Stormcrow

I'm sure some of y'all have seen the new open cutting competition show on the History Channel, "Knife or Death". While I haven't gotten to compete on it (Several "Forged in Fire" competitors, including Rashelle Hams from my episode, have been on. She did quite well.), I did get to be involved in an interesting way. I was contacted by Tu Lam, retired Green Beret and one of the three hosts of the show, when he saw some of my carcass splitters on Instagram. He asked to meet me at Blade Show to discuss a project. bladeshow13 by James Helm, on Flickr All three hosts of the show were getting blades for themselves to do some cutting for demonstration and promotional material for Season 2. Travis Wuertz built his own piece of awesomeness. Bill Goldberg, the wrestler. had a big cleaver built by Wayne Meligan, who had competed on Season 1. Tu was interested in having me build him a blade for him. In particular The Mutant double-edged carcass splitter that was my reaction to seeing the first episode of the show caught his attention. bladeshow12 by James Helm, on Flickr We discussed what he was looking for, his thoughts, my thoughts, made some sketches, and continued the discussion after I got back home. What I ended up building was a kind of pan-Asian dao that Tu named the Ronin War Sword. There are influences from Chinese pudao, Korean hyeopdo, Vietnamese yem nguyet dao, and Nepalese ram dao. ronindao03 by James Helm, on Flickr The steel is, of course, 80CrV2, with a 16" blade and 18" handle. The weight ended up just over 3 pounds, with the point of balance right behind the front Turk's head knot. The handle wrap is toasted hemp cord over a neoprene foundation, impregnated with West System marine epoxy. ronindao06 by James Helm, on Flickr The main edge is a tall flat bevel with secondary bevel, while the spine side and clip are zero-ground convex edges. Stout, and hair-shaving. In addition to a forward lanyard hole, I laser-engraved Tu's dragon logo on the blade. ronindao07 by James Helm, on Flickr I built an open-backed Boltaron sheath for it. ronindao04 by James Helm, on Flickr A look at the War Sword in my hands... ronindao08 by James Helm, on Flickr ...and a far more dramatic shot of it in Tu's grip. It looks better with him! ronindao01 by James Helm, on Flickr I know that there has been at least some cutting done with it in association with the show. Tu made a nice, clean cut on a big fish using the convex side. ronindao09 by James Helm, on Flickr The Ronin War Sword and the other hosts' blades have been all over social media in promotional material, but Travis' sword is the only one that I've seen (in very quick shots) actually on TV. I was pleasantly surprised when I picked up the latest issue of Knives Illustrated to see that in their interview with Bill Goldberg and Tu Lam, that Tu discussed the Ronin War Sword and they included a picture of him with it. That makes two months in a row that my work has ended up in Knives Illustrated. ki01 by James Helm, on Flickr ki02 by James Helm, on Flickr In spite of living a nearly hermit-like existence, I sure get to meet some interesting people and do some interesting things.

Very gad to see you back making blades. I know it weren't easy getting everything back rolling!

