Titanium Frame Lock Wharncliffe

Justin Presson

Justin Presson

Well-Known Member
I have been working on this knife of and on for a long time. It's only my second frame lock. I'm not happy with the action or lack of action as a flipper. You hit the flipper tab and it deploys about half way. I screwed up several things on this knife and weaseled my way around the mistakes and fixed them the best I could. I ground the blade tang wrong and had terrible lock rock so had to fix that which make the knife lock up late.
It will be a good beater for me to carry and test out.
Overall length is 6 3/4"
Steel is AEB-L at 61 hrc
Left at a 60 grit belt finish. I gave it the ol 60 grit and quit.
Titanium frame and clip bead blasted oiled and tumbled slightly.
I made this knife without and milling machine or surface grinder. I really would like to have both....lol
Anyways thanks for looking.
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Dude for your second frame lock that's pretty darn good. I still haven't tried to make a frame lock, so my flippers are all liner locks. For me, getting the action right on the flippers is extremely difficult. First off, Lord knows that I'm definitely no expert on knives let alone flippers. Second, I'm definitely not going to be able to explain this in the most elegant manner, but here it goes. A couple of things that helped me to improve the action somewhat are: Enlarging the detent hole in the blade to a #53 instead of a #54. It allows the detent ball to sit deeper creating additional force necessary to deploy the blade. Then take a small needle file and flatten the top of the detent ball. That way the blade, in theory, will fire as it clears the detent ball where filed. I don't know if that makes any sense but it helped me.
 
BossDog said:
And I meant to ask, how did you cut the lock bar and mill the relief with no mill?
Click to expand...
I used an old drill press, I chucked one of the small dremel cut off wheels in the drill press and whith the handle clamped into a drill press vice I manually feed it into the cut off wheel being very careful and slowly....slowly feeding it. The for the lock relief I chucked a carbide cutter in the drill press and did the same. I know I should not do that and the drill press will not handle the side load but it is what it is.
 
BossDog said:
Great post.
I can feel your pain on those tiny misses in what can go wrong. I carry all my mistakes as self punishment. It’s good motivation to get another one done and put that one in a drawer with the other corpses.
Click to expand...

Thanks Tracy, I think one of my problems is I did not have everything dead nuts flat. I also cut the relief of the lock face to close to the pivot and had to use tiny PB washers so my lock would not hit the washer as it engaged the blade tang.
Live and learn.
 
I think it looks great, Justin. The design looks very functional and I can see it being a great user. All of the problems that you described are very common. There are ways to fix all of them, but it's best to know what to avoid on the next one. Keep it up and you're going to join the dark side of knife making with the rest of us folder makers.
 
Cazador said:
Dude for your second frame lock that's pretty darn good. I still haven't tried to make a frame lock, so my flippers are all liner locks. For me, getting the action right on the flippers is extremely difficult. First off, Lord knows that I'm definitely no expert on knives let alone flippers. Second, I'm definitely not going to be able to explain this in the most elegant manner, but here it goes. A couple of things that helped me to improve the action somewhat are: Enlarging the detent hole in the blade to a #53 instead of a #54. It allows the detent ball to sit deeper creating additional force necessary to deploy the blade. Then take a small needle file and flatten the top of the detent ball. That way the blade, in theory, will fire as it clears the detent ball where filed. I don't know if that makes any sense but it helped me.
Click to expand...
I did use a #53. I did not however flatten the detent ball I might give that a try. I feel like it is just really stiff and tight and if I loosen the pivot more it gets off Center and has side to side play.
 
Justin Presson said:
I did use a #53. I did not however flatten the detent ball I might give that a try. I feel like it is just really stiff and tight and if I loosen the pivot more it gets off Center and has side to side play.
Click to expand...

I found that a lot of that comes from what you already mentioned, everything not being dead nuts flat. You may have already checked, but one of the other things is to make sure the spacing at the front of the knife handles when closed is the exact same as the spacing in the back.

