2500 grit abrasive paper, and LOTS of KoolMist sprayed on the blade;

Here's a different view of the post etch hand sanding. After I get done doing this, then I take a real good look at the blade and decide how exactly I want to proceed;

I want to make some reference lines for etching my name in the blade, but I want the reference lines to be parallel with the guard.... so first things first, I put the guard back on;

Anything that's flat and parallel will work for this. The exact height isn't important, I just want a line to make it easier to position my stencil;

Here's the whole set-up for etching my name into the blade;

The electrolyte and all purpose cleaner that's used with the etcher;

Here's the stencil I'll use on this blade. I have three, but use this one the most;

It really helps me to use back-lighting so that I can position the stencil properly. Since the stencil is dark green, and the blade is dark, it's very hard for me to see where I'm putting it if I just lay it down on the bench;

Here's a close-up.... this is more like the way I see it when positioning the stencil;

Once I get it where I think it's right, I like to look at it upside down. I have no idea what the science is behind this... but if you look at it right side up, you tend to read it just as much as you try to center it. When it's upside down, you just see it as an object rather than a word, so it's easy to see if it's right. For me anyway! LOL;

I actually bought the video for the etcher (15 years ago) and you're supposed to douse the etching hand-pad with electrolyte, then dob it on a paper towel so that it's not soaking wet;

Making contact with the stencil. The machine is set on DC current, and it's actually removing metal through the stencil now;

Etching close up;

All that gunk on the cotton batting is material pulled from the blade. The inside of the batting will be BLACK;

Right after etching my mark... it's really not pretty at this point! It needs some extra work to make it look right;

So, back to the sanding fixture we go... with a little more 2500 grit paper;

Here it is after sanding. It's better, but it's still not very clear;

I get it CLEAN again with hot water and dish-soap, then take it back to the etching tank. I only leave it in there for about one minute this time though;

Spraying the blade down with Windex to neutralize the acid; Guess where we get to go?!?! That's right... more hand finishing This time I'm using 3M polishing paper. The pink stuff is supposed to be 4,000 grit;

Now my mark is clear and much easier to read;

There are many different things you could do to finish out damascus at this point. You could even leave it alone if you wanted to, but I want to get some more "pop" out of this blade, by highlighting as much contrast and shimmer as I can. This is a method I've used for a long time and have had very reliable results with. It's also easy to touch up later if need be. The blade will be CLEANED again, and then I'll go over it with Birchwood Casey Super Blue;

Going over the blade with the Super Blue. This will REALLY make the blade dark;

This is neutralized with cold water after it's been on the blade for a minute;

This is the block I like to use for final sanding on damascus. If you use a soft block, it will contour to the convex blade shape and give it a nice finish, but it will allow the paper to go down into the recessed areas (that are currently very dark) and lift the color out of them. This particular block has a material glued to it that's VERY hard, but has just a tiny bit of give to it. So it gives a nice finish, but also rides on the high spots and leaves the low spots dark;

Final sanding of the blade, this is with the mint green 3M polishing paper, which is supposed to be something like 6,000 grit. That sounds fancy, but it's just going to really help to highlight the high areas of steel so that they contrast with the lower areas. I like this better than buffing, as a buffing wheel tends to pull the dark color from the low areas on a pattern like this (in my experience). I do this with a lot of Koolmist;

After all the polishing is done;

Same thing, different view;

The etched and polished blade;

same;

same, close-up near tip;

same, showing the fine layer appearance of the spine;

I really don't want my knives falling apart, so I try to do several things to ensure that they won't. I haven't been doing this next step for too long, but I think it's one of those extra things that is worth more than the small amount of time it takes to do it. I take a checkering file and file a small serious of singe line checkering grooves in the tang. They're not big, deep cuts that are going to make me worry about cutting too far into the tang... but they are a create a really good surface for the epoxy to adhere to. I do this AFTER I put the guard on, just to make sure I don't raise a burr that might scratch the guard fit-up;

I don't do the entire tang... the is the area that will be inside that rectangular pocket I made inside the handle block with the broach;

