How would you go about Integral build

[Fish30114]

One of the great things here on BF's IMI is the exposure to different things--thanks to the Kitchen Knife KITH that Timos got going, I have dove into kitchen knives, and have found I'm OK at them. Several of them have sold for me since I just got started, I also have to admit a fondness for thin blade stock, which is a great match for the kitchen knife. I've also just finished up the blade on several cleavers--a little thicker stock stuff, with a distinct hollow grind at the edge. One thing I am wondering, saw a lot from large mfgs. at Blade Show, was integral blade knives. I realize the bigger mfgs. have milling machines etc. is that where the line is drawn? I saw some knives that were really attractive to me that had curved/dovetailed integral handles, I looked at them enviously, and don't really know how I would attempt something like that at all.

If any of you have built one of this style, I would sure like to know how you approached it---my brain is always a little to far in advance of my skills, but I'm beginning to think I'm going to need a mill to do a lot of the things I've seen and liked.

Any advice/intel is appreciated!! Thanks--Don

 

[Bob Ohlemann]

Having personally never done an integral, I will say there are plenty of Mastersmiths who make them without a mill. Do you forge?

Bob

 

[Fish30114]

Bob, I do have an Atlas mini-forge, and do some rudimentary forging, mostly Farriers rasps to general shape and them stock removal to make the blade I'm after. I've got a 300 lb piece of steel mounted vertically 4"x8"x32" and a coupled of chunks of railroad track to pound on/against, so I'm open to doing a little more developed forging if needed.

 

[Bob Ohlemann]

Bob, I do have an Atlas mini-forge, and do some rudimentary forging, mostly Farriers rasps to general shape and them stock removal to make the blade I'm after. I've got a 300 lb piece of steel mounted vertically 4"x8"x32" and a coupled of chunks of railroad track to pound on/against, so I'm open to doing a little more developed forging if needed.

Since you do some forging, that is probably the best way to start. Even with a farriers rasp, you can upset the bolster/guard area to gain the thickness and then refine. Since I haven't made an integral, I'll leave the rest for someone else to answer.

Bob

 

[kolec94]

I would clamp the frame in with the pivot

 

[Fish30114]

Kolec, thanks for the input, I think you're referring to a folder--either way I don't know what that process is.

Appreciate the input though!

 

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

Integral knives are almost always milled today.

The "forged" ones are usually the product of large stock and power hammers and hydraulic presses. Obviously, this isn't a beginner process.

The ones that are hand forged are made from large stock (1"X1" and larger) and forged to shape. This takes a full size forge, larger anvil, and good hammer skills ( and a few specialty hammers). It will then need a lot of hand shaping on the grinders and some serious filing to get things square.

The same look can be done by having a slide on metal bolster that is soldered in place. This is far simpler, and can be done with very basic equipment.

 

[jdm61]

Some guys are very good at forging them from small round bar stock, but at my skill level and equipment, I found that is not easy to get a very wide blade using like 3/4 stock. I tend to just make everything longer.

 

[Bob Ohlemann]

This thread has motivated me to try forging an integral. I will report back in a few days.

Bob

 

[Fish30114]

Good scoopage Stacy, thanks -- Ranger Bob-look forward to your get back!

 

[Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith]

Bob,
Start with stock that is suitable size to make the blade, tang, and bolster. Say 10" of 3/4" round stock.

Forge the blade leaving about three or four inches of the round unforged. Six or seven inches of 3/4" round will make a good size blade ( you probably won't need all of it).

Draw out the tang, leaving the bolster area untouched. 1" long is a good size bolster. A couple inches of 3/4" round will make a very long tang ( you probably won't need it all). Hidden tang or full tang is your choice. Both are pretty simple to draw out.

Forge the bolster to an oval ,or other shape if desired.

Clean up the tang to bolster transition with your grinder and files.

Clean up the blade and the curve up to the bolster on the grinder.

HT

With some experience and practice, you can forge a full size chef knife with integral bolster from a 6" piece of round stock.

 

[Willie71]

I've been thinking about trying this. I have 36" of 1" W1 drill rod. I might save it for my JS test knives though.

 

[S.Alexander]

I wanted to try this as well. I just need some slightly larger round stock. Thanks for the reminder!

 

[coldsteelburns]

It's really not all that difficult to forge an integral, sure it takes practice just like anything else, but I say just try it and don't be intimidated by it,

Here's one I forged last summer out of some 7/16" (pretty small stuff, especially for an integral) round 52100 which I upset to around 5/8" diameter as you'll see in the pics below. I then forged it into a square (or diamond) cross section (with rounded corners) in order to forge it on the bias (diagonal/diamond) to get the steel to spread out more, and easier, for the blade width I wanted. This is something I pretty sure that I I learned from reading Tai Goo's blog some years ago, which has really helped me out with getting good width when forging without the help of a power hammer etc. This is the technique he uses to get so much width on the RR spike knives he's made.

After I forged it all out on the bias, I just rounded and smoothed things up to get rid of the edges left by the square. I don't have very good forging skills (or grinding skills for that matter ), but I was pretty happy with the way I was able to transform that long skinny stick of 52100 into a decent sized integral knife, considering the small diameter it started out as.. Gotta love forging! :thumbup:

OK, here are some pictures... (Don't pay any attention to the numbers in some of the pictures)

(A comparison of the exact size bar in length and diameter of what I started with on top, to what an identical bar became after upsetting it)

(Another comparison view showing the thickness gained)

(Here it was after forging the blade and tang. You can tell by the pyramid shape of the bolster that it was forged on it's bias/diamond)

(And here it is after cleaning things up during finish forging)

(This one shows is next to the original sketch of the knife I was trying to forge.. I was happy with it )

The hardest part of forging an integral (at least for me ) is keeping the blade and tang centered and in line with each other , spine side and edge side. It can become quite tricky at times!

