Stormcrow

Thanks, Dave! :)

Chinobi - Had a great time and put over 3,000 on the rental car. Saw Santa Fe, Taos, Pergosa Springs, Durango, Mesa Verde, Moab, Arches National Park, the Las Vegas strip, Hoover Dam, the Grand Canyon, Sedona, Jerome, etc. : :) Gergely - No heart-shaped axes planned. I will show a better shot of the cake cutter and server that I made whenever we get the last few boxes from her parents' house.

I got these finished up and out to customers just before my wedding, so haven't had a chance to post pics yet. This was a small batch that all happened to be 18" models in black. First, a War Chief with sharpened inner beard, no sheath. Then a different War Chief with a bare sheath. A third War Chief with IWB bands on the sheath. He wanted his retention strap to go from above the spike to under the beard, instead of how I usually set them up. However, I cut the straps long enough that they can be easily set up that way and still have some adjustability. And finally, a Woodsman, unsharpened beard, with a shoulder sling.

The customer for this knife wanted a green handle with yellow liners. After looking through the various handle options, he chose a material that I'd been wanting to play with: Warwood. It's a Micarta-esque material built entirely from corn waste products and plant resins, originally used in the hulls of MRAP (mine-resistant, ambush-protected) military vehicles as part of their armor to protect against IEDs. The yellow liners are standard vulcanized fiber material. 6" blade of 5160, stainless steel flared tube rivets. Kydex sheath with TekLok. It was one of the blades I took on my honeymoon to work on finishing up. I finalized the sharpening and installed the TekLok in Moab, Utah, and took pics in Arches National Park, by Park Avenue Canyon. And today he sent me this picture of it whacking off branches from a willow tree in his yard: I commented that it did all right for a knife that wasn't built primarily as a chopper. His response: "It's just so xxxx sharp!" :D Much appreciation to him for his patience in dealing with my distracted mind while getting ready for the wedding.

Thank y'all! Had a blast. Working on catching up now. :)

I'm getting married on Saturday. Between now and then, I need to finish up all this: All the 'hawks and five of the knives need Kydex sheaths. If everything keeps going as smoothly as it has been, I can pull it off, though I will probably be taking them with me to mail to customers from the honeymoon trip. My loverly bride-to-be, bless her heart, is ok with this. :)

Thank y'all! Thomas - When Joe got his hands on the bush sword, he took some experimental swings and commented on how it was "almost delicately balanced". Thank goodness there was a lull in the crowd and no one was nearby in the aisle at the time! Frosty - It'd be great if I got busy enough to expand and hire some help. Not the kind of thing I could really do on the forging side of things, but the stock removal stuff...maybe. :) I do have plenty of work needing my attending to these days, for which I am quite grateful.

I just had an article by Joe Flowers come out in the July issue (yes, already on the stands in March!) of Tactical Knives Magazine. He reviewed a bush sword and companion knife that I made for him with an ambidextrous, modular leather sheath rig by Luke Swenson ( The photos by Terrill Hoffman are terrific, but they're in black and white and don't convey the retina-searing neon lemon color of the paracord wrap on the handle. I chose the color after seeing another article Joe wrote about a river rafting knife that also had a bright yellow handle for high visibility. A nice personal touch from Luke. We also made a rig at the same time for fellow TK writer Reuben Bolieu. In contrast, I used retina-searing neon orange paracord for his. I found out later that he likes orange tools for working in jungle as it shows up easily if dropped among leaves. He's posted on various forums photos of the rig being used to cut wood for fires and shelters, cutting good-sized logs to build a raft, making shavings for fire starter, clearing tall grass, etc. I handed over the rigs to these two gentlemen at the Blade Show. Here's Joe with his: And, from left to right, Luke, Reuben, and me.

Eddie - Thanks! I picked the brains of folks who had already built theirs, let it distill, talked it over with my cousin who actually put the thing together for me (paying gig for him), tweaked a bit on the finished hammer, re-welded the tweaks that broke, and voila! The only thing that I didn't see anyone else do already, I think, was the die-holding setup, and I think that my subconscious may have adapted it from some hydraulic presses I found online. Basically, I took the time to do the video to let folks see what that distillation process had come up with. At this point, the only major change I'd make to the setup is adjustment bolts on the ram guide to be able to take up any slop. It's on my list of things to do down the road. I was kind of absurdly pleased to come across a fellow at a knife show who makes (among other things) a lot of kitchen knives who had built a smaller version in his garage workshop after seeing my videos. If I can pass along what I gained from other smiths and my own observations in a way that helps people build their own power hammers, I am happy. :) Someone asked recently about the clutch wheels' ratio. The drive wheel is about 2 1/4" OD, and the spare tire is about 20" OD.

If you have the skills and resources to build an air hammer, I'd say go with that. The guided helve hammer makes for a great, simple mechanical hammer, though, and with a tire clutch gives you good control.

I'll send you a PM.

Large grain is not a good thing in a blade. Fine grain is much tougher. At the end of your shaping, normalize three times and it will relieve stress and refine the grain to make a tougher blade. And a water quench is most likely too severe for the coil spring, possibly causing micro-cracks that won't show up for a while. Then when it breaks the rest of the way, you see that part of the break is rusty where it's been broken for a while. Try using canola oil at 130 degrees instead. A little science goes a long way, but there's so much science involved that it can be overwhelming. I keep it as simple as possible cuz I know I'll never understand it all. :) Well-executed simple heat treatment on simple steel can provide some pretty amazing performance.