EVERYTHING gets cleaned with Acetone;

I really like Acraglas from Brownell's for my knives. I have had to take a couple knives apart before, and it required completely destroying the handle to get it off the tang;

I like to mix the Acraglas under something warm/hot, like a Halogen light. It makes it mix better, flow better, and it seems to me that it cures out a little faster this way too; Everything gets a good coating of epoxy;

Tightening up my handy dandy fixture;

Glued up tight... time for this to sit for awhile so the Acraglas can cure;

Just double checking that everything went together like it was supposed to, by sighting down the blade. Everything went together square and in-line when it was dry... you'd be surprised how things can move around with wet epoxy on them, even when everything was a nice tight fit. If something had moved, I'd be able to see it here. Fortunately, everything was still lined up. These fixtures do help make sure things stay where they're supposed to as well;

I find that Nick's captions are WAAAAY better when he's got a good night's sleep in him. Enjoy. Well, even after all of the stuff I did to ensure everything would fit together just right--- I THOUGHT I saw a gap on the top side of the handle when I took the knife out of the glue-up fixture. Since that would mean scrapping this handle, I ground everything down at that spot just to check. WHEWE... it was just some kind of optical illusion as everything fits just like it's supposed to;

We need to drill a pin hole. One thing I screwed up a lot when I was first doing this kind of knife, was getting the pin offcenter in the handle. After awhile, you can eyeball it pretty easily, but it doesn't hurt to have a reference. I start by putting a straight edge over the handle that runs up, in-line with the spine of the blade. Then do the same thing on the choil side;

I do just eyeball the overall location of the pin, but one of these Center Rules is very handy for helping out with centering the pin. Side-note, I have a world class Mastersmith friend that DESPISES pins because it disrupts the flow of the knife to his eye. And it's kind of funny because we both seem to like similar type of knives, yet I LIKE a pin not only as a mechanical fastener, but because it's kind of like "dotting the i" or "crossing the t" for me, it just looks right to my eye ;

Here's a drilling fixture I use. I made this back when I was making tapered full tang, stock removal blades and realized you can't lay a tapered blade down on the dill press and expect the holes to still be perpendicular with the table. That idea transfers well for drilling a hidden tang as well, since the ricasso is FLAT and PARALLEL, I KNOW that if I clamp the blade down by the ricasso then I can drill through the block/tang and have the hole be absolutely perpendicular to the ricasso;

You don't want the handle to flex downward as you're drilling, so there's this little adjustable support to ensure it doesn't;

Here's everything set-up for drilling;

Close-up of the same. Now here's the thing here--- When you drill down through the block, and hit the steel tang, it's going to make the bit want to wander before it grabs and penetrates the tang. If you're not careful, you can REALLY warble out the hole in the wood block this way. There are a couple things we can do to fight this. 1.) Start with a bit that's a little smaller than our desired pin diameter. (I want to use a 3/32" pin- so this first bit is 5/64") 2.) Make sure the knife is SECURE so the drill or mill can't move it around. 3.) Use basic machining figures for your feeds and speeds (that means this little bit needs to be turning at a blazing fast speed- and you bring the bit down in light "pecks";

When it comes time to get the hole up to the correct size, my PREFERRED technique is to use a CHUCKING REAMER. A reamer is the standard go-to tool for making a drilled hole round, clean, true, and precise. Unfortunately, my shop secretary neglected to order me some new reamers!!! *eek* So I'm going to do this with a drill bit. I'm using a brand new, cobalt 3/32" jobber drill. I haven't moved the table/vise AT ALL, so I know the spindle is still perfectly in line with the hole. I don't want to contaminate the hole with cutting fluid (it can seep into the wood) so I use my trusty wax again. This time, I'm using the fine feed for taking the spindle down, and do it in one smooth, continuous motion. The reason for all of this semi-technical hoopla for a silly little hole, is we don't want to go through all that other work only to end up with a pin that has a "halo" around it because the pin hole is too big for the pin. I'm sure there are hundreds of makers that just lay the handle down on a drill press, force an old dull bit through the handle and tang, and get a perfect fit for their pin--- but experience (many times over mind you) proves that I am not one of those guys!!! ;

