Bee's Forge

I'm finishing up a couple of couple of 4-in hunters today. The knives are made from D2 tool steel which it is tough and holds an edge very well because of its hardness. Overall length of the knife is 8 and 1/2 in. The handles are made from stabilized purple heart. Both knives have a pancake sheath. Also I am a great-grandfather today, it's been a good day.

In order to improve the bonding of the scales to the knife I've been electrically etching a dot pattern into the handle. Epoxy typically gives you a higher bond strength with 0,010 to 0.020 inch bond thickness. This pattern ensures that a proper bond thickness is maintained.

This knife is 10 in overall with a 6-in blade made from ladder pattern 144 layer 80CRV2/15N20. It features a brass guard and a stabilized curly Maple handle dyed black.

This is my newly completed guard for my 50 lb LG Hammer. Unlike the previous guard this one is easy to remove so you can oil and maintain the linkages

This is a small Hunter done using 144 layer ladder pattern Damascus made from 80CRV2 and 15N20. The knife is 7 and 1/2 in overall with a 3 and 1/2 in blade. The scales are made from stabilized box elder burl dyed red.

A twist Damascus chef's knife using a 144 layer 80CRV2 and 15N20 and a pink resin handle

When I'm in the forge I'm often working two or three items at a time requiring multiple tongs so I end up tong juggling. I have a tong rack on the side of the forge but it presents the hot end of the tong when you go to pick it up. This is the magnetic tong rack I made a couple days ago for the tongs while they are in use. It allows me to grab the tongs by the reins easily. It uses three magnetic tool holders from harbor freight bolted onto a frame I made from some scrap metal my brother-in-law was throwing away.

I got tired of digging through the large ammo box I had stored my angle grinder discs in so I built some holders out of wire and some scrap wood I chose to do this rather than putting up pegs so I don't have to take all the other discs off the peg just to get to the one on the bottom.

A guide to stropping:

Stropping.pdf

Finally getting back to making knives after the move to Ingleside Texas from Maryland, much fun.
Pictured: a 144 layer 1084 and 15N20 twist Damascus Hunter. The blade length is 4 in and the overall knife is 8.5 in. The leather sheath has a kydex liner.