Don Nguyen

Here's the other knife with a Kiritsuke type tip. Similar specs, slightly higher tip. Aldo's 1084FG 2.3mm spine thickness at choil 0.8 spine thinkness one inch from tip (the square angular part) 0.2 thickness behind edge Balance point right at the triangular front on handle Fully tapered tang Black paper micarta handle

Those bolsters are AWESOME. How are they constructed? What's the most difficult part?

Thanks all! That tapered tang was a pain in the butt :ph34r:

Here is the latest one, and smudged with fingerprints.

Rich, I wasn't exactly thinking when I put that extra hole into the knife. I do realize how limiting it would be to hang it from the neck there, but perhaps someone would find a use for it? Perhaps a lanyard or for a keychain or something. Ideally it would be hung from the sheath. There is a kydex sheath for this one (with a belt attachment too), but this knife is no longer in my possession. Next time I see it I'll be sure to take some photos though. Thanks for your comments! :)

That's just the forge scale from when I was heat treating it. Indeed, I like the look of it too :)

Little thing I made using extra material from chef's knife stock. There are some fit and finish issues that have been taken care of since these pictures, including those glue gaps around the pins. Thoughts? Thanks for your time!

Robert you give me too much credit :) I'm still a beginner in the early learning stages, and this is barely my 5th knife. I appreciate your thoughts and comments!

Robert, I don't know all the complete details, but as far as I've understood my friend just sticks all the pins in there without extra prep. The whole pin itself is rigid in the handle, but the inner pins (which go all the way through), were the main problem. If you can see the three black circles in the mosaic pins, they were supposed to be 3 small brass pins. The outer tubing I believe is brass. Mainly the issue with the homemade mosaic pin is that it's difficult to get the inside completely filled with epoxy. There are voids and gaps in there, which probably caused the pins to go loose. Done correctly there shouldn't be any voids or gaps, but it's difficult to do it correctly using the 'homemade' method. Of course, there's the possibility of me causing the problems by inducing too much heat during shaping. You have to be very careful with mosaic pins.

I absolutely love the second one, but wow, all of them look good.

Hey Robert, thanks for the reply! The mosaic pin was made by a knifemaking friend. Unfortunately, I ran into a lot of trouble when I was finishing up the knife. One of the pins fell out, and superglue wasn't working. Another pin fell out, so I look out all 3 and filled them with black epoxy. In the future I will be using mosaic pins from Sally Martin.

Thanks for the kind words everyone. Although there are many things I did on this one that I didn't like too much, it should be a solid performer. In the hands of someone who know's how to sharpen a kitchen knife with 60+ HRC, it'll cut very well. I, however, am not that good, and have problems with the wire edge. It wedges slightly on the tip when cutting up onions, but that could be my technique. We will find out soon when I ship out the knife next week for testing. Slices tomatoes no problem, and glides through potatoes without sticking much at all.

Hello all :) Been working on a gyuto for a while now. I broke the previous one, and then revised my design since then also. Here is the (finally) finished prototype for a right hander. Forged from Aldo's 1084 237mm cutting edge (9.33 in) 50mm overall height at choil (1.96 in) 2.0mm thickness at spine above choil (0.080 in) 1.3mm thickness at spine one inch from tip (0.050 in) 0.05mm thickness above cutting edge (0.002 in) Blended flat grind on right side Slight convex grind on left side Rounded choil biased on right side Balance point right above choil Fully tapered tang Handle is Indian Mountain Laurel 147mm length (5.80 in) Saya carved from Spanish Cedar

Hey Rich, how long does it take you to complete a knife like this? It's pretty majestic.

Really liking the 3rd one. Pretty cool.

I'm not sure why you would want the wire edge?

Does anything significant happen when you do more normalizing than is necessary?

Wow, I like that, so much.

http://www.2x72beltgrinder.com/default.html Ooops. I thought I had it posted...

I think these could very well be a good alternative to the Grizzly. It looks like a slightly simplified welded NWG (No-Weld-Grinder). Some upgrades available, like more power, or NEMA4 enclosure, etc. It's worth looking into I think.

I am in a metal workshop class. Many (practically all) the students in there are interested in making a knife, but are not very informed and are often misguided. I wrote up a general guideline to help them get along. What do you think? Have I included anything vague or wrong? Are there things I should change? Thanks for your time. -Don

http://www.npr.org/2008/03/28/89164759/a-victim-treats-his-mugger-right Makes me smile deep down. Maybe the best thing I've read so far in 2012. :)

I have finished my fourth knife. I decided a while back to not fumble around with any unknown steels, and stick with a known, simple steel. I chose 1084. I already had this one forged and ground out from a file, so I decided to finish it anyways. There's so much that went wrong or sloppy, but I'll leave those to you for nitpicking (patina, fit/finish, maker mark [ghetto], saya, HT, etc) I learned a butt-ton making this one, and hopefully for future works I wont repeat the same mistakes. Much. Thanks for checking! Sincerely, -Don

Thanks for the input everyone. I wasn't aware that this grinder isn't suitable for knife making - always heard that burrkings were popular, but I guess I wasn't paying attention. I'll keep in mind for a variable speed 2x72 in the future. The one reason that I wouldn't be able to use it is if I move into an apartment when I transfer schools.

I have a chance to borrow money and be able to pay it back within a month. Even then, I may have to pass up on it. Pros: -First real equipment for me -Would be used for a long, long time -Extremely good deal Cons: -I'd be dead broke for a few months. -No new materials/supplies for a while. -When I move, I might not be able to use it. -I'm a college student; I have to worry about everything else. Yeesh. I'll probably have to pass... Perhaps within the next year or two I'll have another chance - to either buy or make one.