The next three images are an almost overly simple explanation of what I'm going to shoot for with the handle shaping. This is a little more for my friends and family that are looking at the pictures on my Facebook page--- as I'm sure most all makers and collectors on BF already are more than familiar with these ideas. First up, this is what I like (not everyone I'm sure, but hey--this one has my name on it!) LOL;

Here are some things that I do NOT want. Note the abrupt "ledge" on the top side of the handle, as well as the hump (this is very common with newer makers when they don't get the correct angle on the front of the block--- yes, I mean ME ). Also the guard is NOT thinned down... this is a double negative- for 1.) It looks clunky and 2.) It leaves unnecessary weight in the handle (the guard is steel, you're not going to bend it with your finger). Another thing is that very thin bit of wood right at the finger guard. I don't like that as it's leaving a vulnerable little piece of wood that doesn't need to be there (IMHO) Overall, the handle is too wide for the blade... but if I had to choose too wide (like this) versus too narrow (next image) I'd choose too wide. Of course we are shaping the handle as we choose--- so we will choose to do it right LOL;

This is what I REALLY don't want/like!!! The handle is way too narrow for this blade and that completely stops the eye in that area as you try to look over the knife. Also, the guard is canted upward---which looks bad. That's the kind of thing that made it SOOOOO IMPORTANT to get the guard shoulders filed in at just the right angle. A little bit of downward angle can look okay, but if you're going to cant the guard down a lot, I personally feel like the plunge line should be made that way as well. In the same line of thought, I think it looks funny/odd if the plunge line is canted down at an angle with the guard square to the blade. Again, that's just all MY opinion, and we all know what those are worth! ;

Taking the whole she-bang to the bandsaw. The little fixture wasn't really needed on this knife because we started with a fairly square block. But even if you have a COMPLETELY SQUARE block---yet don't have it fit up and epoxied to the blade squarely, you could mess up your handle profile in this step;

As sawn--- I just have the pattern drawn on there for reference from fitting the tang, so that is not a definitive line for me to follow at this point. It is a general outline that I know will work because I've shaped a lot of handles like this. I would not recommend a newer maker try to simply go off of a pattern, because what looks right to their eye in a pattern, may not be user friendly AT ALL;

I took a LOT of pictures while at the grinders with this knife because I wanted to try to clearly convey what's going on, but also to point out the safety risks here to the new comers. After using belt grinders for 15 years you willingly put your hands/fingers right next to a running belt without even thinking about it because you're familiar with the machine and also familiar with your process. But you KNOW in your mind that you respect that machine because it WILL BITE YOU no matter your sex, race, religion--- if you put any part of your body against it. I have told many people that bumping your hand against a 36 grit belt running at 5000 surface feet per minute is the same as sticking your hand against the pavement while you're driving down the freeway. NOT A PLEASANT EXPERIENCE!!! I start with a 10" wheel to knock down a lot of the bulk. This wood is very hard and dense, and WILL BURN if you do not use new, sharp belts;

10" wheel shaping up the butt end of the handle a little bit;

Handle shaping is where it's REALLY NICE to have multiple grinders. You can freely move from one to the other as you need to, without changing the grinder set-up. I did this stuff for 11 years with one grinder, and I still cannot believe how much nicer it is having 2... let alone 3. ;

Back to the 10" wheel. I should also note that I watched Dan Farr, who is very well recognized for making very comfortable,

user-friendly handles, shape a knife handle at Derrick Wulf's hammer-in in Vermont. Dan is very systematic and proficient with the way he does it. I am not. Part of the problem is the rarity in which I see a knife through to this point, but the other thing is that I just haven't established such a solid routine like Dan has. So I do a lot of "back and forth" but I'll end up with a handle that I feel is comfortable, clean, and aesthetically pleasing--- so it's not all bad Another view of the 10" wheel; LOL;