Thank y'all! Dogsoldat - There's some debate on the efficacy of multiple quenches on steel. It seems to depend on the alloy. It's supposed to allow the carbon to get into solution better at a lower temp. Seems like steels with chromium (5160, 52100, O1) benefit, though I don't have any evidence that it is related to chromium. On a simple carbon steel like 1084, I would triple normalize, single harden, and triple temper. I use 5160 a lot, though, and it seems to at least not hurt the heat treatment; my customers have been happy with the results. TheoRockNazz & Lastronin - Sorry, but it's already been mailed off to Terrill Hoffman to get actual decent photos taken. The false edge thins the spine to approximately 3/16" (although the whole thing tapers distally), so it's not even close to sharp. It's there mostly for the aggressive aesthetics. I've done a number of these with fully sharpened top edges, though.

In support of Knife Rights' efforts in safeguarding the owners of all things sharp from pernicious legislation, I'm again donating to their yearly Ultimate Steel fundraising raffle. Last year was a bush sword with a leather sheath rig by Luke Swenson. This year, it's one of my Benghazi Warfighter model and a Kydex sheath I made for it. The knife is 11 3/4" overall, with a blade length of 6 3/4" and a false edge about 2/3 the blade length. It's forged from 1/4" 5160 that's been triple normalized, triple hardened, and triple tempered. The handle is black canvas Micarta with flared stainless steel tubing rivets. The point is a bit more aggressive on this particular one than what I've been making, and it's something I'm going to incorporate into the Benghazi Warfighter design. It comes with a black Kydex sheath with a large TekLok. I appreciate Knife Rights' work and am glad to help them out. I've seen their efforts to change restrictive laws here in my own state of Texas, and they are making a positive change for knife owners. This set is on its way to them and will have better photos taken of it than what my own poor efforts can do, and I'll put up the better pics when I get them.

Bruno - Yep, 4140. Not really getting an appreciable amount of reverberation. Fellows, I know the padlock is the weak point. That's the reason to attack it! :) When breaching, you go for the weakest link (literally).

I think y'all are taking it as being used by a burglar, but its intention is military and law enforcement "dynamic entry". You're right, you want to attack the weakest point. With a soft chain, it may stretch and be more difficult to snap than the hardened shackle on the padlock. With a better lock, it may be smarter to attack what it's attached to, or the hinges or gate/door material itself. Not as effective as a full breaching kit, but fast enough, a lot lighter and slimmer, and multi-functional. Breaching-type activities are a major usage of a quality tactical 'hawk. Like I said, this was my first time trying to take out a padlock with something other than a bolt cutter or a cutoff wheel in an angle grinder, and I wasn't sure how it'd do. I'm happy with the result. :)

There was a request in another forum to get pictures of breaking padlocks. It was a test I'd been planning on for a while, shooting some video of it, but hadn't gotten to that point yet. I decided to go ahead and test it out with shooting photos and get the video at a future date. I tried padlock breaking for the first time with one of my Wreckers that I was hanging onto for myself to shoot some demonstration videos later. I wasn't as quick or graceful about it as Ryan Johnson, but I was successful. My spike doesn't fit as well in the shackle of the padlock as the RMJ does. Don't know if that will lead to changing the design down the road or not as busting padlocks is not the only design consideration with them. Prior to starting on the lock, a standard Master Lock: After the shackle broke: Hard to tell from that pic. Let's take a closer look: You can see that I struck at the body of the lock with the point of the spike. I honestly don't know if it was prying or striking that broke the shackle. It wasn't a dramatic event and I didn't see it was broken at first. I decided to try it with a lock with a shorter shackle. It was even more difficult to fit the spike in with the heavy chain links. I ended up striking with the spike until the lock popped open. You could not re-lock it afterwards due to the damage. Here's a close look at the longer-shackeld lock: And the various places on the shorter one that got hit: It was hard to get my camera to focus on the end of the spike's point, but you can see that while the steel wasn't untouched, it almost was exactly like it started out. I still plan on shooting video of lock breaking sometime down the road.

I'm thinking I might go with a big forged blade crossed with a tomahawk. That'd represent the Forging and Grinding Divisions of Helm Enterprises. :) Chinobi - Hope they serve y'all well, and please don't duel with 'em! :D

These were commissioned by a fellow for himself and his buddy. Everyone needs a friend like that. :) Unless this is a dueling set. Hmmmm... :blink: 18" Wrecker models, in black, unsharpened inner beards. And the Kydex to go with them. Double-adjustable, quick-detach shoulder slings for carry. I feel like I need something like this on a T-shirt. :D

This is part of the previous batch that went out to customers. The 12" Wrecker with sharpened inner beard in olive drab has been popular so far, but some of the future batches will lean more on some of the other options. 18" desert Wrecker, sharpened inner beard, bare sheath. 18" Woodsman with sharpened inner beard. Black with olive drab Micarta, double retention straps on the sheath. And a naked 18" War Chief with sharpened inner beard, in black. Naked, you ask? Ain't got no pants! :D

Thanks! :)

This one was ordered up by a fellow in the Australian Navy who is about to go on pirate patrol off the African coast. He's thinking of it as a "boarding ax", which I've often read was the precursor to spiked tomahawks. These aren't my best photos, but it's a 12" Wrecker (pry spike) model with sharpened inner beard, in olive drab. Kydex sheath with quick-detachable double-adjustable shoulder sling and IWB bands. Hope it serves him well!

Rather like that first one. :)

Thank y'all! Got a batch of 'em I'm trying to finish up this week and spend some time with a hammer for a break. :)