Making your own tools,

[KittenThrasher]

Greetings folks,,

I’ve been taking ideas and stuff from  this site for ages now and thought it was about time I posted something some of you might find useful.

Skiving knives,

‘never been able to buy one that I really liked, doubtless more a comment on my pickiness than anything else. Anyways, I had a crafty idea and decided to try making my own. Recently I retired my camping firewood saw and recalling how well it held an edge I decided to see if it would make a half-decent skiving knife – it was a ‘mid-range’ pruning saw with a reasonable quality Swedish steel blade, ‘decent - but nothing special. ‘Sort of thing you’d pick up at a boot sale for a couple of £/$ or  thereabouts, or $30.00 new.

The work was not difficult,

1.       Using cutting disks on a Dremel I cut the blade to an appropriate length and the blade angle I wanted.

2.       I made two tools, one from each bit of blade. (I sharpened the first attempt on the wrong side, so it turned out left handed -  and yes, that was embarrassing.)

3.       Using a hand file, dress what will be the cutting edge so it is straight, clean and even.

4.       Carefully grind a shallow bevel  (20 degrees or so, it’s not that critical) on the business end with the finer side of a bench grinder, go slow with this and do not allow the blade to get hot enough to discolour. (it softens the metal). To avoid heat problems I took it down very close to a sharp edge but not quite there, the thinner the metal the more likely it is to heat up too much. Also dip it in a pot of water every few seconds to cool it.

5.       Grind off the teeth, or at least most of them - they might still be sharp!!

6.       If you don’t have a bench grinder you can use the little grinding stones that come with Dremel tools - it’s a bit slower but does actually produce a less rough finish I think. I never found any other use for them so I had loads.

7.       Saw blade metal is hard so you need a bit of patience,  if the metal isn’t hard it’s a clue that it probably isn’t up to the job.

8.       Work the newly formed  bevel and the back of the blade on a 400grit whetstone for some few minutes until you have the start of a sharp edge and most of the scratches from the bench grinder are disappearing. (In all of the following processes, work the back and the front of the blade equally). The back stays completely flat and the front will have a nice shallow bevel.

9.       Then spend some minutes working on a 1000grit whetstone, ‘still looking to see scratches fading and the metal starting to shine up a bit.

10.   Then 5 minutes on 3000grit whetstone, this isn’t taking much metal off anymore but it is clearing up scratches from the previous stones and improving the finish.

11.   Then on to my course grinding-paste strop, this polishes good steel at an astonishing rate. By the time I’ve worked it on that for a few minutes I can see my face in the bevel and on the back edge of the blade, it is important to get both sides of the blade just as nice as each other - they are both equally involved in the cutting process while you are skiving your leather..

12.   Finally onto my fine ‘Tcut’ strop for a while.

13.   Test it out, ‘probably won’t be great first time, but working it regularly on the grinding paste strop will fairly rapidly give you one pretty  damn fine sharp edge.

14.   Thinking about it a bit more, I think you just get better with the tool after a bit of practice more than the edge improving so much, either way is good though.

The grinding paste is an automotive product which is available widely, ‘can’t remember off hand if I got this one from Amazon or Ebay - either way it’s literally just a couple of $/£.

Tcut is another automotive product widely used to ‘refresh’ car paint by finely abrading the top layer of faded paint off,  personally I prefer it to jewellers rouge, I reckon it’s better and cheaper and as it comes in liquid or cream form it’s easier to use and more versatile, it’s also GREAT for refreshing edges on  things like edge bevellers and other tools with a recessed sharp edge. (soak a piece of string or leather thong in it then draw it along the recessed cutting edge a few times - in the right direction of course)

The other skiver shown is an old woodworkers plane blade, again decent quality steel that holds an edge, this one was much easier to make as apart from giving it a good edge - the only thing I did was stick it in a vice, heat the middles section a bit with a torch, then tap it with a hammer to give a bend so I can hold it. I made it a while ago and it now has a completely evil edge that just gets a regular light kiss on the Tcut and an occasional go on the grinding paste.