This is pretty close to my point of view while using the 10" wheel. As you can see, it's easier for YOU to see what I'm doing in the other pics than it is for ME to see what I'm doing while actually standing in front of the grinder;

After I get the sides knocked down, I have to start rotating around the guard to the back of the handle. We want this thing to feel good in the handle. I think a lot of newer makers leave their handles too square for fear of screwing something up--- or make them like a broom handle, which is just as bad if not worse. A very quick study of the human hand will show it's not made to COMFORTABLY hold something that's squared off, or skinny and perfectly round;

Now here is something that I imagine most makers do, I know for a fact that local BF superstar Raymond Richard does this also (note, while Ray and I make knives that are pretty different, I believe we both have very similar ideas on how a handle/guard/blade all need to meet up to allow the eye to flow over the knife and not get caught up in one spot). Hold the knife up to some kind of back-light (I'm using the high output fluorescent above the grinders) to check the SILHOUETTE of the blade/handle. It's MUCH MUCH easier to make sure we're getting to our desired shapes/transitions by checking the silhouette than it is to simply look at it in hand;

Here is my million dollar trick. I made a small tool to do this about 10 years ago, and then one day I saw a surface gauge in an old machining book. Low and behold, you can buy one for about $10 from places like Enco. Now since our ricasso is flat and parallel, and our cutting edge is centered (right?!?!?!? ) then we simply put the knife down on a 1-2-3 (precision ground block) on top of the granite surface plate. Match the marker point up to the cutting edge. (yes, I really just taped the marker to the scribe in the surface gauge, sometimes simple and easy really is better! );

Up close shot of matching the marker up to the cutting edge;

Now trace around the handle, and you have a centerline that is perfectly in line with the entire knife. Like I said before, the flat and parallel ricasso is my foundation;

Going round the butt end of the handle;

Ta-dah!

A perfect center-line to use as a reference while shaping this handle;

Back to the grinder with a 2" wheel to start sculpting this thing. I think of this kind of like carving/whittling... but with a 36 grit belt moving blazing fast! ;

An "ah crap!!!" moment. This is the nature of the beast when you're working with natural materials. A small void can be filled with the same wood's dust and thin super-glue... but a big one can mean mutilating the handle off and starting over. *spoiler alert* this one ended up being ground away ;

Back to the 2" wheel;

Rounding out the sides of the butt end of the handle;

2" wheel, cleaning up the inside are of the handle where the pinky finger will grip;

Getting it "carved down"

It's getting there, but it's still very clunky;

2" wheel--- grinding the butt end of the handle down a bit. It can be round and have shape, it doesn't need to be flat across the butt of the handle;

This is the butt end of the handle, slightly rounded over... it will become more so as the shaping continues;

Cutting in the area near the guard. I guess a lot of makers use a small wheel for this, but that won't give me the shape I

ultimately want. This is a very easy way to screw up the handle in a hurry, but it's a quick way to knock down some of the unneeded bulk;

Same as the previous image, but I set the camera up behind the grinder a bit to give a different perspective;

Now I go to the flat platen to smooth out the taper that will run from the guard to the back half (or so) area of the handle. This is why I ground the guard with an 87 degree angle when I was rough shaping it. I can make contact with the lower side of the guard, and not be cutting into my predetermined guard profile;

Here's the result... it's starting to smooth things out; Now I hop over to the 9" disc with an 80 grit disc. I can clean up the coarse grinding marks, as well as make the taper nice and symmetrical;

Here it is, fresh off the 9" disc.... it's getting there;

Same thing, but showing the font of side of the handle. There's still a lot of material that needs to come off;

Same stage, but next to the pattern to check for progress;

At this point, the handle is almost comfortable to hold, but there are definitely some spots that don't feel right. I like to hold the knife and use a pencil to help pinpoint where things need to be taken down;

Doing the same thing as the previous photo, but with a marker on the guard;

Extending the marker line from the guard, down onto the handle with a pencil;

