Right or Wrong ( but it my way)

[DANA HOLMAN]

Guys, this is NO Way a build along, i did this in order to find out if i was doing thing right. i had posted a knife that had cracked on me and thought i would do this to let you see if I'm doing it right or need to adjust some things. this is a little long and alot of pictures.
I will be using old leafspring from the Doc. buggy.
I could not post all the pictures, but here are the main ones

this is the knife in the forge
 

After the knife is forged
 

ground and hand sanded to 600 grit
 

Here we are with clay on for a hamon
 

After tempering
 

Sanded again to 600 grit
 

ready to install the finger guard
 

The last one is of the finshed knife, the hamon is very light but it's there. hope you can see it.

 

I would like for everyone to speak up if you would, to let me know if its right.
I know that alot of guys grind to 80 to 220 grit before they heat treat, and i use to do that  also, i thought it would be easier to sand to 400 - 600 grit before i heat treated, because it was softer. i know i have a long ways to go in the knife making world, but if you don't ask you don't know.
thanks for your input and time
Dana

[skullworks]

Nice looking knife!

[Lin Rhea]

Dana,
    There are more things that can go wrong than can go right. The parts you show look pretty good. I dont use that thick of clay, but.......
     The cracking you spoke of was likely heat related or rather heat control related. So, unless you can show the heating and thermocycling, etc., I can only guess. I will say this, you will probably have a higher ratio of successes with new steel rather than recycled stuff (when it comes to cracking) even though I sometimes will recycle. Lin

[DANA HOLMAN]

Thanks, guys
Lin, I do use a lot of 1084, but I have a lot of the spring left. I was just trying to use some of it. As far as heating I really do the same as 1084, I brought it up to nonmagnetic then quench in warm oil, with out the true info on the spring steel I'm really guessing at it, but it's good learning.
Thanks
Dana

[Steve Nuckels]

Nice!  I think your as on track as I am!

Steve
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Potomac Forge