forged camp knife- work in progress

[Siberianfury]

ive been wanting to make a large knife for quite some time, after getting tired of knocking up minatures. anyway having been down to the forge and putting the finishing touches to my cletic knife i took the oppertunity to start on my own design.

heres the blade blank after forging into shape and a little bit of rough grinding with the 65grit to get it into shape so you can see the basic idea of the knife.

the knife is made from a austrian Tool steel, similar to O2 but with a very high vanadium content, after forging it was so hard the 65HRC drills could barely scratch the surface of the steel, richard predicted it was about 63HRC with no HT as he explained, forging itself pushed the crystal structure of the metal together, hardnening it much more so that quenching.

if the full tang doesnt work out i may have to convert it to a stick tang with tho power hammer.

the shape of the knife is designed for chopping, the blade is about 6" long but has alot of forward weight to ensure alot of chopping power, the blade starts at about 7mm thick near the handle, before tapering down to about
3mm at the tip.

as for finishing, it up, i plan to put some ebbony on the handle and properly grinding the edge as its about 2m thick at present.

 

[Shewie]

Looking good Josh, should be a handy chopper when it's done mate.

 

[Everything Mac]

sounds like you will need to anneal it before doing some drilling then.

looks good though mate.

 

[bushwacker bob]

I like the influence of the Spyderco/BcUK knife on the handleokenest:. It would make for a comfortable chopper.

 

[Siberianfury]

I like the influence of the Spyderco/BcUK knife on the handleokenest:. It would make for a comfortable chopper.

yes... Uhumm, thats the inspiration lol.

Cheers man, im probably not gnna bother with the drilling now, night be easyer and suit the blade more to have a rounded off leather bound handle as the banalce could be effected by adding more to the handle.

 

[spader]

Where is the hole by the way?

I think the thick spine and weight of the blade will work for chopping tasks. Anyways this type blades are not for anything delicate - such as wood carving.

I like the rustic & solid look of it - nice design.

 

[addo]

Looking good Josh. Look forward to seeing it handled too.

 

[Everything Mac]

yes... Uhumm, thats the inspiration lol.

Cheers man, im probably not gnna bother with the drilling now, night be easyer and suit the blade more to have a rounded off leather bound handle as the banalce could be effected by adding more to the handle.

aye that does sound easier. - a para-cord handle would suit the blade too.

do post pics when its finished

 

[launditch1]

Looking good.
Dont drop it on yer toes!

 

[Siberianfury]

aye that does sound easier. - a para-cord handle would suit the blade too.

do post pics when its finished

i shall do, hoping to finish it tommorow XD

 

[C_Claycomb]

If the tang is pretty thick still, it might be worth either tapering it with the power hammer, or grinding a taper in it. If you aren't going to mess with drilling holes then there isn't much of a down side for assembly. Trying to get a 6-inch blade to chop reasonably well is a matter of weight distribution and where you can get a hold of the knife. Mostly I find that you need to move your hand quite far back down the handle so as to get a decent swing. It looks like the shape you have is pretty good, but if you do a wrapped handle it would be easy to end up with the wrapping burying the tang's handle profile.

Since you have access to all the toys of a forge, have you thought of doing a reverse distal taper? Not on this project, obviously, but maybe on another? Have the thickest part of the blade a couple of inches back from the tip, where the belly joins the straight part of the edge, then taper everything back all the way to the end of the handle. There is a video somewhere of Tai Goo doing a knife like that and it does look good. Would make a good chopper!

Apropos the vanadium and hardening stuff. It is quite possible that what has happened is that the vanadium has formed lamellar sheets of carbides. Its something I have read about and heard other smiths talking about. I have even seen something like it in samples of O-1 treated in a forge. The steel itself doesn't have to be hard in order to give you problems drilling or filing, the files or drills can just end up skating on the carbides while the base metal is still softish. Of course, some of the steels with high V content also air harden.

That forge hardening thing, is that like edge packing?

Best of luck

 

[Draven]

That reverse distal tapering is a nice idea Chris - I've often wondered why I've never seen it done on a chopper. IIRC it's banned at cutting comps but would be nice on a camp knife - depending on how it's done it could also leave the bit near the handle thin-ish for food prep too while keeping a thick robust section at the end for chopping.

Since you've access to a forge now you might wanna give punching a shot instead of drilling if you're gonna do a pinned handle - Mike Ameling I think recommended it as being easier and faster. Nice one anyway Josh, look forward to the result!

Pete

 

[Siberianfury]

the distal taper thing would be wonderful, probably best to try on another one rather than this as i need to get some more practice in before i start doing more advanced stuff. as for the hammer hardening, basicly with every blow it packs the crystal structure of the metal much tighter, according to richard this is an oil hardening steel, somthing i might try once the edge is ground is to differentialy temper it, id like to experiment and see just how well this steel holds its edge.

 

[jdlenton]

you might wanna give punching a shot instead of drilling if you're gonna do a pinned handle

i was just thinking the very same thing if your forging do it that way it will be well worth the effort