I also rounded the corners of the cutting edge just a tad as an experiment, I actually find it easier to control as the blade isn’t trying to dig into my granite or the piece of glass I usually skive on. I liked the result so most of my skivers are now the same.

So there you go, with basic kit most of us will have already or have some access to it is possible to make extremely usable tools.

Generally I buy my tools, as I’d rather be making stuff to sell than crappy second rate tools, however in this case I have managed to produce 3 top quality blades which I now use all the time.

The exact grit grade of the stones doesn’t matter, as long as they’re progressively finer, clean your job between each stone as you don’t want to transfer course grit onto a finer stone.

Even if you don’t fancy making your own skiver I hope there’s something here which will either help you improve what you do, or give you an idea that you can develop to improve what you do.

Have fun and keep your fingers behind the edge!

‘Thrasher,

[LumpenDoodle2]

They look very interesting.   Are the knives doing their jobs ok, or are you finding yourself seeing areas you want to tweak, or redo, as you work with them.

I look forward to some updates on how you are getting on with them.

[KittenThrasher]

The metal of the saw blade turns out to be just  right for making a skiving knife, it holds an edge quite well, is flexible and is developing a good quality polish on the bevel and the back.

The one I accidentally (Duh,,,,,) made left handed I've turned into a knife for cutting thicker leather, that works really well as the long handle gives extra leverage for good control going through 4 or 5mm harder VT leather.

I've been thinking of making a handle for the plane blade but haven't decided if I want a short stubby one or a longer one, maybe I'll try both! the plane blade takes an excellent edge as you'd imagine.

[LumpenDoodle2]

That one looks as if it would work well with a stubby handle, with the end fitting into your palm.    

I am slowly getting the hang of sharpening my knives, and have found for me, it is taking the time to propery polish the blade that gives the best finish.

Edited March 17, 2017 by LumpenDoodle2

[KittenThrasher]

On 2017-3-16 at 9:43 PM, LumpenDoodle2 said:

They look very interesting.   Are the knives doing their jobs ok, or are you finding yourself seeing areas you want to tweak, or redo, as you work with them.

I look forward to some updates on how you are getting on with them.

On 2017-3-16 at 11:55 PM, KittenThrasher said:

Update,,

A few weeks later and things have moved on a bit.

Initially I was very happy with both of the blades I made, so much so that I found I was doing a lot more skiving – more turned edges and other bits I’d really sort of avoided.

Doing a lot more skiving soon showed that neither blade held an edge well enough. They were fine for the odd bit, where I’d hone the edge up every time without thinking about it.

I did a bit of internet searching and found it would be feasible to harden the blades with a ‘back yard’ setup. It was good fun too, ‘always enjoyed setting things on fire.

Now we have two ‘pretty decent’ tools - kind of getting the bug now though.

A week later a nice piece of 01 tool steel arrives and I take the day off to make a proper tool.

I’m well pleased with it, sharpens to a fabulous edge and holds it for ages. In fact I’m not sure I’ve ever had any tool so sharp in my whole  life.

I’m thinking I’m going to make a few more.   :-)

air blown into lumpwood charcoal with a camping air-bed inflater through a length of old car exhaust. gaffer tape, old engine oil (quenching), the worlds worst ever welding, thick gloves, health and safety gear, (beware - fire can be hot.)

plenty of good usable instructions on youtube.

 

[RockyAussie]

Excellent work and thanks for sharing.

[KittenThrasher]

It's all got a bit out of hand I'm afraid, less than a year on and we're onto the serious stuff now, it's all jolly good fun though.

 

 

[cjartist]

It is nice to see how far you have taken this.  What a beautiful knife you have there now.  Congrats!  

Have you gotten in the market of making them for others yet?

[rodneywt1180b]

Sweet looking knife!  You've made a LOT of progress in your tool making.

Rodney

[bikermutt07]

4 hours ago, KittenThrasher said:

It's all got a bit out of hand I'm afraid, less than a year on and we're onto the serious stuff now, it's all jolly good fun though.

 

 

Lordy me, someone done got bit by a bug!!!!

That is a fabulous looking blade.