making knives from odd steel

[Soundguy]

now that i have an anvil and a torch set and some mauls.. ets.. I'm going to play aqound with making a few knives from some things i hve seen others use.

so far I have a piece of leaf spring ( straight section, no bow ), a file with a broken tip. a worn out circuliar saw blade, and a railroad spkie.

any hints / tips or?

soundguy

 

[Inspector507]

Great looking knife blades can be made out of wire rope/cable too.

 

[davygp38]

now that i have an anvil and a torch set and some mauls.. ets.. I'm going to play aqound with making a few knives from some things i have seen others use.

so far I have a piece of leaf spring ( straight section, no bow ), a file with a broken tip. a worn out circular saw blade, and a railroad spkie.

any hints / tips or?

soundguy

I've been making knives for about 15 years, and I just started with a kit. I now make them from scratch with a big belt grinder. I always wanted to make a few out of old files. Try Jantz supply for the rivets etc. Stainless steel bar stock is cheep enough, and you can get the blades heat treated easy enough. I make my own sheaths as well. Post some pics.

 

[MillWeld]

A source of odd steel might be broken bands from a bandsaw mill. They are commonly 1.25 to 2 inches wide and once broken are not worth re-welding. I break them occasionally on my mill but have not made them into knives but am told they make good ones.

 

[Soundguy]

when I start playing, I'll post pics.

I think the railroad spike will be my first attempt. saw a nice one at a gun show a while back.

soundguy

 

[RobertBrown]

now that i have an anvil and a torch set and some mauls.. ets.. I'm going to play aqound with making a few knives from some things i hve seen others use.

so far I have a piece of leaf spring ( straight section, no bow ), a file with a broken tip. a worn out circuliar saw blade, and a railroad spkie.

any hints / tips or?

soundguy

I have heard that an old chiansaw bar will make a few good knives. There are several knife forums out there. I have a friend who is somewhat obsessed with knive collecting and making. He buys very high dollar alloys from scrap dealers. 250$ for a knife is no big deal for him.
I guess the harder the metal the harder the tooling gets

 

[SandburRanch]

If you decide to try a file, first drop it in the oven at 475 F for an hour/inch of thickness to draw it.

 

[Soundguy]

gas grill work?

 

[catfishdaddyengineering]

My Papaw makes them out of worn out lawnmower blades. You could probably make a sword out of brushcutter blades.:thumbsup:

 

[Soundguy]

hmm.. got lawnmower blades too....

 

[not2old]

I've made crude ones out of power hacksaw blades. I was more interested in function than form and wanted to use them because they were cheap(free).

 

[SandburRanch]

gas grill work?

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Sure, and it won't even care if there are rib eyes sizzling with it.

 

[Soundguy]

wife's gettin touchy about coming home and fiding tractor parts in the kitchen...

 

[Bill Hoffman]

Gas grill won't get hot enough for forging, not even close.
Go to Don Fogg's forum for some great information on knifemaking.

"Bladesmith's Forum Board"

Great bunch of bladesmiths who share information without a catch.

If you're serious, don't use junk steel, especially used auto/truck
springs. Too much chance of micro cracks which will show up when
you heat treat.

Let me know if I can help.

Bill

 

[Soundguy]

it for sure goes to 475' i can assure you of that.

as for heat treating and junk steel.

i WANT to use those specific items I mentioned.. i've seen others do it for fun.

i'm not schrade or buck.. I'm not making knives to sell.. just beat a few 'lookers' out on my anvil.

soundguy

Gas grill won't get hot enough for forging, not even close.
Go to Don Fogg's forum for some great information on knifemaking.

"Bladesmith's Forum Board"

Great bunch of bladesmiths who share information without a catch.

If you're serious, don't use junk steel, especially used auto/truck
springs. Too much chance of micro cracks which will show up when
you heat treat.

Let me know if I can help.

Bill

 

[Bill 55]

The old circular saw blades will make a nice ulu. I have a couple of cheap ulus that I bought, but have been thinking about trying my hand at making one from an old sawblade. They are certainly non conventional looking but work beautifully in the kitchen for chopping and mincing things

 

[crash325]

wife's gettin touchy about coming home and fiding tractor parts in the kitchen...

Build yourself a Forge first. Its pretty simple and can be real cheap. I built one in 1962 and it worked real good.

Old 55 gal drum, old can style vacuum, a rheostat to control the vacuum air flow and a little heavy metal to from a grate. Re bar will work for a grate, 3/8" or larger. If you have trouble finding a rheostat, build in an air vent. If you don't have coal, regular charcoal. will do just fine.

An old hot water tank with a dished bottom will be even better than the drum. Its a little thicker and you don't have to beat the dish into it.

 

[Gary Fowler]

My dad made his forge out of dirt (clay) and wooden bottom and sides. Just formed the dirt and attached the hand powered fan type blower with flexible pipe to the bottom. I'm sure he must have had some kind of screen at the bottom to keep the coal from falling thru but it worked fine for heating plow points and sharpening by beating them out on the anvil by hand. Lots of work, but there was no other way in the 40's. Finally we got a local blacksmith with an electric driven trip hammer and that pretty much ended the homemade forge use. I can still remember the smell of that #2 coal burning. I wonder where that old hand blower went off too?

 

[varmint]

My dad was stationed in the Navy during WW11, at the Pensacola Naval Air Station. He had the dangerous duty of heading up a propeller rebuilding shop, fully "manned" by Navy Waves. Towards the end of the war, as the need for pilots decreased, or maybe they got better in their training procedures, they had a lot fewer props to rebuild. With time on his hands, and newly married, he started making knives. He made some beauties from car springs (aluminum from props didn't cut it) with the handles from bakelite and aluminum, sometimes local wood. Other than the fact the blades can rust, they are still fine knives. Latter in his life, he made himself a belt sander that used a 2" x 72" belt, and took up knife making again. I still use the sander- it'd be hard to improve on it.

 

[The Dougster]

I don't want to highjack this thread but it is close to something I've been thinking about....
Last weekend I was using a very old prybar that was almost straight... One of my random thoughts was to heat the darn thing up and give it a little more bend... of course, this led to another random thought. If I heated the bar enough to bend it, what would be the best way to preserve it's temper? Dip in water/oil or just let it cool naturally? Any thoughts ?