A Little Slab of Sharp

I want to introduce you to a carving in metal this time,a real working “work in progress”.

My current favourite knife for small carvings is this one. It is a really simple double grind Kiridashi “carved” from an old file. I didn’t heat treat it at all and so it is just as hard as it was when it was actually a file. The sharp edge is only just over an inch long and is razor sharp (as are all of my knives, including the cooking ones). I want it to be a simple flat grind with no secondary bevel so that re-honing is as simple as laying it flat on a stone and polishing. I don’t think that will work in practice though so I may end up with an absolutely tiny little micro-bevel, just enough to mean I can hone it without taking off half a ton of metal each time.

Anyway, this little slab of steel is a real joy to use, small it may be but it sits really well in my hand and just “feels right” if you know what I mean. I’ve still got quite a bit of work to do on getting the two bevels as flat as I possibly can with the tools I have to hand but things are coming along nicely.

In the meantime it sits quite nicely in it’s soft leather sheath in my pocket. It is the only knife I carry now and has a smaller blade than almost any pocket knife I can think of. It is well under the 3 inch limit for folding knives that we Brits seem so fond of referring to.  What most people forget in this country is that should an incident occur or the police need to detain anybody then almost anything from a key to a nail file could be deemed to be an offensive weapon. This is a fixed blade and so I need to have a really good reason to carry it. I’m hoping that the fact that it usually shares my pocket with a small bit of wood or other material that I’m carving will be enough to satisfy the law. The interesting thing is that I could carry a folding knife with a blade of up to three inches long without needing to explain why, unless of course I was involved in a fracas.

For now though I enjoy the feel of this little sharp thing and am really loving how it carves…

  

Another one that I have played with but feel a little less in love with is this.

Again a simple double bevelled flat grind and the sharp on this one is less than an inch. I’m quite proud of the simplicity and the finish but it has it’s issues in use.

The handle section feels good to hold but I think I should have tapered down towards the edge in a graceful curve rather than the sharp notch that is there. The blade has a tendency to turn in the hand because there is a long distance between the shank and the edge.