It has been a very busy summer and I haven't kept things updated as I should. Had an awesome Blade Show this year (first weekend in June! I am way behind!), and two full tables of inventory. This year had the distinction of the *first* show I've ever had a table where I wasn't having to sharpen blades in the hotel room/at the table. My wife was happy about that. One table was dedicated to forged blades and the other to mid-techs. Ed Calderon, the Taco Ninja, usually works with the small and concealable, but he loves my big carcass splitters. Filthy Mitch added to his impressive collection of Helm blades with a smaller carcass splitter and my first-ever ginunting, plus one or two mid-techs. Tu Lam, co-host of the History Channel cutting competition show "Knife or Death" had seen my big blades on Instagram and arranged to meet up to discuss a project for him. More details later. Tobin Nieto re-created the pose used by artist Matt Dyck for my T-shirt design, using the wakizashi/tanto daisho collaboration I did with Ben Tendick. I was quite pleased and humbled when ABS Mastersmith Lin Rhea came over to my table to tell me he appreciated what I was doing in the field of forged blades. Especially high praise given his amazing skill with a hammer. Allan Reid of ARctc Knives was grinding so hard he got to the show late, but he came with a good showing. James Huse earned his ABS Journeyman Smith stamp this year. Congratulations! More pics in a bit. A better look at the forged blades. All wrapped handles. The cleavers are 5160, the rest are 80CrV2. The hemp wraps were torched prior to being impregnated with epoxy. Sheaths are Boltaron. Especially with the cleavers, I've been working on getting closer to the final shape with my power hammer, Gunnhilda. The cleavers in particular only had hand forging to straighten them. The power hammer die texture on those has not been smoothed over with a hand hammer as I usually do. Just an area of skill I'm currently working on refining. It's been a while, so any dimensions mentioned below will be approximate. Carcass splitter with an 18" blade, 22" handle. Carcass splitter with a 15" blade, 14" handle. Bush sword, about 15" blade. The first ginunting I've made, about a 15" blade. I'm working on my second one right now for inventory for Blade Show West. This carcass splitter was my reaction to seeing what challenges were on the first episode of "Knife or Death" on the History Channel. I call it "The Mutant". Approximately a 14.5" blade, 14" handle. The "spine" side is sharpened with a stout convex edge that is frighteningly sharp. The idea being that the main edge would work for most of the cutting tasks, while the convex edge is reserved for particularly damaging tests such as buckets of gravel and huge ice blocks. I think of the design as a hybrid fusion of a carcass splitter and a Nepalese ram dao. It balances on the heavy side for plenty of inertia, but is still nimble and *very* powerful! This was one of the blades that caught Tu Lam's attention. I initially tried to build a normal Boltaron sheath, but saw that the chances of grievous harm to the sheather was high, so ended up turning it into a split sheath. The cleaver hole is centered on the blade instead of offset toward the spine, which made me think of a Cyclops and contributed to its name. While this particular carcass splitter was not forged until after the Blade Show, it was requested by a repeat customer after the other short carcass splitter got picked up by Filthy Mitch at the show. He was really hoping it would make it through the show so he could buy it, so I ended up making him one as close to the one he had liked. I'm currently working on inventory for Blade Show West coming up the first weekend in October in Portland, OR. It'll be my first time in the Pacific Northwest, and I'm looking forward to it. Only one table this time, and all of the inventory is forged work.

Very kewl!

Thank y'all!

If you pick up a copy of the November 2018 "Knives Illustrated" magazine, you'll see a well-written article about one of my knives by Waysun Johnny Tsai. article02 by James Helm, on Flickr article01 by James Helm, on Flickr This 7 1/2" bladed variation of my Benghazi Warfighter model got put through a pretty thorough series of tests and did what it was supposed to. camp03 by James Helm, on Flickr camp04 by James Helm, on Flickr Thanks to Waysun for the testing, the article, and the good-quality photos.

"As plain as possible" indeed, and very beautiful.

One of the cool things about custom knives is stories like that.

Frosty FTW indeed!

Thanks, guys! John in Oly, WA - It's a sword that can open wild appliances in the bush.

Not necessarily something I'd recommend, but apparently my bush swords are mini-fridge rated. Customer pics. minifridge by James Helm, on Flickr minifridge2 by James Helm, on Flickr

Ammo cans with the lids latched down make great quench tanks, and should theoretically not spill if they get knocked over somehow. Always check for leaks with water before you ever put oil in one, though!

Gotta go with Templehound on this. Choose your alloy based on performance more than messiness. Besides which, I've seen a lot more folks have blades fail in a water quench than in oil.

I have no idea who I was looking up at in the first picture.

