Homemade Knife - from a File

[lrs]

Has anyone tried this.  I've heard about it before, saw it on the history channel once. 
I was thinking about giving it a try.
I could use some advice.  This would be my first attempt at knife making.

[DC]

I did it once.  I made a dagger shaped blade which I made out of a file.  Most files are very hard and brittle so they have to be annealed to work with them.  I heated mine to the point where a magnet would no longer stick and slowly cooled it.  It was then soft enough to grind and was more resilient.  I gound and sanded mine to shape but with a forge and an anvil I could have done a lot more.
There is a ton of information on the net.  Here is one site that will get you started.
http://www.primitiveways.com/pt-knives-1.html

[Dee]

Has anyone tried this.  I've heard about it before, saw it on the history channel once. 
I was thinking about giving it a try.
I could use some advice.  This would be my first attempt at knife making.

Do not use a cheap file. Go to a garage sale or something and get a quality wore out file. I use charcoal brickets, and a shopvac on blow side. Place the file in the charcoal after they are full ready, and raise the heat with the blower. When a magnet will no longer stick to it (check the entire length of the file), take it out of the coals and let it "slowly air cool" until it can be held with the bare hand. At this point, put it back into the coals, and with the blower raise the temp up again, until once again the file looses it magnetism. When this temp is again reached, turn off the blower, and leave the file in the coals until the coals burn out and the file cools again on it's own.
At this point the file will be soft enough to work and even cut with a hack saw.
Shape the knife (I use a grinder for part of that) like you want it, polish it if that is the finish you want, and get the charcoal out again.
Once again, heat it up until a magnet won't stick to it. By the way, this is between 1400 & 1500 degrees. Once you reach this temp, quickly take the knife out and quench about 2/3rds of the blade (edge down) in a mixture of 3 parts 30 weight oil and 1 part diesel oil. When the rib (top part of the blade) turns dark, quench the entire blade and keep it under until it cools enough to be held in the bare hand.
Scrub the oil off and, you may want to re polish here. Next, preheat your oven on you cook stove to 430 degrees and put the knife in the oven for about an hour and twenty minutes with the edge UP. After that allotted time, turn the oven off, but leave the knife inside until the oven and knife are cool and the knife can once again be handled bare handed. Put a handle and a tang too if your so inclined, and sharpen it. Your done.

[Joel]

I just finished one made from a Sandvik file; in fact I started out my knifemaking career making/selling file knives.  I don't see any point in annealing an already hardened piece of steel, saves you a heat treat step if you don't have a forge(which I don't). It just needs to be ground "cool" and tempered.  The blade colour should never go beyond gold/straw as you grind.  Granted it's a bit harder to grind the blade like that, but on a belt grinder the point is moot.   I use a temper/freeze/temper/freeze/temper cycle. My neighbors/son-in-law all have used them for years and won't use another knife.  I do soften the handle/ricasso area by sticking the blade portion in a can of water and using a blowtorch to heat the handle portion to blue.  Makes drilling with conventional drills easier. Here's the new one.  I've worked only in stainless?D-2 for years, but found this one already ground in a drawer and finished it.


The handle is stained birch.

[deernhog]

Just a note on handling the hot blade when you quench in oil or water. Make sure you have tongs long enough to get you away from a flame up or the steam cloud. Also if possible try to be upwind of the oil smoke when you quench it will be thick. I found out the hard way making a tomahawk head lost the hair on my forearm quick.

[Dee]

That is very true. It is best to have a container full of your quenching liquid, and a lid to smother a flame up. Good advice.

[nodlenor]

I've made a few from files and some from power hacksaw blades. I grind mine and try to not take the temper out. I (like Joel) don't have a forge. So far I've been successful. Mine aren't show pieces, but they make good users.
Here are a couple I have made.

[deernhog]

Here is a knife I'm making a sheath for. I was measuring and noticed it was made from a file you can still see the teeth. Sharp little feller, but the neat thing is that the handle is made from the parts of an old bomber. The guys dad was a watchman for a plane grave yard in California. He made the knife at work from aluminum skin, plexi-glass and an old file. The owner could not tell me how old it is,  but made at least before 1965 when he left there.

[Joel]

Since I treated the files like W-2, I didn't quench in oil, but used brine instead.  I'd dump enough non-iodized salt to float an egg in a small coffe can and place the can in a pot.  I'd bring the pot to a boil and using a candy thermometer heat the brine to 170f.  Worked nicely on this particular steel.  No smoke or flames...or stench.

[dean51]

Look around for a knife file,the taper is already there,  Goodluck