My first Bowie question

JawJacker

JawJacker

Well-Known Member
I have attempted what when done may resemble a Bowie. Here is where I'm at, I was keeping the ricoso clean as I could, then right before I quit I slipped and belt hit. Needless to say I was hogging so I'm missing some steel. What can I do to make this look good? Or just chuck it.
 

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Yeah, that's a bad one alright. I feel for you.

How tall is your ricasso from blade spine to blade edge? You don't really have enough room to move your plunge lines at all. The only way to get rid of that is to shorten your ricasso or make it thinner or a combination of the two.
 
Been there and I feel your pain. John has given you the answer for this one.

I just want to share what I now do to allow me to resolve the issue when, not if, it happens on a future knife. I leave the ricasso longer until I'm near done with the grinding and remove the extra material from the tang side when squaring the shoulders for the guard. You can always remove material but, never put it back.
 
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Well I'll just chalk this one up as the big L, before I spend any more time on it. This was the first knife I have done this with. I am usually very aware I need to be careful there but.... Thanks for the responses
 
I feel your pain! How thick is it? Could you thin it down enough to save it? You could chop the cutting edge side, put a little angle on the ricasso and make a smaller blade. I hate to waste blade steel.
 
JawJacker said:
Well I'll just chalk this one up as the big L, before I spend any more time on it. This was the first knife I have done this with. I am usually very aware I need to be careful there but.... Thanks for the responses
Click to expand...

This is a very wise response. And probably the right one. Often times, as hard as it is to swallow at first, you're far better off starting over than trying to fight some mistake along the way.
 
Anthony, its 1/4 thick, The more I look at it the more I want to change the blade design anyway. Thinking of dropping the point some.
 
For future reference. I leave my file guide in place while I'm roughing out my bevels. If you have 1/4" of thickness to play with you could could carefully thin the ricasso and tang from both sides to see if you can remove it but starting over is still a viable option.

Doug
 
I've made this mistake a few times, "where did I put that file guide? Oh well, I'll just touch this up quickly...."

What I do if it can't reprofiled a bit is to finish it out, and give it to someone as a "tester." Get feedback on balance, weight, geometry, handle comfort, etc. you will learn a lot.
 
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