Stormcrow

Abbott sold and I set up the sheath for left hand carry, edge up, cross draw. The Combat Loop will be a more rigid belt mount, or the webbing and buckle should allow a carry that can shift around more like sash/obi carry.

Thank y'all! Thomas - I wouldn't consider any of these four traditional. They're pretty Westernized. Of these four, Abbott is probably closest to traditional. This little one I posted earlier in the summer is probably closest to a traditional profile that I've done.

In amongst other blades, I continue to play around with tantos with varying degrees of traditional/non-traditional profiles. These are some of the more recent ones. All of 'em are forged from 5160 with paracord over neoprene wrapped handles impregnated with marine epoxy. Also, Kydex. First off, my donation this year for Knife Rights' Ultimate Steel fundraiser. Like I told Doug Ritter the other day at the Gathering, I would rather sweat in the humidity and feed mosquitos in my shop than deal with the lawyers and politicians he does. My wife is a registered nurse and I feel much the way about her job; I would never be able to or want to do it, but I am very grateful that there are people who can and will. And, of course, they have professional photographers that do much better than I could hope to. Off the top of my head, I want to say this was about a 13" blade. Next up are Abbott and Costello, forged for the Gathering show. They were forged from the same size starting stock, which I did not measure before starting. Costello came first, shorter and fatter with a 12" long blade and 17 7/8" overall length. Next was Abbott, longer and skinnier with a 15" blade and 20 7/8" overall length. Abbott has more power hammer texture than I usually leave, similar to the chubby kwaiken I did for the Blade Show. Both of these have beefy handles from me using thicker neoprene for the foundation than I usually do. Playing around with different ways of building 'em. Abbott and Costello are both stout suckers. And the smallest of this round, dubbed the "Mean Little Sucker". It's narrow, pointy, and really wants to be all stabbity stabbity. It was a bit scary to work on even before there was any kind of cutting edge on it. Gotta keep an eye on the tip. Blade length is 7", overall is 12 3/4".

You have such exquisite attention to detail on everything, on a tool that begs to be used daily. Beautiful!

Came out beautifully!

I haven't seen it. I scanned through this sub-forum first.

This fellow always has interesting videos. In this one, he uses stone age technology to build a forge blower and smelt a small amount of iron.

I have never seen chain Damascus that looked like that. That is beautiful! I hear you about welding up the socket, but the effect works with this somehow. Good work all around.

The American Tomahawk Company 'hawks use injection molded nylon 6/6. I bought one when I was starting on the tactical 'hawk journey and beat the crap out of it. The handle held up to everything. Both it and the one I made that broke at the crack felt a lot like hickory when chopping, but if the blade got stuck in wood, would flex a great deal more. ATC has video of the handle being propped up on a curb and then driven on with a pickup, flexing back to true. So it is very tough, but if you are wanting a design you are going to pry with, it probably will flex more than you want. But if you are wanting a punched-eye construction ax going into a war zone, it's probably what I would go with.

I spent a lot of time looking at materials for a synthetic handle for use in tactical tomahawk handles before a customer's request for a full-tang 'hawk shifted the whole direction of the project for me. I would *not* use Micarta by itself. It may make a good knife handle when backed up by a steel tang, but it is easily broken without that backing. My two recommendations would be nylon 6/6, which is what is used on the American Tomahawk Company's LaGana 'hawks, and ABS. I did a lot of testing on a nylon handle I made and it did great except for breaking at the end of a crack caused by me not sawing the spilt far enough down before wedging it in the head. That was at the end of a long series of destructive testing, and I feel like if it had not had that crack, it would have been fine. http://www.mcmaster.com/#nylon-plastic/=1368qum ABS is what I build my tomahawk trainers from, and it has shown itself to be darn tough. I haven't done a side by side comparison of the two materials. If it's going into a war zone, I would definitely do some extensive testing before trusting a soldier's life with it. http://www.mcmaster.com/#abs/=1368uja Neither material likes to be ground, though you can do some cleanup by going against the direction of belt travel. You should be able to machine it or shape it with a router, though.

Those came out great!

Thank y'all! Gergely - Back to 5160 at least for a while. Having some issue with not getting 80CrV2 to consistently harden. Got some advice at the Blade Show I'm going to try out.

Some smaller work from the Blade Show. All of them are forged from 5160 with wraps of paracord over a foundation of neoprene and impregnated with West System marine epoxy. This o-tanto has a blade 13" long and an overall length of 18 3/4". This shorter one's blade is 7 3/4", OAL of 13". Camp knife is a 7" blade with an OAL of 12 1/2". And this chubby kwaiken sold before I could get any decent pictures, but the new owner started posting pics of it on Facebook the next day, already out in the woods with it. I was able to retain more power hammer texture on this one than I usually do and it lends an almost reptilian look to the blade. With a 12" Wrecker he picked up from me last year: I didn't get to measure it, but I'd estimate a 6 1/2" - 7" long blade. He picked up a couple of these belt loops from RMJ at the show. He told me it would be getting wet, and sure enough, it got rained on its first day in the woods. Here it is next to the remains of an old moonshine still that he found in his wanderings. Always glad to see my blades out getting used.

