Two more knives finished

[Topper]

The blanks were made by a custom knife maker in Texas.
The deal was I finish both, keep the D2 for doing the 440c.
They were in the raw meaning that grind marks were still visible and no edge formed.
I'm guessing the D2 steel blank took 40 hours to hand polish before buffing. It is some really hard steel. You can't file or use stones to sharpen it unless they are diamond coated.
I wanted to try something other than wood for scales (grips) so I used black canvas micarta.
The grips are not sealed. Micarta has a peculiarity of being more tactile when wet, providing an even better grip if you don't seal it.
The pins are stainless steel.
My focus on these two knives was more on function and durability than looks.
The largest one in front is D2 steel, the smaller is 440c stainless.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v342/Topper_1950/P3250006.jpg

[drhall762]

Look pretty good to me.

[waksupi]

Pretty cool. I saw somewhere on the web that a guy makes his own micarta, from layers of Levi's with epoxy, clamping it all together to cure before using.

[waksupi]

What is your harden and temper process with the D2?

[W.R.Buchanan]

Waksupi: typically D2 is hardened at 1950F, and then tempered twice at 1000F which yeilds a blade at about 62 Rc.

They are very hard to sharpen, but when actually at a shaving edge they stay like that for a long time.

My first knife was made from 154CM which is very similar to D2 it was sharpened on the grinder using a 1200 grit film belt. It has been sharpened exactly once! in 1984!

I once spent 3 hours on a set of Crock sticks trying to sharpen a similar knife. I only did that once too!

I just had a shaft made of 440C hardened last Friday. It was pulled back to 56 Rc. The tensile strength of this material at this level is 313,000 PSI! That's alot!

Randy

[danski26]

WOW! Those are two nice looking blades!

[725]

Very fine work, indeed. Congrats

[Topper]

Thanks for the complements gentlemen.
The blades and tempering were not done by me so I have no idea of the precess used.
Randy, if the metal is anything like what you described I should be able to skin a few hogs before I have to sharpen it again. I've also read some post where 154CM makes a great knife blade.
The person I got these from did leather work for the knife maker.
These were rejects, imperfections in the jibbing and not up to par for this maker to put his name on them http://halfrichknives.com/gallery.htm