A little side note on how critical the tolerances are in making folders. I had been working on a liner lock recently and was just about done with it when I was having similar problems. Blade off center and a bit tight to open and close. It was driving me crazy. So I decided I would go back and check what I mentioned above to you. There was a bit of a discrepancy between front and rear with the front being narrower. Took the knife apart and began the process of checking the blade thickness and washer thickness for the umpteenth time. Well DUH!!! I somehow during one of the times of taking it apart and putting it back together, I ended up putting different sized washers, ,.020 on one side .015 on the other. Fixed that problem, checked the knife and lo and behold it opened and closed beautifully and was perfectly centered. Crazy that .005 made that much of a difference.

Keep plugging away, you'll get it.

Frank
 
There's a lot to like about that knife.

I think you've nailed the design. Looks good and functional.

When it comes to flipping action it can be a real bear getting it right because there's so many variables. Any one of which can derail good snappy action. It's something I struggle with a lot.

You might want to try to adjust the lock bar tension. Too much or too little can effect the action dramatically.

Also when designing a flipper, you want the flipper tab to be forward of the centerline of the pivot (when closed) as much as possible. Looks like you've got decent placement but if your design allows it, bumping it forward on the next one can only help.

There's guys out there with amazing flipping action. Guys like David Mosier, Tom Mayo and especially RJ Martin. And Lee Williams' kick stop is on a whole different plane of reality.

But one thing I'm sure of, they had to start somewhere and overcome their own struggles.

Keep at it. You can only get better.
 
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Motor City Mike said:
There's a lot to like about that knife.

I think you've nailed the design. Looks good and functional.

When it comes to flipping action it can be a real bear getting it right because there's so many variables. Any one of which can derail good snappy action. It's something I struggle with a lot.

You might want to try to adjust the lock bar tension. Too much or too little can really effect the action dramatically.

Also when designing a flipper, you want the flipper tab to be forward of the centerline of the pivot as much as possible. Looks like you've got decent placement but if your design allows it, bumping it forward on the next one can only help.

There's guys out there with amazing flipping action. Guys like David Mosier, Tom Mayo and especially RJ Martin. And Lee Williams' kick stop is on a whole different plane of reality.

But one thing I'm sure of, they had to start somewhere and overcome their own struggles.

Keep at it. You can only get better.
Click to expand...

Thanks Mike, I wondered about the lock bar can I simply bend it back a little without heating it you think?
I do agree my flipper tab is to far back, I find myself wanting it further forward.
 
Justin Presson said:
Thanks Mike, I wondered about the lock bar can I simply bend it back a little without heating it you think?
I do agree my flipper tab is to far back, I find myself wanting it further forward.
Click to expand...

Yes. You can tweak it without heat. I do that all the time.

I only use heat to set the initial bend

The other place for adjustment is the pivot screw. This can have a lot to do with the action too. I usually put a small dot of blue loctite on it during final assembly when I get where I want it. But it sounds like you're having some issues with blade play when you loosen the pivot too much.

I know it's been mentioned already but flat, square and parallel is the name of the game with folders

You did this without a mill?? That's seriously impressive.
 
Cazador said:
I found that a lot of that comes from what you already mentioned, everything not being dead nuts flat. You may have already checked, but one of the other things is to make sure the spacing at the front of the knife handles when closed is the exact same as the spacing in the back.

A little side note on how critical the tolerances are in making folders. I had been working on a liner lock recently and was just about done with it when I was having similar problems. Blade off center and a bit tight to open and close. It was driving me crazy. So I decided I would go back and check what I mentioned above to you. There was a bit of a discrepancy between front and rear with the front being narrower. Took the knife apart and began the process of checking the blade thickness and washer thickness for the umpteenth time. Well DUH!!! I somehow during one of the times of taking it apart and putting it back together, I ended up putting different sized washers, ,.020 on one side .015 on the other. Fixed that problem, checked the knife and lo and behold it opened and closed beautifully and was perfectly centered. Crazy that .005 made that much of a difference.

Keep plugging away, you'll get it.

Frank
Click to expand...
.005 is alot of area
 
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