WaddWatsonEllis Belduque WIP

Started by Josh Dabney, February 16, 2010, 08:52:47 AM

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Josh Dabney

Messerist,

Thats a great lookin finish Pard.  A couple hours to late for this'n   LOL  but we'll get to that soon.  I have heard of your treatment but haven't experimented with it personally yet.   I'm actually using a similar process though so we'll have to see how she comes out  ;D.

One thing I forgot to mention about the wire is how to get the nice taper on the end of the wire.  This is accomplished very simply by "cold forging"  the end of the wire prior to starting.



Here's side #2 done and cleaned up a little.



Getting prepped for some wood treatments with the Vinegaroon, and some dark brown Fieblings Pro Oil Dye


Josh Dabney

Here we're really soaking the wood down good with the Vinegaroon and hitting it with the heat gun.  My purpose here with the heat gun is to swell the grain as tight as I can get it.  I did this process 3 times the left it wet the 4 run.



Here she is wet with V and ready for the dye.  I like to dye the wood wet because the wetness will assist in wicking the dye into the wood.  Next shot soaked with dye.  And left to dry.




I do of course clean the dye off the bolsters and tang while it's still wet  ;D  Dang, still looks like crud, LOL



I really didn't need to dye the wood quite yet but  it's a great way to easily find any low spots in your wood when doing the final shaping and finishing of the handle.




Josh Dabney

While the handle is drying back out we're gonna move on to some work on the bolsters.

I'm going to use this diamond bit to grind out the tang where the filework will be.  Before begining I cut a line in with a diamond triangle file so I'v got a groove for the bit to ride in.  My diamond bit is a smaller diameter than the filework so I've got to freehand it a bit to get the tang right.


Here we got it roughed in fairly close to where we need to be. 


Getting a layout measurement to tranfer the center of the cutout to the top of the bolster to keep my cut going straight.


Mark tranferred and my cut line drawn on.  I just freehand this but a piece of tape could easily be used to get a straight line over a curved surface like this.

Josh Dabney

Cut a nice straight guide line in with the triangle file.


Now I go to the round file and "chase" the line across the bolster going forward little by little as the cut gets deeper.




Now I move on to rounding the inside corners of the groove


Josh Dabney

Same thing for the other side to complete this part of the file work.

Here I've layed out where I want my other decorative suts to be made.


Here I'll be starting the cut with a triangle needle file the switching to the regular size triangle once I've got a nice starting cut to assist in staying on course.  Slipping and marring up the finish on the bolster flats creates more work in hand finishing the bolster so we try to avoid that if possible.


Now that I've got the filework finished I'm using this wire wheel in the Dremel to burnish the inside of the filework.  This leaves a kinda of Matte textured appearance to the filework that contrasts nicely with the flats.


Here we've got the flats hand sanded to 320 grit and all the corners gently "broken"  just enough so they wont be too hard on the fingers

Josh Dabney

Now I'm pretty much done with the bolsters other than cleaning up the flats a little more so I pulled all the tape so we could have a peek at how she's comming along.




Josh Dabney

Now bare with me her Pards 'cuz some of yall are gonna think I've gone and lost my marbles here but it's time to go back to the handle and do the final machine shaping of the handle followed by hand sanding areas we can get with the grinding belt.

This is something worth noting here.  Anytime your sanding and area where wood meets metal such as- Pins, Silverwire, Guard, Bolsters, etc.  you HAVE to sand with a hard backing on your paper to keep things even and flush.

On Baby Duty.  be back a bit later LOL,  Josh

WaddWatsonEllis

What a nice Easter Gift!

I just came back from dinner with friends and this work is waiting for me ...

Thank you so much for a very special Easter gift!
My moniker is my great grandfather's name. He served with the 2nd Florida Mounted Regiment in the Civil War. Afterward, he came home, packed his wife into a wagon, and was one of the first NorteAmericanos on the Frio River southwest of San Antonio ..... Kinda where present day Dilley is ...