Here's the knife in one of my handle working fixtures. I got this idea from a knife maker named Tiny Spencer when I was 17 years old. I modified his idea a little, and ended up with this. I'll step out on the ledge to say that this is far better than the standard "knife maker's vise" because I can rotate the base of the bench vise, I can rotate the head of the bench vise, and I can rotate the fixture itself. I can position this thing ANYWHERE I want to in order to make it comfortable and so that I can see what I'm doing;

These are my favorite files for fine tuning a handle. This brings up an interesting side story. A while back a fella that makes knives came to my shop. He took a look around (this is even before the lathe, mills, and grinders #2 and #3) and said, "Well I get it now!!!" I asked him what he meant, and he replied, "Well shoot, look at all of this equipment!!! I could make knives just like yours if I had all these machines too!!!" I kind of laughed and said, "Well, you know, there's a lot of hand work involved. I don't know how to make a knife without hand work." He held his position... basically trying to invoke some kind of argument out of me, or admission that I run a knife factory.... so finally I told him "Knock yourself out then. "

Don't forget the file-card!!! Wood of any kind will load a file up, but some of it you can simply knock out of the file by giving it a light wrap against the vise. This stuff is dense and oily, so it will load up a file FAST, and that has to be cleaned or your file will quit cutting;

Getting to work with a file--- working on the transition from handle to guard;

Up close shot of filing the guard to shape;

Filing from a different angle... this type of positioning is where this fixture/vise combination REALLY shines;

More filing...

More... more filing...

We are getting closer though!

More filing, in the recess just behind the palm swell;

Ya' gotta' get right in there and file away. I actually love this part of the process, because with the blade grinding/heattreating/drilling etc.... you can be very matter of fact and work to essentially engineered procedures. This is free form shaping. There are no fixtures, no absolute rules, no times/temperatures... it is simply working with your hands in the most basic way as man has been doing for--- how long? I want the handle to have a certain look, even more importantly- a certain feel, but I also will hold myself to the same type of standards in symmetry with the round and contoured handle, as I did with things like machining the guard slot;

Guess what? Yep, that's right! More filing

I want to thin the guard down a lot more. Now I can say from experience, that it's possible to get ahead of yourself, slip, and end up with the file sliding underneath the guard and scratching the pretty 600grit hand planed surface to hell. That is NOT-sogood! Simple solution, put a piece of micarta under the face of the guard so that can't happen ;

Filing the guard down thinner;

Well, I don't just file away with abandon, it is a good idea to stop, take the knife out of the fixture, and check for feel and symmetry. I am left handed, so it's very important to make the knife completely symmetrical not only for appearance, but if I can make the handle feel good in my left hand AND it's completely symmetrical, then it will feel good to the other 92% of the population's right handers. It's a good time to go back to the silhouette and check for our progress there too. It's starting to come together now ;

Well... this sucks giant donkey balls... but I guess life does that sometimes. I was in the homestretch when this popped up. It's just a natural void in the wood. NO WAY of knowing it was there until I filed into it. I've heard you can fill them with superglue, so I gave it a shot. Well, like 7 shots actually... and you know what it looked like? A big void filled with superglue. So, um, yea... that ain't gonna cut it. I guess this is the kind of spot you have to decide if you're going to be the guy that tries really hard to hide something that's not right, and then forever worry about it... or grit your teeth and do it right. As much as I don't want to and really can't afford to... this handle has to come off. Maybe the silver lining is that it's a ~$65 block of wood, and not a $300 piece of ivory??? The part that hurts the most when something like this happens... is the time lost.

