jmccustomknives

Don't drop that on your foot trying to mount it :wacko:

Yep. I said to myself, "self, that's easy enough to make." :rolleyes:

I envy you. I can't seem to make wood do what I want. Steel on the other hand, we get along. Soon enough you'll be making your own fixtures. Share pics.

Lets just say, I've been suffering from a bad case of tennis elbow for over a year because of that anvil. I had to strike so hard to do a little. I'm using a piece of RR track flipped upside down and boxed in. It works so much better. Get some 309 stainless and surface the anvil. It will make for a more lively face. Just preheat and don't run beads next to each other consecutively to keep heat buildup to a minimum. Once you get a good layer built up you can run them together. The plate worked better than nothing but I wouldn't do it that way again.

Here's what I did. I found a leaf spring from a coal hauling trailer. They were the right width for the anvil. Cut off the excess length off. Preheat the anvil and run a stringer bead focused mainly on the anvil with a nickel 99 rod. Follow that with either a 7018 or 309 stainless rod focusing the bead twards the steel plate. Use short beads of 1 1/2" move 6" around and keep going until finished. This worked but the anvil was still dead. I ended up cutting the plate off and am now in the process of surfacing it with the 309 stainless rod wich suprisingly enough bonded to the cast. Good luck.

Each has its advantages. For you gas is probably the best option. If your nieghbors wouldn't like you making charcoal, burning green coal will really tweak them. I don't like using charcoal because it hurts :wacko: (don't use it around flamable stuff). Coal and coke are getting harder to find, if you do happen on a reliable supply use it, otherwise gas is cleaner and available.

Smithing fits nicely between what I've got to do, what my wife say's I've got to do and everything else. I used to hot rod, that was getting expensive and I hated getting greasy. I sold the car and got a boat; that was just a hole in the water I pored money and time into. Smithing allows me to express my artistic side, keeps me home and almost pays for itself. The last part helps the wife be a little more understanding. ;)

The blade itself is blah <_< , I really wanted to try Robakyo's suggestion for the scales. If it didn't work the little forged 1080 blade wasn't going to kill me to junk. -_- Those who thought the wood was ash, I think your right. As per his instructions, final sanding was done with steel wool with a little vinigar added. Finished with tung oil and wax. You never know what kind of suprises might be lurking in an unasuming pallet. :o

:o what can one say? :huh: speachless. How does one get a hamon like that?

Thanks for the tip Robakyo, I'll give it a try on the next one. As far as your cable, use lots of borax (I apply 3-4 times before welding) and when welding heat is reached (orange to yellow)spin it around striking it medium hard with a 2 lb hammer. You should feel it start resisting. If your still having troubles the problem may be with your cable, I've gotten some with galv coating and those don't like to be forge welded.

Sounds inviting, unfortunatly I'll be trying to make a little extra $'s to support my hobbie that weekend at Tannehill Trade Days. You can always make a cable knife in my place. ;)

If you were just a little closer :(

Sounds like something I've done many times. :wacko:

Great story. Unfortunatly I run into people who have met 'smiths #1 &2. The last event I had several people thank me for taking the time to show them how something was done when others wouldn't give them the time of day. If you don't like talking to people, even ones with stupid questions then you probably shouldn't be demoing in front of them. Thanks for the pic of the fire steel, now when someone ask me if I can make one I'll say," never have but I've seen one." ^_^

I think you'd be wasting your time. You'll never get them so strait that they won't need to be machined. Then you run into having to re-heat treat wich compounds the problem.

Most of the pallets we get aren't marked at all. The best ones have been repaired. I've found some pretty exotic stuff like mahagony, maple, cherry, walnut and some that were real nice but I'm not exactly sure as to the exact species. It is rare to find a pallet that is made from the same stuff (the good stuff). Most pallets we get are poplar, red and white oak, pine and some local junk woods, those get reused and or given to local recycling people.

Clip point Bowie is my favorite pattern. That one looks like it could have been in a pic of a civil war solder.

Definatly not white oak, we see a lot of those pallets. This stuff had a closed grain and was soft and light. Kind of reminded me of spruce. I'm thinking some kind of fir or such. I've never seen a soft wood get that kind of grain.

The blade is forged from 7/8 cable. The scales are an unknown wood I found on a pallet. It was so deeply flamed I could see it through the saw marks. I would really like to find a stain that will help bring out that figure. This one I used tung oil wich seemed to work best of the things I have. Some slats have a better grain than others, but for the most part it's a good find.

I can't say I ever have, might have to try it when I get the time.

When you get into some of the more complex alloys heat treating becomes an issue to get the most out of your steel. For most smiths the most exotic stuff we can work with is 52100 carbon steel. When the alloy content goes higher complex heat treating equipment/procedures are necessary to get everything out of the steel. When you get into the HS steels the difficulty just increases more and forging is next to impossible. As far as the best, look into the CPM steels and find a good heat treater that cryo-treats. I think you'll be surprised at what a properly exicuted blade made from even as low an alloy as 5160 is capable of when it comes to edge sharpness/holding. The best steel, poorly exicuted won't perform as well.

I like it, I think I'll try something similar but with cable. Thanks.

I personally prefer coke. That being said the benefits of gas are numorous. The biggest problem I've got ( I use a Diamondback 2 burner knifemakers forge) is it's small size. I recently forged up some half round file "hawks" and the gas forge was too small. The open fire forge allows for odd shaped/sized items to be heated. For forging smaller knives the gas forge is excellent.

I recently did a show, but really didn't think it through all the way. Most of what I sell are knives, the majority of the show's visitors were children. Duh! I didn't have much of nothing to sell to them. All I had that wasn't bladesmithing steel was some old 5/32 tig rod I'd brought for "emergency" tent stakes. I set my cutting torch up in my vice where I could get to the flame and the kids could see the steel heating up. Folded it at 1/2 inch, dipped it in borax (that brought a lot of questions) and forge welded it in front of them. It took about 3 folds to get enough mass. That stuff was so soft and welded with little effort. Made a leaf preform heated the back and hot cut the stem then tapered it out and finished shaping with pliers. The kids enjoyed watching and it only took about five minutes to make one. I had some leather cords and made little necklaces for them to buy. LOL, one kid told me, "if I don't spend it I'll have to give it back to mom."

It might work a little, every part outside the 3" would be "dead" and any part inside the weld would also be "dead". You might be better off to use the 3" shaft as the face, it would be livelier but really small.