Thank y'all! Daswulf - I did not. The package for shipping the big one was a bit over 5 pounds. The original was 3 lbs 7 oz and balanced at the Turk's head. With the new ones, the big one balanced at the Turk's head and the smaller one balanced just back of the Turk's head. Jackdawg - These ought to cut meat pretty well. They'll shave hair. Not sure about heavy bone, but they will do just fine chopping hardwood all day. DSW - A fellow knifemaker took a pic of me acting like I was shaving with the big carcass splitter. But, it's on Instagram and I can't save pics from there.

Some biggish blades I forged out for the Blade Show. This one is the second of the blades inspired by Chris Redfield's Resident Evil 5 knife that I've forged. The steel is 5160, handle is black TeroTuf with flared stainless steel rivets. Blade length is 16 3/4", overall length is 21 3/4" I happily appropriate the term "tactical elvish" from my buddy Tobin Nieto to describe this blade. It ended up being fairly close to my recollection of one of the rejected designs for Sting from Weta Workshops. Now, if I saw the picture again, I might find I'm wrong. 5160 and TeroTuf, blade length of 14 1/4", OAL of 19 5/8". And a simple camp chopper forged from 80CrV2, with marine epoxy-impregnated paracord over neoprene. Blade is 12", OAL is 18 1/4".

So, some of y'all might remember the carcass splitter I made a while back. Well, I made a couple more. I wanted these to be wider blades, more like meat cleavers and less like a Chinese pole arm. The original was forged from 1/4" x 2" 5160; these were forged from 1/4" x 3" 5160. The new ones have hemp wraps and Turk's head knots over a foundation of neoprene, all impregnated with marine epoxy. They were on my table at the Blade Show. The lights of the wood display behind me made it hard to get decent photos of my side of the aisle, but this should give an idea of size in hand, and also what a year's worth of beard growing looks like on me. The longer of the two has a 17" blade and an overall length of 36". The smaller of the two has a 14 3/4" blade and 34 1/2" overall length. As before, the sheaths are a collaboration between myself and my buddy Tobin Nieto. In this case they are distressed rawhide over a Kydex core, with brick red India ink "blood splatters" added by me. We wanted something that looked like it would hang above Leatherface's bed. I think we got the look. The big one is on its way to South Africa with Trevor Burger, the fellow in the blue shirt standing behind me facing the other way. He makes awesome folders. He had us write a label stating "Sold to Trevor Burger" on the table next to it and would periodically check to make sure that the label was still there. The smaller one is on its way to California. I have several more carcass splitters and large cleavers coming along in the next little bit, too. These are kind of fun to do, though definitely a challenge working on this scale.

Looking pretty good!

Congratulations! At the bottom of the page it says "Messer Magazine". Can it be assumed that this is the German edition of Blade Magazine and that the English version is available?

I dig it! What kind of dimensions are we looking at?

Thank y'all! Takeru691 - It certainly does make building a sheath (of any construction) more complicated to have the blade wider near the tip than at the base. I believe on this one that the spine pretty much just follows the mold of the Kydex while the primary bevel forces open the Kydex on the edge side, so the secondary bevel (the actual cutting edge) is not in contact with the Kydex.

This was intended to be part of my Blade Show inventory, but a fellow spotted it on Instagram before it was finished and wanted it, and I needed the money to stay ahead of bills, so I finished it out and headed it his way. Here's what caught his attention. Still with oil baked on from the heat treatment, with a loose paracord wrap temporarily on it to protect my hand from the rough edges of the tang while doing a bit of test cutting. Steel is 80CrV2, blade is a bit under 12" long. He liked the look of the temporary wrap, so I laid a foundation of neoprene to bulk up the handle and did a single layer of paracord with a two-strand Turk's head knot before applying the marine epoxy. The end of the wrap leaving the corners of the tang exposed is something I haven't tried before, but definitely will be doing again! I did keep it (and myself) away from the poison ivy on the edge of the photo. And a basic OD Kydex sheath to round out the package. It got to him a day ahead of when it was slated to. He was very happy with the heft, balance, and handling. Now to forge some more along these lines for Blade...

Thank y'all! Templhound - I like to focus on the shaping of the blade and handle. That's one reason you'll see the same few materials from me. I know they work.

Thank y'all! Thomas - That's what I aim for.

This was a rush job to get done for a former Naval Special Warfare member who was heading over to Pakistan. Got it to him the day before his flight. He was close enough that he met me halfway and I hand delivered it. Double edged, 80CrV2 steel, black oxide finish, Tero Tuf, flared stainless steel tubing rivets, and Kydex sheath. I knew he wanted to wear it on his belt, but wasn't sure about the position, so I took a Combat Loop and installed it as he waited. He asked for it set up for right hand draw scout carry.

Where's the "HC" stamp on the head so I know it's the bestest best steel for knives?