"Courage is being scared to death and saddling up anyway." John Wayne
NCOWS #3403

WaddWatsonEllis

Hi,

I was doing a search for Damascus steel and ran into this page ... about 10% was above my head, but still worth the read ...

http://www.tf.uni-kiel.de/matwis/amat/def_en/kap_5/advanced/t5_1_1.html

My moniker is my great grandfather's name. He served with the 2nd Florida Mounted Regiment in the Civil War. Afterward, he came home, packed his wife into a wagon, and was one of the first NorteAmericanos on the Frio River southwest of San Antonio ..... Kinda where present day Dilley is ...

"Courage is being scared to death and saddling up anyway." John Wayne
NCOWS #3403

Josh Dabney

Ok, Back to it, LOL

What happens is the wood will cut away MUCH faster than the metal leaving an un-even or wavvy surface instead of a flat smooth one.  Even on the grinder this will happen a slow speeds with a clogged belt so to flatten everything out I clean my belt and make a couple passes with medium pressure to get a nice agressive cut, albeit at 220 grit.



At this time I'm now getting everything evened up from side to side to end up with a nice symetrical handle



I'm missing some pics I thought I took of thia part.  Here is one where I've pencil marked where I need to cut this side to so it matches the opposite side.  From there I hand sanded this area on both sides to finish them up.

Josh Dabney

At this point I'm not really worried about getting a more refined finish on the handle.  From here I re-wet with the Vinegaroon then dyed and cleaned again and let it sit till the surface was dry to the touch then covered the entire handle with a mix of 70% Birchwwod Casey Tru-oil gunstock finish and 30% mineral spirits.   

This coat is put on very heavy until the suface of the wood stays wet with oil which allows the wood to soak up as much of the oil as possible.  It is left to dry like this even though we'll be doing more sanding to refine the suface of the wood and will basically be sanding back down to the wood.  At this point the main goal is just the penetration of the oil to fill the pores of the wood so we can refine the surface to what will hopefully end up being a glass smooth handle with a beautiful finish that highlights the curl of the wood and has an almost 3-D effect.

Here's a couple shots of her wet with oil




Thanks agin for following alon Pards   ;D

kflach

WOW! WOW! WOW!


One thing I haven't noticed (or maybe it just slipped by me because I was overcome with how pretty this is) is any specific steps to 'balance' the blade. How is that accomplished? Is that even applicable since this isn't a throwing knife?

Josh Dabney

kflach,

Thats a very good question, and one that may requre a lengthy answer LOL.

Balance is VERY important to the feel of a knife, especially one this big.   Believe it or not balance has a much larger effect on how the knife feels in the hand and performs than the actual weight of the knife. 

For instance, a heavy knife thats well balanced will feel "light and fast" in the hand, while a light knife balanced too far forward will feel awkward with little control.

Balancing the knife is something that to a large degree is controllable by the maker of the knife.  For example 2 full tang  8" bowie knives with the same profile. 

Knife #1  Is ground with a full length distal taper (taper in the width towards the tip)   Which allows the maker to "adjust" how much weight he's taking off the front of the blade and moving the balance rearward.   Now he can also taper the tang to do the opposite and move the point of balance forward.  Many times additional holes are drilled in the tang to also remove weight to affect the balance point.   With these combinations there is alot of ability to balance the knife the way you want.   Say for this example that this knife balances right at the guard.  It's gonna be light and fast in the hand and make a great Fighting Bowie that will perform ok in tougher chopping "machete" type tasks.

Knife #2 has no taper and a short hollow grind and a tapered tang.  This knife is going to balance a good distance in front of the guard and feel slower and clunky compared to #1 but will excell at chopping and heavy "camp chore" type tasks due to the extra leverage applied to the cutting edge toward the front of the blade.

Learning how to get the balance you desire is to a large degree figured out from experience and is not an exact science as many factors come into play.  Here are some other factors that will also affect the balance of the knife.

What is the handle material
Is there a rear bolster
Is there a lanyard tube or hole
how many pins, what size, and where on the handle are they placed
Full tang, hidden tang, or framed handle
Size (or more importantly weight)of guard or bolsters

Balance is ALWAYS applicable.  I think many makers just make the knife and it comes out how it comes out and through experience and/or luck they come up with something usefull for the intended tasks of the knife or perhaps not, LOL.