I have a family shin-dig this weekend and will not be home at all. And since I have to hurry up and get a knife done for the Journeyman fixed blade to be auctioned at Blade... I might have to put this project on hold for a few now.... Well, these pics didn't get sent yet, but they are still part of the process...whether that handle worked out or not! 9" disc sander with a rubber pad over top of the aluminum disc, and a 120 grit disc;

Here it is off the disc after that step;

Now I roll the guard against the disc so that I can get a smooth and symmetrical shape on the spine side of the handle;

In this shot I'm blending the shape on the butt end of the handle with the rotary platen and a 120 grit J-flex belt;

Rolling the J-flex belt over, and then into the guard/handle transition;

Same as previous photo, on the other side of the handle;

This is getting close to what I shoot for with that last step;

Getting the slack belt to roll into the palm recess to help smooth out all of my file marks;

Now I want to get the slack belt into the front of the handle recesses, but a 2" belt will wash out some of the shape that I've

worked hard to file into this handle... so I need some 1" wide belts. This is a belt splitter I made that uses a standard utility knife blade. You CAN just tear the belts in half... but you usually get some frays or a weird spot at the joint in the belt. This will eliminate those problems;

Splitting a 120 grit J-flex belt with the belt splitter;

The 2" wide belt knocked down to 1" width;

Using the 1" slack belt in the front part of the palm recess;

Back to some more filing to tweak the shape;

Close to final shape at this point;

I don't normally use a small wheel on a handle like this, but I wanted to tweak the shape of the butt end of the handle a little

bit, and the small wheel was a good choice to make the changes I wanted;

Same thing, close-up shot; Well, as you all know--- All that work was pretty much for not, as the handle ended up not working out. I was fortunate not to have put the pin in the handle yet, because it means the handle can be pulled off rather than chiseled/smashed/machined/ground off. Acraglas is very tough stuff--- you're not going to just yank the handle off. First the blade is wrapped in a heat deflecting cloth (I think it's what fireman's suits are made of) and a paper towel, then a leather pad, and the whole thing is clamped down tight to the bench vise. I put on welding gloves, wrap the handle with a piece of Kaowool, and apply heat to the handle with a heat gun. Once the handle gets quite hot, the epoxy will let go just enough that I can grab the handle with both hands, pull like crazy, and get the handle off;

Here's the handle... no longer on the knife! It's definitely worse for ware... but it's a heck of a lot easier to get it off in one big piece than in hundreds of little ones!

New handle in the fixture. Hmm... I wonder what it is???

This close-up shows some neopreme foam that I sometimes use in the glue-up fixture. The foam combined with the swivel pad bolts allows you to apply pressure to the back end of the handle that's very similar to holding the handle in place with your

hand;

This is just a still shot of what I was doing in the video, but for the sake of consistency I want to keep up with the sequential photos;

For me, the best way to get the distinct radius in the handle to guard transition is to file it in;

Filed in;

Here's a handful of the "sanding sticks" I use while hand sanding a handle as part of the final finishing process;

Getting started with hand sanding on the handle with 320 grit paper. I suppose it would be possible to go right to the buffer with the finish the handle currently has--- but it would require some pretty aggressive buffing. Starting out like this, I can make sure that everything truly is symmetrical and that there are no little inconsistencies that I may have left with the machines. When I'm done hand sanding, the buffing process is VERY QUICK and won't wash out the wood;

With all those little gadgets and gizmoes for handle work, this is still the one I use the most. It's essentially a rubber finger that I made for this back when I was 17, after meeting custom maker Tiny Spencer. There's just something about the shape and durometer of the rubber that makes it work really well;

Using that same rubber stick with 320 grit paper;

Sanding the butt end of the handle with 320 grit and a rigid backing;

This is the soft faced sanding block I use AFTER the rigid block. The rigid block makes sure it's flat and smooth. The soft one makes sure it has a nice finish with a nice "corner" around the end;

When most guys learn about the "shoe shine" sanding technique they'll go nuts with it--- just sanding all over hell and gone

that way. At least I did. The technique is pretty much explained with its name. The problem is that it's easy to wash out defined shapes, and also get humps and lumps over pins, in handle to guard transitions, etc. So I use this technique VERY sparingly... and with fine paper. I don't do it enough to justify buying expensive fine grit shop rolls, so I make something that works very well. I slap a piece of duct tape on the back of some 600 grit (or finer if need be) sand paper, then cut it into strips. A standard width duct tape is wide enough for 3 or 4 strips;

Sanding with the "shoe shine" technique and the 600X/duct tape combo;

Sanding the "flats" of the handle with 600 grit paper and a steel backing bar (just what I was doing in the last video);

Close up of same.... gotta get the guard sanded out as well!

