Work in progress - If I remember. . . .

[Stew]

You're braver than me!

[Iron Hoarder]

Still lovin' it.

[irbailey]

Cheers for your perseverance! Its now got to the most crucial stage.
If the heat treat goes wrong - warped blade, wrinkled edge, crack, etc, its all been a waste of time Alternatively my name stamp could bounce when I hit it and ruin it . Thats the thing I love about getting a knife finished, right up until the final stages its possible to make a mess of it. To get it right means that every step has to be done correctly.
For me, thats where the appeal of knifemaking lies.
I still can't believe I decided to do this thread though! I'm gonna look such a if it suddenly goes wrong!!
Still, I'm confident all will be ok, and if its not I'm sure that someone will have learnt something from it.
If all goes to plan I'll see you tomorrow for some heat treating

Cheers, Ian

[lilzee]

you fit the gaurds before the HT? man, you have some serious guts!

and those fits arent human. i would explode several times if i ever got a fit that good. out of sheer surprise.

[The Blunt End]

those fits arent human. i would explode several times if i ever got a fit that good. out of sheer surprise.

Well said that man. I've been trying to find the words to express my wonder at/curse/praise his skill since I saw the first one

[GHEzell]

Hey, you're putting the guard on from the blade end, you don't see that too often (it should have been obvious from the beginning, but I just noticed). I'd like to do a few built like that eventually, there's some early Sheffield bowies made that way I'd like to take a crack at... I suspect there may be some interesting challenges to this style of construction.

Love your take on the Moran style, too.

[Me&Fe]

Well said that man. I've been trying to find the words to express my wonder at/curse/praise his skill since I saw the first one

I have watched the bloke at work and he is a perfectionist.
Quite clearly this shows in his work


P.s.Gonna come over for a bash in the smiffy??

[Winter]

Putting the guard on from the front?

That's impressive.

[irbailey]

This is getting embarrassing
Thanks for the kind words! By the way Me&Fe, I'm definitely coming round, its just a case of when. I need more hours in the day!
Anyway - here we go again!
First up is a picture of my one brick (actually its 2!) forge. Thank you to Wayne Goddard for sharing good ideas in books. Note the speaker magnet fixed to the brick on the right, for finding the critical temperature.

Hear I am trying to do photography and knifemaking at the same time. I had visions of dropping the knife on the gas pipe and burning to death, but as it was all was ok.
More by luck than judgment I hasten to add.

One piece of hot steel before cooling slightly to stamp my name.

Here it is again, I let it cool to a heat that still removes my fingerprints, and then make my mark. This little jig makes life a little less scary, nothing worse than a bounced and shadowed stamp mark. (Except dropping the work on the gas pipe and burning to death, as mentioned earlier)

[irbailey]

Heres the two freshly stamped.

The next sequence of events was a bit to hard to photograph on my own. So I'm afraid you'll have to use your imagination. To help, picture a fat bearded man standing in a cloud of (most probably) poisonous smoke coughing like a cat thats just drank petrol.
Heres the cause of the smoke - my super scary mix of used engine oil, anti-freeze, brake fluid, screen-wash, and God knows what else. Note the high tech basket set-up ready for the edge quench.

Once I'd recovered from smoke inhalation, this is what the end product was.
The chute . . .

And the drop . . .

These two are in the oven at present, undergoing their second cycle of tempering.
Next job, re-grind and finish blades, and pin, peen and solder guards.
Coming soon . . . . .
Thanks for looking,

Ian

[deviant11]

Absolutely brilliant WIP.

Thank you so much for sharing !

[irbailey]

Cheers, very much appreciated

Ian

[a6cjn]

I'm enjoying this
Just imagining you doing all this and trying to take pics at the same time
Well worth it, most informative
Very well done

Chris

[ChrisR]

Fascinating ... I mean, I always knew I couldn't do this kind of stuff ... but I would never have believed there was so much stuff I can't do!! Really good to see a craftsman turning out something of beauty.

[jamiemackie]

Ha ha that quench medium sounds deadly, ive atcually puked from inhaling cooking oil smoke which I thought must be the worst smelling smoke known to man but I doubt it smells as nasty as your quench concoction.

I thought your set-up would be really high-tech when I saw your knives but its not much more high-tech than mine, its just you have more skill. It gives people like me hope seeing what you can pull off with the most basic of setups.

Thanks.
Jamie