I will however also add that many factors come into play in the design, construction, and end functionality of a knife. Cross section of the blade, thickness of the blade at the edge, angle and quality of sharpening, type of grind, shape of the blade for the intended tasks are all factors that are all equally important and need to work together to creat a really outstanding knife.

As to how this all applies to the Belduque,  I like tapering my tangs from a design standpoint but decided not to on this blade due to the effect it would have on the balance and now I'm glad I didn't.   I did put a distal taper on her but only from the start of the clip forward. She balances right at the front of the bolsters which makes her light and fast feeling but should also perform admirably at chopping tasks due to the thinness of the blade on the edge.  To me this is a good compromise for a knife that would've most likely been the owners all purpose cutting, slicing, butchering, chopping, self defense weapon, and tool of choice for pretty much everything.

-Josh

Josh Dabney

It's also worth noting that with this knife the design of the handle also comes into play.

The size of the wood is just about hand sized so when swinging the blade for chopping, fighting or slashing the balance point is about 3/4" in front of the hand which gives a little forward leverage.

But when "choking up" on the handle over the bolster and using a chef style pinch grip the balance point is now right  between the first and middle finger offering a great deal of control and precision like would be needed when skinning game or eating.

I think thats about it, LOL   ;D

-Josh

kflach

Thanks Josh, that's exactly the info I was looking for!

Forty Rod

Josh, would fully sharpening the top of the clip and maybe 1/3-1/2 of the remainder of the blade behind the clip significantly lighten the front enough to make the knife more "agile"?
People like me are the reason people like you have the right to bitch about people like me.

Josh Dabney

Forty Rod,

It would have an affect on balance but probably not that significant.  The closer to the point of balance that changes are made have less affect. 

Now going from no clip at all to a clip half the blade length will have a big impact on the balance point.

Another factor is how thick the blade steel is to begin with. 

Say for example your knife is 1/4" on the spine then your removing quite a bit of steel to get a sharpenable clip.  Where-as if the blade is an 1/8"  not much steel has to be removed to make it sharpenable. 

It would seem that it would be a direct ratio meaning the 1/8" blade is lighter so it would still have the same effect on balance but that's not really the case because  to get the thick blade thin enough much more steel has to be removed.


Now if we're talking about a false clip then it's mostly just a factor of where the maker wants the grind line for appearance reasons.


Hope that didn't just confuse things further,  LOL   Josh ;D

WaddWatsonEllis

klach& Forty Rod,

Thank you for putting into words questions that I did not even know I wanted to find out  ... *S*

Josh,

Thank you for clearing this up for me ... now, if someone asks me one of these questions while I am being a docent, I can quote like I actually understand ... LOL.

TTFN,
My moniker is my great grandfather's name. He served with the 2nd Florida Mounted Regiment in the Civil War. Afterward, he came home, packed his wife into a wagon, and was one of the first NorteAmericanos on the Frio River southwest of San Antonio ..... Kinda where present day Dilley is ...

"Courage is being scared to death and saddling up anyway." John Wayne
NCOWS #3403

Josh Dabney

Howdy Pards,

Anybody like Carved sheaths ? ? ? ? ?

-Josh

Josh Dabney

This is gonna be the last handle pic for awhile as I'll be waiting to do all of the FINAL finish work on the knife until the sheath is completed.

I didn't get any pics of the process that got us from there to here but it's really a very simple one that only needs explanation to understand.

Starting with a dryed slurry coat of my Tru-oil mix I steel wooled it down to a OOOO finish.  Inevitably doing this will wear through the stain just a touch on the "corners" of the wood.   To solve this problem I dip a Q-tip in Pro-Oil dye and touch up the little bit that's worn through then blend it back with the steel wool. 

What we're doing here is basically leaving the curl the darkest and lightening the rest of the wood.  This is done till the color suits my taste and we move on from there.

Now we will apply very light coats of the oil waiting about an hour between coats for drying.  I dunk my finger in the oil and massage it into the surface of the wood for a couple minutes then wipe off the excess with a paper towel.

Through the night last night and this morning I did this 5 times to get where we're at now.  Now I've burnished the surface of the wood with a piece of denim to smooth things up and end up with a hand buffed surface.  I will continue this process till I get the desired finish once I'm done with the sheath but here's what she looks like now.


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