First of my Blade Show pieces

EdCaffreyMS

EdCaffreyMS

"The Montana Bladesmith"
As usual, I put myself behind the 8 ball again.....lots to do, and short on time. Looks like it will be 12+ hour shop days until the show. Early this morning I put the finishing touches on this culinary set.

Both are my "Fossil" Damascus, with explosion pattern "plug welds". The larger blade is 9" X .112" thick, and the smaller blade is 6" X .100" thick. Both are convex ground, finished out with satin clear Gun-Kote, dark Desert Ironwood scales & Nickel Silver pins. The plan is to have a display rack of Desert Ironwood for them at the show.....but we'll see what time allow. Still have 5 hunters of various types/patterns/steels, a couple of bowies, and folders in the works.

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EdCaffreyMS said:
As usual, I put myself behind the 8 ball again.....lots to do, and short on time. Looks like it will be 12+ hour shop days until the show. Early this morning I put the finishing touches on this culinary set.

Both are my "Fossil" Damascus, with explosion pattern "plug welds". The larger blade is 9" X .112" thick, and the smaller blade is 6" X .100" thick. Both are convex ground, finished out with satin clear Gun-Kote, dark Desert Ironwood scales & Nickel Silver pins. The plan is to have a display rack of Desert Ironwood for them at the show.....but we'll see what time allow. Still have 5 hunters of various types/patterns/steels, a couple of bowies, and folders in the works.

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set2web.jpg


Bladesweb.jpg
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Gorgeous blades!
 
Wow! I've always loved your fossil Damascus, but those explosion plugs take these over the top. Expertly done!
 
I don't mind sharing how they were done. First I built "cans" of fossil damascus.... mostly pieces left over from accordion cutting mosaic billets, the I add 1095 powder, that is mixed with 9% pure nickel powder, to fill all the air voids. The "can" I started with was 4"x4"x8". That "can" was forge welded up, reduced to 2"x2", annealed, then slices were taken off with the bandsaw. Those slices were then forged into the rough profile of what I wanted, and then annealed. After annealing, both profiled blades were surface ground. Mean while I created several round rods of explosion pattern damascus, and forged them round using spring fullers in the air hammer. Those rods were annealed, then turned down on the lathe to .002" over 7/16" so they would press fit into 7/16" holes, which I drilled in the profiled blade blanks.

An explanation of how I do the plug welds can be found in this thread: https://knifedogs.com/threads/plug-welding-anyone.47301/

After the plugs were welded in, and the profiles were forged to finished, everything was thermal cycled, then annealed. Next job was to clean the blades up. In this case, I chose to surface grind them to about 1/4" thick. In order to avoid as much warping as possible, I chose to heat treat them at that point, which worked well, and after there were tempered, each were surface ground to their current thickness, then it was just knifemaking 101 to finish them up. The big blade did take a LONG time to grind, simply because It was thin, and I didn't want to risk warping it during grinding.

I didn't keep accurate track, but my best guess is there's approx 80-90 hours or so of "hands on" time with them. It was just one of those ideas that got stuck in my head, and wouldn't go away until I did it. :)
 
I'm sure there are more then a few that enjoyed that info. Can I borrow your surface grinder. Just for a little time! lol,,, Did you change it over to a belt or does it still have a wheel?
 
I'm all about a belt conversion on a surface grinder..... at least for knifemaking....and as long as it's done correctly. There are a couple of drawbacks compared to a wheel, but there are a whole lot more pros than cons IMO.
 
"I didn't keep accurate track, but my best guess is there's approx 80-90 hours or so of "hands on" time with them. It was just one of those ideas that got stuck in my head, and wouldn't go away until I did it."

Wow....A LOT of work involved.Way to keep with it! I'm sure the show response will be worth it. These are so different looking and attractive...I love the "lines" coming out of the handle on the larger knife...the whole pattern on both is so artistic. (I'm not a big Damascus fan....but these are so different looking)
 
EdCaffreyMS said:
I'm all about a belt conversion on a surface grinder..... at least for knifemaking....and as long as it's done correctly. There are a couple of drawbacks compared to a wheel, but there are a whole lot more pros than cons IMO.
Click to expand...

I keep an eye on CL and KBid for a grinder. A knee mill would be nice too. I'd take the grinder first. Ed,,, please define "correctly ".
 
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