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Old 09-03-2018, 02:26 PM
AllanBeasley AllanBeasley is offline
Steel Addict
 
Join Date: Aug 2014
Location: Roswell, Georgia
Posts: 133
I let a newb loose with a railroad spike



So a friend of mine came over yesterday to bring me an extremely miniature horizontal cross pein hammer and anvil. I promised him something cool in return so I let him go to town on MY anvil instead of the guest anvil with a railroad spike just to smash some steel. He got a pretty large flat piece of steel and decided he wanted to turn it into a knife. Better than the one his son made just to mess with him. It turns out he made a wonderful shape out of the slab he'd smashed out and all I had to do was show him how to form the fingerwell on the tang. He has the magic touch and I could feel the concrete floor vibrate off every hammer blow. After he finished the raw form he set up the edge how he liked it and he cut the head of the spike off so we could put scales on it. I used something spalted my dad stabilized ages ago and I did the glueup and he cut the scales to fit, cut the pins and softened the edges, I drilled the holes which was a nightmare, I found a confusing hard spot none of my drill bits would touch. I had to use a screwdriver as an impromptu punch to make it happen. He did the grinding on the handle after I showed him what to do on it, did the hand sanding and I oiled the wood and made the kydex sheath. I figured I'd show what a man did on his first time forging or making a knife with minimal guidance. And yes, I DID make sure to explain to him the non-hardenable nature of the spike BEFORE he committed to making a knife out of it.
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