Eagle Knife Build Complete

The following photos show the progress that I made on my son's knife this weekend.

I tried another new technique on this knife, that of jeweling the insides of the liners.  It's a very subtle embellishment, but it looks really cool.  I do this by covering the liner in some valve grinding compound that I purchased from the autoparts store.  I chuck a rotary tool felt cylinder in my drill press and lower the felt until it makes contact with the liner.  I allow it to spin there for a few seconds and them slide the liner over and make another mark.  It's a little tedious, but I think it will be worth the extra effort.

Here is a shot of one of the liners after it has been jeweled.  I hope you agree that it looks very classy.  The thing I liked most about doing this is that I don't have to spend a lot of time polishing the inside of the liners, and I really hate polishing the inside of liners.

 

Here is a photo of the blade after it gets a nice satin finish.  I use 1500 grit sandpaper to put the hand-rubbed finish onto the blade.  By the way, my new grinder worked absolutely fantastic when it came to hollow grinding the blade.  I'm very pleased with the new grinder.  It's making my time in the shop much more pleasant.

This picture shows the liners after they have been anodized.  I really love the way the jeweling looks on the blue liners.  Very classy indeed.

I thought I'd post a pic of my hand sanding jig that I just made.  It's really a  simple thing, just a piece of steel angle that has been drilled and tapped to accept a bolt that passes through the pivot hole in the blade.  I put a washer on under the head of the bolt so that I don't sand away that area.  There is also a piece of red spacer material glued to the jig to help cushion the blade and guard against scratches.

 I turn my own thumb studs for all of my knives.  That way, each knife gets a custom thumb stud that fits the design.  I don't have a metal lathe, but my little wood lathes works pretty well.  I use an assortment of files and sandpaper to achieve the design I want.  I drill and tap the bottom of the stud to accept a 0-80 screw that will hold it to the blade.  The wood tool rest is there so I don't damage my good steel tool rest.

I still need to put an edge on the blade, but other than that, it's finished.  I debated whether or not to do some etching or engraving on the bolsters with something to commemorate my son's achievement, but I decided against it.  I did, however, choose to anodize the liners blue, which together with the red scales and white (well, silver) bolsters, give a very patriotic "flag" theme.  I sure hope he likes it and that you like it as well.  Thanks for following along with this build.  The next one will certainly be one that I will make available for purchase.  I really need to sell some knives to pay for my grinder.  Thanks for stopping by the Robinson Edge.

-  Brandant Robinson