Here are two pics showing the alignment of the blade and tang on the integral above.

First is with the edge up looking from the tip.

And second is spine up looking from the tang end. (There is a small shadow on the right side of the blade spine which makes it look off center, but it's just an illusion )

That was actually my third attempt at forging an integral, and the two prior to it were forged using the same small diameter stock, before I thought to try and upset the bar before forging the knife .

Here is another integral that I forged last summer as well, not that long after the one shown above, except this time I had some "real" steel to begin forging with... Don Hanson's W2 in 7/8" diameter. :thumbup: ... I actually had it the whole time I was messing around with the 52100, but I didn't want to experiment/practice a new technique using such a precious metal..

--------------------------------------

All of this was done with using only a cheap 2-1/2 lb sledge for forging, a crappy mild steel "post anvil" that doesn't have very good edges on it, or a hardy hole for helpful tooling (I don't forge on that RR track anvil in the pics, it's WAY too loud for my neighborhood), and my single venturi burner propane forge I made from a mail box.

Also, I don't have a small wheel attachment for my grinder or any sanding drums for my dremel to clean up the blade/bolster transition with, and the round & half round file I have didn't do much to the W2 because some are dull and he others are very cheap. So all I did at the time was I just made a makeshift mandrel using some 1/4" round stock with some small rubber hose around it with some sandpaper spray glued around that, which I then chucked into my big old Dewalt hand drill. It definitely was NOT ideal for the job and it made any attempt at being accurate very difficult, but it ended up doing and OK job on that W2 integral.

One tip I do have to offer you if you do decide to make an integral would be to try and leave at least a small flat surface on each of the bolster faces, this way you can use a file guide to keep the bolster/blade and bolster/tang transitions even and symmetrical. Like if you're using a small wheel on your grinder (or dremel or round file) to clean up the radiused blade to bolster transition, you can just grind up to the carbide faces on the file guide... and of course you want to be able to have a square, flat and even surface on the tang shoulders to get a nice handle fit up. You can clean up and round over the bolster faces after cleaning up the transitions post heat treat. Just one option to keep in mind.

Also, I used a spring fuller made from some round stock (a crappy one) to forge in the radius for blade to bolster transition. I would suggest you make one (or a few different sizes) using the same diameter in round stock that you plan on using for your small wheel attachment (or file or dremel wheel size) to grind in your radii (blade/bolster transition).

Oh yes! It can be pretty helpful to use a vise and an adjustable crescent wrench (or something like it) while forging to help you adjust the blade, edge and tang centering while it's hot.

That's all I can think of right now, but if anything else comes to mind I'll make sure to sure and share it here. I would definitely suggest reading through some integral knife WIPs, such as this one from Salem Straub.. http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/978336-10-quot-integral-chef-WIP
Guys like him know a lot more about this stuff than I do that's for sure! :thumbup:

Here are links to more great integral WIPs!

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/1106294-Intergral-chef-knife-forging-WIP

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/s...ed-Integral-Not-Actually-Really-a-Chopper-WIP

https://picasaweb.google.com/primitivepoint/IntegralTutorial

http://web.archive.org/web/20080112222924/http://www.brazilianbladesmiths.com.br/integral.htm


Hope this is of some help to you.

~Paul

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My YT Channel Lsubslimed
... (It's been a few years since my last upload)

 

[Bob Ohlemann]

Great stuff!! Thanks for sharing Paul.

Bob

 

[Willie71]

Thanks Paul!

 

[El Mucho Hombre]

This is how I do integrals.

I use a lot of 1/2-3/4" W1 drill rod for them.

Draw out your blade, whatever shape you're looking for, then cut off the bar a couple inches behind where you want the bolster to finish. Draw the tang out in the style you like. I like a hidden tang, so I forge them round to make the handles easier to do.

I use the idler wheel on my flat platen to shape the transition. Grind the blade, and using the wheel at an angle, blend it into the ground flats being careful not to dish out the bevels, and grind down your tang to the rough size you want.

Do up a good sketch to make sure you're following a plan that will produce a good looking knife.

These pics are all pre heat treat. After heat treat, finish out your grinds in the same manner. You can pretty easily square up the tang shoulders at the bolster by chucking it up in a drill and using it as a lathe with a file, gets a nice square shoulder to butt up against your handle. Cut a cross slot in the tang for your pin to go through, notch the tang to hold epoxy, and glue it up.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[coldsteelburns]

Great stuff!! Thanks for sharing Paul.

Bob

Thanks Paul!

Sure, no problem guys! I'm glad I could help a bit.

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Once again El Mucho Hombre, I admire your forging skills, and that looks like another great, simple way to go about forging and grinding integrals. :thumbup:

I sure would like to see one of your blades in it's finished state one of these days though.. I'm just messin with ya man.

~Paul

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My YT Channel Lsubslimed
... (It's been a few years since my last upload)

 

[El Mucho Hombre]

Sure, no problem guys! I'm glad I could help a bit.

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Once again El Mucho Hombre, I admire your forging skills, and that looks like another great, simple way to go about forging and grinding integrals. :thumbup:

I sure would like to see one of your blades in it's finished state one of these days though.. Just playing around

~Paul

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My YT Channel Lsubslimed
... (It's been a few years since my last upload)

Hahahaha, I do tend to get a little sidetracked...hey look, a squirrel!

 

[Fish30114]

El Mucho, that is a nice forging example--I think I'm a good ways from forging that well to be honest--I'm not sure I follow you when you say use your drill like a lathe and square up the shoulders with a file--are you chucking up the round 'billet' in the to be tang zone to turn?

Thanks for the pics and your input brother.