Antbody ever made knives out of old circular saw blades or table saw blades?

[roverboy]

I was wondering anybody had done this and how did they cut the blades. They are super hard.

[Guest Broomhead]

I am gather supplies, and knowledge, to start making knives myself. First, you'd probably want to anneal it, to soften the metal to be able to work it easier. Then use a Dremel, angle grinder with cut-off wheel, air cut-off wheel, bench grinder, or belt grinder to cut it out and shape it.

[bigbabysweets]

I've made dozens out of bandsaw blades. A few out of skill saw blades, a few out of files, horse shoes, railroad spikes.... Car leaf springs are the best!

Heat the metal to it's transformation temperature. You'll know you're there when it wont attract a magnet. Let it cool slowly and it's annealed. Do your work then harden and temper it.

[Guest Blueyed Rebel]

When I started Metal Shop in school, I use to get one of the huge circular saw blades every once in a while from the father of my running bud.. His family owned McKenny Lumber Company back home... the first couple of knife blades, the shop teacher had me cut out with a hack saw then shape them on in with a 10" mill bastard file... after a while I was able to use the big band saw and the bench grinder... my instructor would heat the blades up and the use "Layout Dye" to draw out specific shapes and such... He had me do a set for him that included three different sizes of Cleavers, a couple of butcher knives, a pairing knife and a very long narrow bread knife... He paid me three hundred dollars for my saw blades and for the work I myself had done on them.. He did a final round of very fine honing and sharpening on them as well as making his own hickory handles for them... Mr. McKenny gave me a nice sized piece of stainless flat stock one time, which I made a large Bowie knife out of.. My uncle guided me through shaping it and all the way down to putting a very fine edge on it... I did all of the actual work myself, he just advised me through out the whole process... Another guy my father knew gave me $350 for it when I had it finished and I tooled a nice leather scabbard for it...

the best two pieces of advice to remember are these :

1) you can always take just a little more off, but you can't add back once it's been removed...

2) there is no substitute for fine hand (bench) work.. no type of machine work can ever take

it's place!!

[Mike]

I've made dozens out of bandsaw blades. A few out of skill saw blades, a few out of files, horse shoes, railroad spikes.... Car leaf springs are the best!

I have a really nice knife a guy I work with made from a polished up railroad spike.

This one was made from a deuce and a half leaf spring.

Mike

[East_TN_Patriot]

Yes, I worked with a semi-retired knife maker who worked for Buck for several years and then went independent. He's made more blades than any living knife maker as far as anyone knows. He now runs the Kelgin Knife Maker's Co-op in Sevierville, TN. I have made many bandsaw blades, forged blades from horseshoes and railroad spikes, and have a general knowledge of how to make them from other materials such as old files and scrap steel. I worked with them for about a year before grad school got in the way.

To cut the material, we always used a metal cutting bandsaw. You typically can't use a regular bandsaw because they don't have the torque and run too fast. You can also cut the metal with a torch or a cutoff wheel, but that's not as easy. You don't necessarily need to soften the steel first, and for bandsaw blades, you really don't want to since the steel is typically the proper hardness already. If you do soften the steel, it does make it a lot easier to work with. Many knife makers use a large bench grinder with abrasive belts for grinding metal. Regular aluminum oxide belts don't hold up to this sort of heavy duty work. You can also simply file the blade profile with a good file, but it is a lot of hard work.

My advice is to take a look at the lessons sold by the co-op and/or take a look at a book called "Wayne Goddard's $50 Knife Shop."

Edited January 3, 2012 by East_TN_Patriot