Blacksmithing

So most of you know that I like to get into alot of new hobbies. I am constantly making something or in the middle of a project. Recently I got into making knife handles and sheaths. I made three knife handles but quickly grew bored. I decided to move on to making the knife blades as well. I spent some time researching on youtube and other resources until I found some good plans to make a forge. I settled on making a ‘Brake Drum Forge’. I took an old brake drum off of a truck, turned it upside down and bolted a 2″ black floor flange to it. From there I put in a “T” with a one foot section to stick out the bottom of the “T” and a cap to screw on the other end. Then I stole my mothers’ dying hair dryer and inserted it into the non-threaded end of the 1′ section. I also took a thick wire grid and cut it to size to fit over the hole in the bottom of the brake drum. Fill it with coal, lit it on fire and Viola! a working forge.

Now all I have to do it get some metal to throw in, and make some  knives. Hopefully they’ll turn out looking like an actually knife and not a ugly hunk of burnt metal.

The makings of a knife

While at one of my favorite local stores, WoodCraft, I discover a knife kit and decided I would try it. The knife looked like this

and the wood like this

(sorry that’s kinda blurry) anyway it’s a drop point knife and the wood is “Bolivian Rosewood”

I had no clue how I was going to get these blocks of wood into the shape and size of a knife handle. So I went a googling and found a couple ideas. I decided to go with the bandsaw approach.

After cutting the wood to the shape of the handle, I took it to the belt sander to bring it down to size.

After belt sanding came drilling the holes for the hidden rivets

Then came alot more sanding, working my way from 60 grit all the way up to 220 for a smooth, gouge free finish. So a couple hours later I now have a new kinfe. Now I just have to figure out how to make a leather sheath for it and I’ll be good to go!