John:  Anything worth doing is worth overdoing.  "Too much is never enough."

"By hammer and hand all arts do stand."

18 hours ago, SLAG said:

Mr. Philb86,

Beautiful knife,

What are the scales made of.

And what alloy of steel did you use.

SLAG.

 

7 hours ago, ThomasPowers said:

Philb86, beautiful handle is it dyed; or spalted; or other?  My pareidolia seems to see lost souls in torment in the main section near the blade end!

SLAG and Thomas

The handle is dyed and stabilized maple burl wood.  My absolute favorite handle material with so many curls and eyes everywhere.  I know exactly what you mean about the torment of lost souls, it is not the first time I have heard someone say something similar.  The blade material is 1095.

7 hours ago, Daswulf said:

Beautiful handle Phil. Nice all around.

Thanks Daswulf.  Gotta get over to my shop to check it out and try out my ASO and the newly acquired free Fisher anvil.  Feel like I need to watch you forge some more so I can learn.

5 hours ago, RedWest said:

Damn. From a guy just getting started in BS with zero knives under his belt yet... that's beautiful. Handle's fantastic. Would love to see it again after the oiling. 

Red,

I appreciate the kind words.  I have been doing this for about 2 years, maybe a little bit longer, sold maybe 20 blades total, given away alot.  This knife here was stock removal, not forged.  Still working on perfecting my forge of knives, first few looked like complete trash, but I will definately post the first forge one up once Im happy. Ill get some pictures up possible later this evening as I just oiled it up earlier, I have to get my wife to get the pictures taken for our business page on facebook.  She takes much better photos than I do.

Red, heres a couple pictures of the knife once oiled up.  Pictures arent the best, tlmy wife excels on the camera.

Sweet looking package, John. 

On 2/11/2021 at 3:14 PM, John in Oly, WA said:

My latest blade has taken me about 3 years to make.

With the box, hinges and castings, no wonder....

This is one of my most recent commissions, the blade is forged from a piece of water tower. The client wanted this knife made from the steel even after I advised him that it was medium carbon. It was a retirement gift for a friend in the waterworks. I also built a wooden plaque that it hangs on with the water tower wood-burnt into it (he provided a picture). Blade is medium carbon, guard and butt-cap are the same. They are blued and I used Cherry for the handle.

Thanks billyO. The casting part, to reach a satisfactory level of success, has taken the largest part of that time. 

Is he planning to hang around on Sand Bars a lot?   

I have some metal from water tower of the Ohio Penitentiary that they tore down over 20 years ago, they tank was real wrought iron plate even though the tank was built in the late 1920's.  It may actually be Byers Bidirectionally rolled wrought iron as the break is platy rather than stringy.  Have to do San Mai for a blade from it.

Some of the 1.75" rod he gave me is pure iron. I told him the blade was shaving sharp, but it probably wouldn't hold up for long under working conditions. The fellow ended up hanging it on the wall in his office.

I used some of the iron to forge a camp axe head with a file steel bit. It was interesting, I don't forge much true iron, kinda hard to get nowadays.

Edited February 16, 20215 yr by Rhyfelwr
eh.

Cool story and nice knife Rhy

Thanks.
 

 

A.G. Russell once flattened and honed an aluminum beer can till it was shaving sharp; just wouldn't keep an edge long...

It still needs a little polishing but this one I finished last June, a few days before my surgery. 1084 steel, whitetail antler and black walnut with brass hardware.

Not quite Finnished?

Yeah. Just needs some fine sanding on the blade. Can't tell from the pic but still got some scratches.

I was referring to the puukko-ness of the blade... of course.

Frontier bowie I just finished up

Not sure why but I really like it.... a lot! Could be the straighter lines and straight grain in the scales that makes it flow for me.

  Being fairly new to knifemaking, this build had many "firsts" to it. I forge welded an old bed frame around W2 in a taco san mai, made mokume gana from quarters, learned how to make the Japanese style handle and sheath, made an electro-etching rig, converted photos to line art, put it all together.  I still have a lot of finishing to do, but so far I'm pretty happy with it.  It's part of a project to make a knife for every type of aircraft mission I flew during my time in the Air Force.  I'll be building a matching 1911 also.

This is a test blade for a mosaic pattern I was working on that will be appropriately scaled for pocket knives.  It came out OK for a prototype...

Rhitee, if it starts bothering you you can mail it to me to get it out of your life.  looks great. 

Lol, thanks Daswulf.  It's already been gifted to a friend

 

That's an eye grabber! Me LIKES!

Great looking blades guys. Here is my most recent forging.  

Thanks for serving Samal. 

Pretty nice for a lot of firsts knife. Well done. I like your attention to details like matching the grain between handle and sheath, that came out very nicely. I can't see much pattern in the mokume gane but I think understated pattern is Japanese for blade furniture. 

I like it, well done.

Frosty The Lucky.

Rhitee, if that is the prototype then I can hardly wait to see what is to follow.