Not Tenkara - Making a Fixed Blade Knife (my first try)

I've always loved knives. Folders, fixed blade, full tang, rat tail tang, flat grind, saber grind, scandi grind, whatever. I love knives. It probable stems from the fact that my mother would never let me use knives, even in scouts. I think she was scared of them. Any knife I received she took away (interestingly enough, she never took my guns away).

My favorite knives are fixed blade, or what my grandpa used to call a "sheath knife".  Grandpa made his own hunting knives, and I have the last one he made.

Grandpa's last knife, with sheath. 

My favorite style of fixed blade is the "bushcraft" knife. It is usually made from high carbon steel, with a scandi grind, and made to take a beating. Bushcraft knives are usually not as long or large as "survival" knives. They are elegant and simple in design with understated curves. I think a well done bushcraft knife is a functional work of art.

In my life of various outdoor pursuits, if I like doing something I usually end up trying to make my own gear. In the 70's (when I was in my teens) I was into archery, so I made my own 70 lb recurve bow. It took me about 6 months. I also made my own bow strings and arrows. I learned to tie flies in the early 70's as well, but I didn't start making my own graphite fly rods until the mid 90's.

My old bow. It has been a good friend all these years!

Recently I thought that I'd like to make my own fixed blade knife. I wanted to make it in a bushcraft design, but since I have other full sized bushcraft knives, I thought I'd like to make this knife just a little bit shorter. That would make it lighter and easier to carry. I didn't make it specifically to baton, rather I wanted it to be a good all a-rounder, slicing, cutting, feather sticks, etc. I usually carry a Gransfors hatchet for processing firewood.

So, I did some research online (it sure is a lot easier to find information now days than it was in the 1970's).  I got my materials together and started.

I chose 0.125" x 1.5" O-1 tool steel for my blade. I also decided on green G10 liners and black Micarta scales.  After drawing out the design and gluing it on the steel I cut it out roughly with an angle grinder. I then shaped it with my belt grinder. I drilled holes in the tang for brass pins and a lanyard hole as well as others to reduce the weight and hold the epoxy.

Following that, I ground the edge bevel. I decided to do it by hand with a file instead of on my belt grinder, as I wanted more control. I'll practice and do other knives with the belt sander, but the first knife I made I wanted to be made by hand.

Getting there. Just a little more to remove. 

I did a modified scandi grind. Next, I hand sanded the blade with 120, 150, 220, 440, 800 grit sand paper.

Next step was normalizing the steel. I used my forge to bring the blade up to 1425-50 degrees F (about when O-1 tool steel looses its magnetic attraction. This is called the Curie point.), and then let it cool slowly in the air. I did this three times.

After normalizing I heat treated the blade by bringing it slowing and evenly back up to the Curie point (again, about 1400-1450 degrees F). I then quickly plunged the blade, using a slicing motion, into warm (160 degrees F) canola oil. After the blade had cooled, I could see that my heat treat was good because a Nicholson mill file just skipped off the edge and would not bite. My knife is probably a Rockwell of 62-65, I'd guess.

Right after the heat treat I used my wife's oven (which has been calibrated) to temper the steel. I did 415 degrees for two hours, let the blade cool in the oven to room temperature, then repeated the process again. That gave me a total of 4 hours at 415 degrees F.

Next I hand sanded the blade again to 800 grit for a satin finish. Following this I electrochemically etched my initials onto the blade using salt water and a 6V battery.

It's supposed to be a stylized "TVD".

I then epoxied the G10 liners onto the Micarta scales. After the epoxy hardened I drilled the scales for the pins, epoxied the scales onto the tang, and clamped it up.

After a full 24 hour cure I used the belt sander to grind down the pins and shape the handle. I then hand sanded the handle up to 800 grit.

After I got the handle shape I wanted, I used my Edge Pro to sharpen the knife edge with a slight convex edge for strength. Following sharpening I stropped (green compound) for 50 times each side. It is now shaving sharp!

I sealed the Micarta scales with WD-40 and did a final sanding with 800 grit. This is what I ended up with:

I'm very pleased with how it turned out, given it was my first time making a fixed blade knife. I'll make a loop for my 5th finger (a pinky loop) to help stabilize the knife when cutting. Now, I have to learn how to make a sheath!

If you have any experience making your own knife, let me know. I'd love to hear how it turned out for you.