Sanding the inside curve of the finger guard with some roundstock and 320 grit paper. I did the main clean-up of this transition by floating the J-flex belt into the junction... but I never can get the guard cleaned up quite right, so this is required. I don't want to mess up the junction, so I try to mostly just sand the steel guard. It's like sanding 90% guard, with 10% onto the junction. If you don't sand the junction AT ALL, then you'll get a noticeable lip there;

Same thing, different shot;

Once I get the steel smoothed out with 320 grit paper, I move to 600X, then 1200X. For the 1200X, I use this smaller piece of round stock with a piece of hard rubber tubing pressed over it;

At this point the entire handle, guard and all... has been HAND sanded to 1200 grit paper. I smear some Tru-Oil (a gun-stock finish) on the wood and do some more sanding with 1200X and a sanding stick that has a soft rubber face. This is stabilized Koa so this step is not a necessity, but it helps to ensure there are no funky open "pores" and that the wood will buff out nicely;

Sanding with the finishing oil. I will sand until the dust and oil build up a slurry, and then keep sanding. Almost all of the oil will penetrate into the wood and also be deposited onto the sand paper. After that I rub the handle down with a piece of flannel, then set it aside for a bit to make sure the oil won't be gummy when I go to the buffer;

Buffing needs to be QUICK. I used to think you could buff the crud out of something... and you can... but it will look like CRUD! IF care was taken up to this point with the hand sanding, then the buffing will literally take seconds. I didn't spend an entire minute with this spiral sewn buffing wheel and white rouge;

I decided to mirror polish the inside curve of this guard. I've only done it on one other knife, Roger P's fighter... but I really liked it as it adds an interesting bit of contrast to the satin finished sides of the guard. I taped the handle off because I don't want to get green buffing compound on the wood, and the green compound works VERY well for getting the mirror polish I want;

Here's the inside of the finger guard with a mirror polish. The green compound leaves it a little bit cloudy, but that will come right out with the pink "no-scratch" buffing compound;

Buffing with the pink "no-scratch" compound on a spiral sewn buffing wheel. This should take about 30-45 seconds to do the entire handle (the way I do it anyway);

All buffed out...

Taping off the handle to separate it from the guard. I want to put a hand sanded, satin finish on the sides of the guard, and this will allow me to do that without scratching up our freshly buffed handle. I have no idea how other makers do this... this is just one of those things I came up with when I realized what kind of finish I wanted. I'd imagine others do it similarly;

Here's the sanding block I use for the final finish on the sides of the guard. It's got just enough cushion/give to make it easy to get a nice, smooth finish;

I use an extremely high tech fixture for sanding the sides of the guard. Yep... my leg. I have the sanding block with 800 grit paper gripped firmly in one hand, and I rotate the knife with the other hand so that I can go all the way around the guard in smooth strokes;

Close up of the same;

1.

This shows the sides of the guard sanded out with the 800 grit paper. It's gotta be nice and clean!

Now this next step is all Ed Caffrey's fault! LOL I showed Ed one of my forged hunters (this was over 12 years ago) and Ed told me he liked everything but the sharp edge on the guard. "Sharp edge on the guard?!?!... What?!?!" LOL He was right... when you shape up a guard the way I do, it will leave an edge sharp enough to scrape curls off of your thumbnail. So I made this little sanding stick so I can sand around the top "corner" of the guard and give it a nice, soft edge. Really the biggest problem with having a sharp edge here is it tears up a sheath... but it's the fine details right???? The narrow stick makes it easy to see what I'm doing, and it also helps having a small surface area so as to avoid hitting

something you don't want to... like the blade!

Here's the sanding stick in action

Same thing, different angle... hopefully you can see in the pic how this will give a nice soft corner instead of a sharp one;

Handle has been sanded, buffed, smoothed.... only needs a pin now!

