Fruit of my labor

[elginrunner]

Well this is the fruit of last night's labor... not prize winning blue ribbon fruit, but fruit none the less.... : )

She's 1095, oil/edge quenched, and tempered, etc. My third attempt with micarta handles, and first with the 1/4" thong holes.

Newbie lessons learnt' : when working with micarta it seems that the texture is brought out more with the ruffer the grit. My first trial was with 80 sanding disc, and i wasn't impressed with the texture that I had read so much about... I sanded these handles with a 50 grit sanding disk and the texture is a lot better, I worked at the slowest speed with my drill press and it seemed to help with a.) dust control, and b.) slowed down material removal. I also bought some tubing from hobby lobby for use in the handle. The material is too thin in my opinion (sorry don't have measurments) I'll try and obtain some thicker walled stock in the future. Oh and the best lesson learnt' was you can almost screw up more in a minute and a half with a belt sander, more than you can fix in five hours hand sanding





My lighting sucks, but it's on my list of things to correct.... when I become rich and famous!!

[Raymond Johnson]

Looks good, Brock! I like it.
And every bit of knowledge that you learn is a blessing in one form or another, so cherish them. Even if there painful and eat up time. You will learn alot from those moments.
Again very nice and keep the work.
Raymond Johnson

[Ray Rogers]

Not bad at all! Have you tested on yet, really hard? You should, you know.

For that type of knife and texture from Micarta you should be using Canvas Micarta. Maybe you are, I can't tell. Like any other handle material, you want to get those coarse scratches out. Get it down to 220 at least. You won't have much texture at that point but then you sand blast it and there you are ...

[elginrunner]

it is canvas, but i don't have a sand blaster yet... i've been looking at the $99 bench top models at HF. Something else I've been wondering... as anyone sandblasted the blade and then did a vinigar etch.... it should turn out just like parkerizing..... Or at least that is the direction I want to go... If that did look good then I was thinking about blasting and then Duracoat finish from lauer weaponry. It's held up alot better than I'd thought on my 1911, and Glock field knife.

Oh and I havn't fully tested it yet. It warped bad when I quenched it. It seemed fairly easy to straighten out in the vise/pin setup. The edge was hard (file tested) about half way up so I went ahead and finished it out. If I get time tonight and might revisit the oak board test!!

[Ray Rogers]

Sandblasting followed by a vinegar etch will look a lot like parkerizing but the dimples left by sandblasting will hold moisture and encourage rusting (unlike Parkerizing). However, if you use a coating on it you'd probably be good to go.

I know it hurts a little at this early stage but you should test some baldes -made as much as possible exactly the same way - to distruction. You don't need to mirror polish them and a cheapie handle is fine. Wear eye protection!! Test it hard, stick it in a stump and twist it out. throw it, test the cutting ability of course, and then break it to see what the grain looks like. If it breaks early the grain may look coarse and the heat treat isn't as good as you want it to be. If it survives until you break it on purpose the grain is probably fine and you'll know in the future if one doesn't look like that. If the grain is fine AND it breaks early, you probably screwed up on the temper ...

[ranger1]

Very impressive.I agree with Ray 220 no scratches then sandblast.You'll like the handle texture.

[Raymond Johnson]

It a good idea to take a test bar and harden it and then just start snapping pieces off at half inch to a inch length to give something to compare with. Just use anything cheap like leaf spring and heat one end way to hot, then quench the whole bar and a light temper. When you start to snap the pieces you notice a difference in the grain as you travel up the bar. You know, tip to hot, middle just right, top to cold or breaks like glass, hard to break, or crap it just bends. The idea here is more important than the test bar. It's just to give you a visual referance. Well it's two in the a.m. I'm going to bed. If this sounds silly. I blame it on lack of sleep. Raymond Johnson p.s. wear glasses