In the weeks leading up to the Blade Show, a knifemaker's life gets pretty crazy. One aspect, especially for full-timers, is moving along enough work for customers to be able to stay ahead of the bills while also building inventory for the show. Add to that equipment breakage, injuries, lack of sleep, torrential rains, high heat and humidity, and general bad luck and it's a wonder any of us make it to Atlanta alive and coherent. As part of the pre-Blade balancing, I forged out a couple of big ol' carcass splitters. One was to be a commission, the other table inventory. I let the customer pick which of the two he liked once they were forged out, then finished it out to his taste. carcasssplitters02 by James Helm, on Flickr I'm kind of enjoying shaping the fawn's foot handles on these full-sized carcass splitters. The blades were forged as closely as possible with the power hammer, with a hand hammer used only for straightening. The spines are as-forged. carcasssplitters01 by James Helm, on Flickr Getting the handle wraps epoxied with some other Blade Show inventory. bladeshow11 by James Helm, on Flickr The customer picked the blade with slightly more curve to the profile, and requested hemp cord (over a neoprene foundation) and black paracord Turk's head knots fore and aft. carcasssplitter04 by James Helm, on Flickr I built a Boltaron sheath for it. carcasssplitter05 by James Helm, on Flickr Little hard to see in the picture, but there is more power hammer texture in the blade than usual. carcasssplitter06 by James Helm, on Flickr Big blade! carcasssplitter07 by James Helm, on Flickr Long handle! carcasssplitter08 by James Helm, on Flickr The specs: Blade is forged from 1/4" 5160 steel, is 18 1/2" long and 3 1/2" wide. The overall length is 40 1/4" and the weight is 77 ounces, or 4.8 pounds. It shaved hair cleanly down the full length of the edge. The customer commented upon receipt, "Pics are great, but you need to feel this thing in your hands to appreciate it."

I like that.

Well done, fellows.

Templehound - It's closed up, but not back to normal. The new scar itself is sensitive, and the callused skin on top has come off, leaving raw, new skin underneath. Makes for new challenges, but much better than trying to work with a big ol' bandage. At least I can tie my shoes semi-decently again.

Biggundoctor - I posted pics of the thumb on Instagram with my grinning mug first so folks could avoid seeing the carnage if they wanted. It's far enough along I worked without a bandage for the first time today, then sliced my other thumb just enough to be aggravating and to sting while cleaning blades out of the vinegar they were soaking in.

It will hurt! TwistedCustoms - I've always done Turk's head knots fore and aft on bush sword handles. The smaller choppers and small knives usually only have a Turk's head at the blade/tang transition.

Impressive! When I think about what goes into making wavy blades like this, I feel less tempted to try one, but I truly respect those that make them.

Thanks, Robert! Been working on stock removal knives (I have two tables at the show!), got them heat treated today and will be taking them to get Cerakote tomorrow. While they're gone, I'll work on finishing up the forged blades. bladeshow5 by James Helm, on Flickr bladeshow4 by James Helm, on Flickr And one more forged blade, deliberately left with as much power hammer texture as possible. bladeshow03 by James Helm, on Flickr

Some bush swords recently finished up and off to their new owners. All are 80CrV2 steel with marine epoxy-impregnated cord wraps and Boltaron sheaths. About a 13 1/2" blade, based on a wooden Filipino training sword the customer already had. Black on black wrap. bushsword05 by James Helm, on Flickr bushsword06 by James Helm, on Flickr This one is about a 16" blade. It was made for an old schoolmate of mine, one grade ahead but who was in several classes with me in high school. Olive drab on OD wrap, tan Boltaron. I had made it almost 36 years without any stitches. As I was re-sheathing it from taking these pics, the sheath slipped and I cut the ever-lovin' crap out of the thumb on my dominant hand, earning 10 stitches. I tweaked the sheath to be a smidge looser before mailing it to him. Sure has made it challenging to get ready for the Blade Show. bushsword03 by James Helm, on Flickr bushsword04 by James Helm, on Flickr And finally, a two-hander with an 18" blade and a hemp cord wrap. Wasn't sure about it, but by the time I finished up, I really liked it. Fast and powerful! bushsword01 by James Helm, on Flickr bushsword02 by James Helm, on Flickr

Working on some carcass splitters and my first-ever ginunting for the tables.

The Blade Show approaches with frightening rapidity, as usual. I have two tables and at the moment nothing ready. I did have this 5160 blade, but it sold within a few minutes of me posting it on Instagram. My wife wasn't too happy about that, but my pickup's transmission decided it needed rebuilt RIGHT NOW and I needed the money. The rest of these were commissions that I finished up prior to the show. They're all 80CrV2 steel with Boltaron sheaths. These two are about 7 1/2" blades. A 5" blade with retina-searing neon orange over hemp, for a deer hunter who wanted a hi-viz knife handle. And a blade a bit over 6". And now, panic mode engage! Time to FORGE AHEAD!!!!