The Amateur Crafter: Project 3.0: First Design!

I’ve decided to try and make a fixed blade, full length tang, drop point, possibly a convex grind, small neck knife. Whew! Imagine trying to explain that verbally. From the photos in the previous article, one can get a good idea of what I want. I like knives that are simple but have elegance in their design. I don’t necessarily feel that form should come before function but I do feel that there’s no reason that it can’t come in a close second. My knife’s purpose is a simple general purpose camping knife. Depending on the type of grind, it may see use for simple cutting tasks or even processing small wood pieces for a campfire. I may even try several different grinds, including a hollow grind for skinning carcasses. It’s important to note that I’m not making the knives just yet; I’m making the template. There are two reasons for this. First, if I wish to reuse this design I’d like an actual model to go by for future reference. Having a template already made to scale will make it much easier to duplicate in the future. Second, the paper that I've printed my design onto will not stand up very well to quenching but copying a completed template will. As stated in previous articles, this method will generate a lot of heat that can affect the properties of the blade steel. So, keeping the steel from heating up will be necessary as I grind the profile or the edge into the blade. I’ll use just plain water in the bucket in front of the Grizzly to do this. 

My first design attempt. As of this writing, I’m undecided if I wish to use 2 or 3 pins along the handle. Personally, I don’t much prefer pins more than I would screws but to keep the design simple, and because I’m still learning, I’ll use pins. For scales, I was going to use just “plain-jane” cheap, readily available wood. I would prefer if it were already milled 4 square but I can deal with it if it’s not. I may later decide to try some G10 or Micarta.

 The altered design. I felt that the height of the blade from edge to spine was a bit too much so I made it more subdued. I think that the final design looks quite good.

This is the knife that inspired my design. It comes from a picture in Custom Knifemaking: 10 Projects from a Master Craftsman by Tim McCreight.

But the grind can come later. I won’t start that process until I’ve got the shape and profile completed. And I won’t actually make the template with a grind anyway. So, to start with, I need some material. This is blade steel I’m working with. The size is 5/32” x 1-1/2” 1095 CRA steel purchased from Admiral Steel. To give an idea of what that means 1095 is an industrial designation, meaning that the 1000 range specifies carbon steel and 95 means that it has approx. 0.95% carbon in it. CRA stands for cold-rolled annealed. That is a process to form the steel into shape and induce ductility or relieve internal stresses as a result of cold forming. 

Cutting my 1095 steel into manageable sections. It actually comes from Admiral Steel in 96” lengths. Cutting it into shorter lengths may limit the number of blades I can produce from them, but it also means less space taken up by the material.

First step cut the blank. Originally I was planning to take several paper copies of my design that I made earlier and cut them out and paste them onto the blanks. Because I don’ t think that the paper will hold up to this process, I'll simply make a template first. Later, I’ll want to cut each blank into a short rough size like the one I'm about to cut here. The overall length of the knife is 6 inches. 

 I’ll mark each blank on my stock and rough cut the length with the portaband saw. To allow for some extra material, I’ll cut them slightly oversized than what I need – say about 1/16” longer. 



My super-awesome DeWalt portaband saw. I’m using a 1/2”

 blade 24 TPI (teeth per inch). And it cuts great!

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Rough cut design. The inner curve can be challenging. To get the curve in the finger choil area, I used a method known as “connect-the-dots” where a series of straight cuts are made close to the finished profile to allow material to break off out of the way as the profile gets cut. This is helpful when changing to a smaller blade may be too time-consuming and only the rough design is required for working.

Cut several straight lines up to the curve close to each other. 

As the main cut into the curve comes up, each smaller piece is cut off, making it easier to get a curve with a larger saw blade.

 

These small bits may be just scrap but I’m wondering if I can use them as spacers towards possible future folder knife designs. We’ll see. 

The template so far. Because I’m using a lot of photos to describe this process, I’ll post the next series of steps in my process in the next article.

Next up, grinding the profile.