Hey gents! So I have been super tied up with life lately and just haven't been getting any shop time, but a buddy of mine was over for dinner on Saturday and checked out the few knives I have made and convinced me to make one for him. He wants to pay me but I am honestly not comfortable making a profit on my work yet as I am not satisfied enough with my skills to take someones hard earned money, but I finally agreed to charge him for my supply costs at least, so I guess this is my first knife being made on someone else' dime! lol Anyhow, he wants a larger bushcraft style to use as a camp type knife, so here is what I have come up with so far. Again I have borrowed one of Dancoms templates off of his blog and am making some subtle variations to it, but so far so good. He wants something he can abuse so I went with 3/16" 1095 carbon steel. I went with a scandi grind for strength. This is absolutely the best grinds I have made to date and am quite pleased. For the scales I went with cocobolo as it is a nice, oily, durable wood and will handle the elements pretty decently. As we speak, the blade is in the oven finishing its tempering cycle. I won't be able to get back to it probably until next weekend, but here is were I am at to date...
Looking good so far. I would go with smaller holes or wider spacing in the tang go strength. You have removed quite a pile of steel there with the late holes being that close together. So do you have a kiln or are you heat treating with a forge? I'm planning to get a kiln but haven't taken that big step yet.
Actually I am all high tech and using a big assed propane weed torch right now, haha! Basically I am heating to non-magnetic and then quenching in 130° canola oil and then 2 rounds of 2 hour tempering cycles in my kitchen oven at 450° (for this one). Not ideal by any means but the knives I have done this way so far are getting sharp and holding an edge well so I am running with it for now. As for the holes, the handle doesn't really see so much abuse like the blade, so I have not been too worried but that said, I could be completely wrong and am not stuck on it for future blades. I just really don't like a massively handle heavy knife. I have to start learning how to do a tapered tang!
It all depends on the intended use of the knives really. A typical hunter sees little stress on the handle. A camp knife that may be used to baton is a different story. When force is applied downward on the handle, and the tip is struck downward to split wood, a fair amount of stock is transferred back to the ricasso and mid handle region.
Looks good Bob. Grind line looks nice and straight. The cocobolo has some interesting figuring. I think it will be a winner.
