My friend Andy Pomorski forge heat treated all my 15N20, including 4 ultra-light Barax machetes, and a Golok. He heat treated all my 1084 seax machetes and Barax machetes. He is avowedly not a bladesmith; I gave him instructions based conversations with established makers whose experience I trust. I was highly impressed with what I got. Both steels took extreme geometries, and both held the shape well even with hard use. The toughness of 1084 impressed me so much that over the course of a few runs, I tried lower tempering temps over a few orders, to try and boost retention from what was seemed to be thought as a negligible loss in toughness. The machetes seemed to hold up well. On the 15N20 we did a large batch of over sixty blades. In the next batch of 15N20, whenever that will be, I'll also review the instructions I gave him for it and see if we can try to boost retention on these as well with more hardness. I'm planning to go to him again for this 8670.
I'm going to have to sketch these out in paper, and glue 'em on, then perform surgery with a shotgun.
Hmmm.. actually, the angle grinder and shotgun analogy works on a bunch of levels.
Adaptability being the chuck-key to my heart.
Anyway...
This run would not have been possible without the generous support of my valued customers. I appreciate you all, and this run for you to have fun with. No deposits, unless your design is so wacky only you would buy it, but good faith requests for most kinds of designs. Meaning you show me a design you have in mind that will fit on there, and if you fully intend to grab it if it's made, we'll work together on it in PM or email, and once you like it, and the cost is fitting, then your good faith statement that you intend to buy the knife when is all that it takes to get it made. Once you say "okay, make this one for me" you have right of first refusal. Meaning nobody's on a hook, but when the knife is done, you get a chance take it or refuse it before anyone else's has a chance.
Design possibilities have to be able to fit on one of those sheets. They're 2" x 12", 2 x 23" and ~5.6" x 23", but within this we've got machetes, and hawks, and fighters, oh my. Even a chef already, so that's one of those 2 x 12s already off the table.
I'm very excited about the possibilities here.
I expect the ulu is going to be one of the heaviest and most expensive working ulus out there.