Now this is a bastardized version of how John White explained his domed pin process to me over the phone. I say it like that

because I definitely want to give my friend John credit for helping me!!! But at the same time I don't want you to associate him with my weird version! LMAO I start by cutting a pin that's long enough to stick out both sides of the handle a little bit, then round and buff both ends of the pin. I also score a few lines in the pin (near the middle) to give the epoxy a little extra surface area to grab onto. Then I put the pin into this block and start peening the end that's sticking out with a mirror polished ball-peen hammer. One maker I talked to about this, said this is "cheating" And I honestly have no idea what that means... because all I am doing it starting the head on one side of the pin before putting it in the handle. This makes it MUCH easier for me to set the pin. And this is essentially how the rivets that hold that old iron bridge together (that you drive on all the time) were made;

The pin peened a little bit, you can see I have the start of one head now;

I like to ream the pin hole with a tapered diamond cone. I'm not taking a lot of material out here... just making some room for the pin to expand and not crack the handle. All that fancy drilling stuff I did earlier is not really necessary when you're going to do a peened pin... but I still do it so that the middle section of the pin stays put and isn't "flopping around" inside a warbled out hole;

This is some Loctite epoxy I got from Tracy Mickley at USA Knife Maker Supply after reading a glowing review from our own, very well versed Matt Gregory. This is a two part system--- an adhesive and a spray activator. It is VERY STRONG. I still like using Acraglas for the handle itself as that's what I know, and it works VERY WELL. But for holding the pin tight while peening, this stuff works well and sets up FAST (3-5 minutes);

Here's part of my pin peening rig. It's a large steel block with a 3/8-16 stainless steel bolt threaded into it. The bolt head has been rounded over, a

divot has been machined into it, and then the top of the bolt was mirror polished. It is basically a little stake anvil with which I can adjust the height. The nut can be tightened down against the block so that bolt will stay at the height you want;

I glue the pin in place after reaming both sides of the handle, then go to the peening rig. I place the side that's already been started against the divot in the bolt, and start working the opposite side of the pin with the mirror polished ball peen. I work around the pin, gently tapping away... the knife is done other than this pin... so now would not be a good time to get too gung-ho and a.) miss the pin and hit the handle material or b.) spread the pin too much too fast and crack the handle;

Here it's set up in the whole peening rig. This is just like my pin drilling fixture, but more robust and taller.

The blade is clamped down by the ricasso, then the bolt/block are situated so that the bolt is snug up against the pin on the bottom side. Now I can work on the pin with the hammer and a punch (with rounded and mirror polished end). This decreases my "likely to screw it up royally" factor;

Up close with the punch;

I work both sides, refining the shape and getting them domed evenly. You can get a pretty nice finish with just the hammer and punch. John does a faceted pin which is waaaay cool... but I haven't built the confidence to do one that way and leave it as-is just yet. So I want this pin highly polished. I put paper tape over the domed pin (both sides) and press it down around the pin as firmly as I can;

Next I go to my Foredom tool with a fine Cratex knife-edge wheel. I grind right through the paper tape with it, and once I do, then I gently work the Cratex against the pin to refine its finish;

Here you can see why I wanted the tape in place.

I need to green rouge to get the finish I want on the pin, and I don't want to get the green compound embedded in the wood!

Now I go to the pink "no-scratch" compound and go over the whole thing very lightly (with tape removed);

Pin domed and buffed;

Last thing I do (besides final sharpening) is rub the handle down with Johnson's paste wax with my fingers. The heat generated will make the wax move well and allow me to get a nice coating. I set it aside and let the wax come to a haze;

Then I buff out the wax with either a piece of flannel or an old cloth diaper. This will remove MOST of the wax, but will leave a very thin/fine protective coating;

This knife, as you have been following, is well constructed and uses the finest of materials. My experience handling it, confirms that. This is the real deal. The knife IS this beautiful.

(Open the photo in a new tab to see it without the forum compression.) It's finally on the way via USPS International Mail to Lorien. I'll expect it to arrive in about a week. Maybe less. In the meantime, we have this image. Coop Thanks, Nick for sending this to me!