Circular Saw Blade Knife

[opaul]

I used this old saw blade to make this knife. I used a 1" belt sander to shape the blade and a 4-1/2 inch disc grinder to cut the shape from the circular saw. The second knife is an old Rigid knife blank I had in a kit form from the early 70's. I made the leather sheath for this one. I would also like to advance this skill as well. Since I retired this is something I might pursue.
Anyone else have home made knives to show? I hope to get past the primitive stage soon and start turning out some nice ones!
Thanks for looking

 

[Lee Barner]

what did you use to cut that blank out of the saw blade? I like it. keep them coming. lee

 

[Gripgrabber]

Great job! Nothing better than making something yourself
SEMPER PARATUS

 

[Iggy]

My Dad had one made out of a power hacksaw blade used to cut railroad rails. That sucker was sharp and seldom needed any touch up.

Whoever made it, left the saw blade on the back of the blade. My Dad used it to saw thru the spine and other bones while quartering elk and moose to put on pack horses.

I don't know whatever became of that knife. He gave it to someone while I was gone.

 

[opaul]

what did you use to cut that blank out of the saw blade? I like it. keep them coming. lee

Thanks!
I used a 4-1/2" metal cut off disc on my angle grinder.

 

[les.b]

Well, I don't know much about knives, but that looks great! Have fun!!

Best Regards, Les

 

[SPEEDGUNNER]

Well done. I am sure it is not as easy as your pictures make it look, there is probably a lot of time spent between cutting out the blank and the finished product. If you ever decide to go retail I would be a buyer, something like either shown would be cool to own.

 

[garddogg56]

Good looking knife..

 

[ky wonder]

somewhere around here there is a knife that I made from an old cross cut saw blade, and I used a old antler base for the handle, it was not as nice looking as yours, and I gave up on making knifes after that attempt

 

[vonn]

Nice looking work!

 

[Drm50]

When I was still in school I got a job in the machine shop of a
small manufacture, clean up man. There was a old machinist
that taught me to make knives out of power hack saw blades.
This was in 60s and most power hacksaw blades were only
tempered on the teeth. This is the section that would hold a
edge. When your blade left parallel with teeth you would lose
the benifit of the tempered edge. He had two tests he preformed
on any stray metal I drug in for blade making. See how well it
held a magnet and he would put it on grinder to "read" the spark.
Cutting blanks from a circular saw blade is kind of iffy too, most
aren't tool steel, and if you heat them up with a cutting tool you
can ruin any temper they have. If you can't temper the steel you
are wasting your time. The last knife I made used a industrial
chipper blade, already a piece of tempered steel that held a fine
edge.

 

[Richard Simmons]

I used this old saw blade to make this knife. I used a 1" belt sander to shape the blade and a 4-1/2 inch disc grinder to cut the shape from the circular saw. The second knife is an old Rigid knife blank I had in a kit form from the early 70's. I made the leather sheath for this one. I would also like to advance this skill as well. Since I retired this is something I might pursue.
Anyone else have home made knives to show? I hope to get past the primitive stage soon and start turning out some nice ones!
Thanks for looking

I like the design of your knife, particularly the profile of the blade. How did you heat treat it?

 

[opaul]

I like the design of your knife, particularly the profile of the blade. How did you heat treat it?

Sorry for the delay. I did not heat treat it. Reason being, and I'm sure there are many different opinions, that when I ran the edge of a file over the steel it skated across. I was also careful not to overheat the steel when I cut out the shape.
It takes and holds an edge well. I just made the bottom one in the photo out of the same saw blade.
But I am in the process of getting a propane forge and study up on metallurgy
Added second picture with the leather sheath I made for the smaller knife.

 

[6518John]

OPaul--have you seen the TV show "Forged in Fire?" You would love it. I saw for the first time this week and enjoyed it immensely.

Forged in Fire (TV Series 2015– ) - IMDb

 

[lebomm]

Really likin' the little one ! Congratulations !

Larry

 

[k22fan]

During the early 1970s I made a knife out of a broken power hack saw blade that my high school metal shop teacher provided. He said there were two types. Some only had the teeth edge hardened with electricity but the blade he gave he was hardened throughout. I only had to careful to not over heat it and after it was finished to never loan it. Steel that hard used by a fool as a pry bar will snap.

I made an aluminum hand guard and spacers out of scrap and drilled holes through a piece of purple heart wood to slip over the tang. I assembled it with epoxy and a cross bolt through the hack saw blade's mounting hole. It looks amateur but not to shabby for a 16 year old.

If I had it to do over I'd leave the teeth on the back dulled for scaling fish, make it shorter and not give it a clip point. It was more than enough work without making a pommel or butt cap.

 

[OLDSTER]

home made knives

Now I REALLY have the itch! Those all look great, and what a great project. I'm gonna try it for sure. Thanks for posting

 

[SOTVEN]

I HAVE ONLY INSTALLED AN ANTLER HANDLE TO A BUCK 119...... NOTHING NEAR TO WHAT YOU DID FRIEND. REALLY NICE WORK YOU HAVE DONE!

 

[steelslaver]

I make knives. If you use circle saw blades that are NOT carbide tipped you are probably fine, if you do not get it overr about 450f while cutting and grinding. Higher than that your going to be removing some of the hardness.

Large older saw blades where usually L6 or 15n20, both good steels. Newer smaller blades are suspect and "mystery steel" You can tell some about the alloy of steel by the sparks it sends off while grinding.

The power hack saw blades mentioned are a whole different ball game. Usually something like M4, which is a carbon and tungsten rich steel. When heat treated it forms small tungsten carbides in the steel matrix. This makes it very wear resistant and it takes much higher heat to cause it to loose its temper. It is often used for lathe and mill tooling.(as opposed tto purer carbide tooling). It is very difficult to grind (wear resistant) when compared to many tool steels. It also has a very abrupt elastic limit. In thin sections like power hacksaw blades it will flex some, but, then abruptly snap similar to D2 which forms vanadium carbides as apposed to tungsten carbides. Most good files are 1095 or W2 which are mainly just plain high carbon steels. Good springs and many farm implement tooling like disks and non hard faced harrow teeth are 5160. All of which can make good knives if heat treated properly. Found steel can be fun and good practice material.

But, many found steels are mystery steels. It can be fun to mess with them and experiment. But, really the piece of steel is cheap when you start looking at things like grinder belts, good burl wood for handles corby fasteners. Then there is the time spend grinding, hand sanding, heat treating and fitting it all together. Even if I pay $20 or more for a quality piece of known steel to me it is cheap in the long run. On knives for sale I only use known steels. That is because every steel has a best heat treat method to achieve the best results. A common saying among many knife makers is "if the Lord himself send down the perfect steel it would be nothing without the proper heat treat."

I have watched Forged in Fire. On common high carbon steels an experienced smith can do a very good job of hardening by eyeballing the color of the steel before quench. But, that show never shows a temper cycle. A proper temper cycle takes time for the best result. Untempered high carbon steel is very brittle. It would never survive a chopping test. Just dropping it could cause a hardened untempered piece to shatter.

 

[Drm50]

I have seen guys put a lot of time in on making a knife out of
unknown steels. What they usually end up with is a very classy
butter knife. I recently bought some old tool steel blanks.
2"x16" in different thicknesses. The brand is Simmons and each
piece is individually wrapped. There is heat treating information
on the labels. It is given by the color of the steel under heat. In
present state it can be filed. I'm guessing this stuff came from
the 1950s, blanks have fine rust on them but no pitting. I'm
going to make a blade out of this and take it to a shop that has
controlled tempering to have it done.