Utility Knife and an Epic Failure

The utility knife is now done, and it turned out great.  That's three down and one more to go.  Here's a look at the utility knife.

The building of the handle is underway.  The front bolsters have been pinned in place.

In this pic, the rear bolsters have been pinned in place.  I have also fit the scales to the handle and did some preliminary profile shaping of the bolsters.

The scales have been epoxied and pinned in place and are clamped up while the epoxy cures.

Here's the handle out of the clamps and ready for some cleanup and shaping.

And finally, the completed utility blade.  I took it into the house and my sweet wife put it through its paces in the kitchen.  Worked great!  It's really a comfortable design, especially for her small hands.

As the title of this post implies, I also experienced some trouble along the way.  Here's the bad news.

Here's a photo of the chef's knife after the initial hollow grind has been established.  The knife had a slight warp to it from heat treating, so I decided to try straightening the blade.  That's where the epic failure enters into the scene.

I tried straightening the blade cold instead of doing it the right way.  This is what happens when you try to cut corners.  Not a good thing.  Now I have to start from scratch with a new knife.  There's no way now that I'll have it finished for Christmas.  Oh well, you win some and you loose some.  Bad things are bound to happen in knife making, but it doesn't take the sting out of a catastrophe like this one.  But, I'll just pick myself up from the ashes of defeat, or shards as it were, and start over again. Luckily I had a leftover piece of 440C that fits the chef's knife pattern almost perfectly.  At least I don't have to wait for some new steel to be shipped.  Well, at least the utility knife works great.

Thanks for following along with me on this project. I had hoped to have this project done this week, but alas, that's just not going to happen.  I should get some shop time over the Christmas weekend, so I'll post up next week to show off any new progress.

-  Brandant Robinson