New to knifemaking

A lot of production steak knives have rivets versus pins. No biggie. Just drill them out or grind the heads off. You can use anything for pins, especially for practice. The blades will be hardened so you won’t have any luck drilling the pin holes bigger (unless you put a propane torch to the pin hole areas to anneal the steel).

They may have partial tangs. You can tell because the handle will only have a partial slot on one side, right in line with the pins / rivets and there won’t be any slot or pin down at the butt end. These are fine, too. Turn them into hidden tang knives for practice.

The world is your oyster. Go crazy!
 
Depending on the steel, you could play around/experiment with mustard patinas or etching. How thick are the blades?
Those probably have partial tangs, so would be good to practice your WA handles...
...but I guess Mr Wilson already suggested this.

But to go a little further on this idea, if you plan on doing kitchen knives, a lot of makers use what's referred to as the "hidden dowel" technique which allows a relatively easy way to replace/change out WA handles, and these might be a good way to master that technique.
 
I have an old Scout folding knife. I would like to create new handle inserts and the blades could use some work. A little rust and sharpening are needed.
Is it possible to take the folder apart to clean the blades?
 

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I also have six throwing knives that I'd like to play with. 5-1/2" overall length. Handle is almost 3". Less than 0.125" thick.
I was thinking some thin .125 or thinner handle pieces. Just to play. The handle area has 3 slots, I may need to drill a hole.
Of course paracord is the norm, but I want to play.
Any tips?
Any tips on epoxy?
 

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Budkitc said:
I have an old Scout folding knife. I would like to create new handle inserts and the blades could use some work. A little rust and sharpening are needed.
Is it possible to take the folder apart to clean the blades?
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Yes, you can take the knife apart but it takes a little know-how to put it back together. You'll make new pins and you'll have to learn to peen the pins. It's a good learning experience. My advice is to work on a few fixed blades first to get the feel. Of course you can start with folders, it's just a lot more involved.
 
Budkitc said:
Here is another knife I would like clean up.
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This is the knife I'd start with if I were you. These are the perfect knives to cut your teeth on. Get creative. Make a new guard and fit it. If the antler is dry and cracking, make a new one. Make a new pommel. This is the kind of knife that lets you learn about how it all goes together.
 
Budkitc said:
What all can I do to the actual blade on these used knives I bought?
Clean up and polish and sharpen?
Tips?
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I would practice making new edges. Grind the serrations completely off. You'll be left with a flat edge, and most likely not a straight one. Practice re-establishing the cutting edge. This is the most common repair you'll ever make if someone brings you a knife to sharpen. Usually they have knocked chunks out of the edge or sharpened them so poorly that the edge isn't even a straight line anymore. What you'll have to do is turn it back into a knife again. It's not a hard job at all if you know what you're doing, and learning on a $2 knife is the perfect way to learn what you're doing without fear of making a problem worse.

The next skill you can learn is putting a tip back on a knife. That's another skill that will make people think you are a magician. Grind the tip off just like if someone had broken the tip off using it as a screwdriver. Practice bringing the spine down to the edge, or the edge up to the spine, or doing both and meeting in the middle. You'll eventually do all of these things on the knives you make, because part of the learning process is that you'll ruin a whole bunch of tips when you're learning to grind. Having the confidence to re-establish a tip in the place where you wanted it originally will resurrect a blade that might otherwise have gone into the scrap bin.

Being a knifemaker is more about fixing problems than it is having everything go perfectly. It takes years before you ever make a knife perfectly start to finish. I don't care if you're a Master Knifesmith. Sooner or later you'll sneeze at the wrong time and you'll have to debate throwing 20 hours in the trash versus trying to make chicken salad out of chicken s##t.
 
TimGinMN said:
If they are full tang knives like chicago cutlery, the scales are likely not glued on, just held on by the pins. You might have to drill them out.
Here's one I did. Epoxied on the new scales and pins are brass rod from the hardware store. You can get Corby bolts from knifemaker supply places that are more of a mechanical connection.
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Excellent advice from Tim that it doesn't hurt to start simple and learn how to re-handle kitchen knives from Chicago Cutlery, Ontario Knife and the like. When I saw this photo I almost laughed because a deer hunting friend just asked me to refurbish a cherished Ontario that his new dog had grabbed off the table and literally chewed the handle apart. I guess maybe a little meat grease had worked its way into that wood over the years. Anyway, I'm just seconding this suggestion as the steel in these knives is often quite good and people use these knives over the years for routine kitchen work as well as to skin and bone deer, elk, and other animals. Lots of good memories in these old knives.
 
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Sorry for some crazy questions. I appreciate all the replies.
On my used kitchen knives - if I grind the serrated edge off should I draw a new line to follow?
Any metal grinding cleaning tips?
 
Budkitc said:
Sorry for some crazy questions. I appreciate all the replies.
On my used kitchen knives - if I grind the serrated edge off should I draw a new line to follow?
Any metal grinding cleaning tips?
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You can. It can be good practice to have a line to follow. Use Dykem (layout blue) or a fat sharpie and darken the blade. Then you can use a cheap digital caliper to scribe a line. Or you can forego all of that and go by eye.

As far as cleaning tips- there's nothing special. You may be overthinking all of this. Just get out there and go for it!
 
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