Want To Make A Homemade Blade?
Being able to make a homemade blade is almost a forgotten art, but I’m here to tell you about it.
High-carbon steel is what you want in a good knife. It’s tough, hard and takes an exceptional edge. But if you cut it with a torch it need to be heat-treated and tempered again. The secret is antique hand saws.
By removing the high-carbon steel from antique hand saws, you can make an excellent knife. It can be made extremely sharp and it will hold an edge for a long time.
Carpenter saws will yield steel thick enough for lighter duty like kitchen knives and filet knives. Much heavier duty knives can be made from timber saws also known as crosscut saw because the steel is much thicker.
If you’re familiar with heat-treating steel then tempering it, you won’t have any problem cutting out your homemade blade knife blanks. But if you, like me, don’t know this there may be an answer.
You see if the steel is removed with a cutting torch it will be compromised. It will lose both its hardness and temper, making it useless as knife steel.
If you know how to do this and you don’t mind doing it, then you’re in luck. If not, there may be another way.
The old-timers did it this way for the same reason, they wanted good steel for their knives, but either didn’t have the knowledge to heat treat and temper or didn’t want to bother with it.
They figured out that if you cut out the knife blank with a cold chisel you could access steel for great knives and never have to treat it. It’s pretty ingenious really, if not for the labor intensity.
I’ve actually done this many times and it works. The thicker stuff takes longer, but if you’re patient and take your time you’ll get some great steel and as a result some great homemade blades.
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