Finished a New Knife

Besides making a plane iron, I was also making two new santoku knives. One of them is finished...

5.5" blade, 10" overall, A2 tool steel. Bocote handle. This thing is HEAVY!!!!! I made the blade over 1/8" thick, so it has plenty of heft to chop through anything.

Plough Plane Iron

Regular reader, Ralph, requested that I make him a special iron for his Record plough plane. "Of course," says I.
I'll try anything once, right?

After a few emails, we made sure we were speaking the same language, and I got to work. I had to work quick, because my day job popped an emergency on me, and if I wanted Ralph to get his iron in a reasonable amount of time, I had to get it done fast.

A special width of .207". It's 3/16" thick, 3 1/2 long, A2 tool steel. The sides of the iron are beveled at 2 degrees...and that's the tricky bit...

Toolmaker's Vise Clamps

I finished these the other night:

A toolmaker's vise does not mount like a traditional mill vise. You can mount it in a vise...or you can use the holes on the sides. I couldn't find clamps for this size, I got the idea from a larger size.

New Ralph Gauges

Sorry, Ralph...for now, they're named after you!

I downsized Ralph's original gauge a bit. It's now 2 1/4" long, 3/4" grip with a 1 1/2" blade. These two have the same 1:7 slope. A little less bulky in your hand.

If anyone is interested, these will go for $70 including shipping in the lower 48 states.

Sheesh...busy

I used to live a pretty laid back life. 9-5, Monday through Friday. The rest of the time I just did what I wanted. These days...more like run, run, run...nap...run, run, run.

The last two months have been insane. No sign of it winding down any time soon, but still trying to squeeze in some projects. (I never thought my day job would be so crazy, ah well, it pays the bills and it's a challenge.)

If I didn't mention it before, I got a new rip tenon saw from Veritas. I got it for splitting knife handles and such. My dovetail saws don't have the depth of cut required for making blanks. It's a SUPER nice saw. I really like it. Maybe a more thorough review once I give it some more use.

New Grinding Rest

Latest widget that I've been working on is a new grinding rest. I'm not satisfied with my current set up. It's difficult to get it set up and doesn't give me the results I want.

The new fixture will move the grinding down to the contact wheel, so now I'll be hollow grinding. Also, I'll have more adjustment to get everything nice and flat.

Most of the pieces, minus the top. Just a couple hours at the mill. Not a lot of special stuff going on here, some slots and tapped holes.

Grinding Gauge

This one will make more sense once my next project is done:

When making knives, I've been using two main thicknesses: 1/16" and 3/32". Each side of this gauge is milled to 1/2 of a blade thickness.