New Collaboration with JK Knives

I'm late to the party but I wish this joint venture all the success life has to offer!
Kudos to you for having a dream and following it thru.
However, I do have one observation, black micarta? I KNOW you dearly love orange.

I do indeed Uncle T, but I'm trying to get other people to like these too :D. As much as I love my orange, I probably use the more natural colors of micarta (black, green, brown) over other handles since orange is mostly available in G10 and John can't work with it due to an allergy.

More importantly, I want people to buy these and I know you love love black micarta, so I'll sign you up from one of them ;). Probably the 3rd one? Should mix it up well with your Kephart collection since it's based off of a knife Kephart himself called one of the best designs at the time.
 
Wow. Maybe the two of you could develope some orange canvas micarta?
Also, I have a Marine co-worker who doesn't have anything good to say about Wounded Warriors. He says that way too much is spent on non soldier help. Too much on administration.
I personally like Tunnels to Tower where they pay the mortgage off for a soldiers widow and family.

Making orange micarta, or a composite material as it really is, is a consideration of mine; maybe actually use that fancy science degree I earned for something. There are a few commercial options out there but the quality isn't that great from what I've been told. In truth, as much as I love orange, it's probably not worth the effort and investment at this time as I like other things more. I do have a little more interest in possibly doing something with carbon fiber, which I've researched a ton more from my days in bicycle racing, and then designs and materials as a hobby.

Wounded Warriors isn't a consideration, but if you have some other thoughts I would appreciate them via PM. I just don't want to bring some of the potential conflicts of thoughts and feelings of various charity organizations into this thread. I could start a different thread on the topic but I already have some good input from 3 or 4 different guys that I have respect for, so I just have to narrow it down to one.
 
Sorry I'm so late to this thread bikerector bikerector . I didn't get an alert to my tag. Those knives look great. That first one has some pretty cool flare to them. You and JK Knives JK Knives did a hell of a job. Now which one is which lol (a,b,c,?)
 
Wow. Maybe the two of you could develope some orange canvas micarta?
Also, I have a Marine co-worker who doesn't have anything good to say about Wounded Warriors. He says that way too much is spent on non soldier help. Too much on administration.
I personally like Tunnels to Tower where they pay the mortgage off for a soldiers widow and family.
I have mixed feelings on WWP. I took a few awesome trips with them and then they lost their way. They were definitely spending too much on “admin” costs. They had an all hands conference where their ceo rode in on a horse! That year they spent $26mm on admin costs for 600 employees:mad: They cleaned house, he is gone and now a former General is running the show. They have gotten a lot better. But they certainly don’t need more funding. bikerector bikerector I did more research and the vet org you are considering seems to be on the up and up. Good choice!
 
I do indeed Uncle T, but I'm trying to get other people to like these too :D. As much as I love my orange, I probably use the more natural colors of micarta (black, green, brown) over other handles since orange is mostly available in G10 and John can't work with it due to an allergy.

More importantly, I want people to buy these and I know you love love black micarta, so I'll sign you up from one of them ;). Probably the 3rd one? Should mix it up well with your Kephart collection since it's based off of a knife Kephart himself called one of the best designs at the time.
A Kephart inspired sounds great and I will consider it an honor.
JK - I would like to have one of your Kephart styled knives but I must pace myself. I have a few guilty pleasures right now and I am not a well off man.

ps. I edited my military post from this morning.
 
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Sorry I'm so late to this thread bikerector bikerector . I didn't get an alert to my tag. Those knives look great. That first one has some pretty cool flare to them. You and JK Knives JK Knives did a hell of a job. Now which one is which lol (a,b,c,?)

They are in order of A, C, B. The handle material on B & C is osage orange (there's the orange for you Uncle Timbo Uncle Timbo ) and I'll see how they look in person. Might need to give them a flamed look to deepen the color a little. We'll see. Osage ages well, IMO.
 
They are in order of A, C, B. The handle material on B & C is osage orange (there's the orange for you Uncle Timbo Uncle Timbo ) and I'll see how they look in person. Might need to give them a flamed look to deepen the color a little. We'll see. Osage ages well, IMO.
I do not recommend doing that, I quit “torching” wood handles for a reason.
 
They are in order of A, C, B. The handle material on B & C is osage orange (there's the orange for you Uncle Timbo Uncle Timbo ) and I'll see how they look in person. Might need to give them a flamed look to deepen the color a little. We'll see. Osage ages well, IMO.

Ok thanks. As far as the handle material, it might darken with use or maybe apply a coat of oil of some sort. I'm no expert like JK just throwing ideas out, he doesn't seem to find of the fire idea lol.
 
If you accidentally overheat it it’s possible the glue will be affected.

Okay, that's actually what I was thinking the problem would be. Thank you for the insight.

Ok thanks. As far as the handle material, it might darken with use or maybe apply a coat of oil of some sort. I'm no expert like JK just throwing ideas out, he doesn't seem to find of the fire idea lol.

He's certainly done it on a lot more things than I have and I've only done it on a few woodworking projects, none of which had glue applied while I was flaming them.

Here's a hand carved name plate I made for my son's room while we were putting his nursery together. It turned out pretty well for a random idea. It's also how I told my wife I decided on his name for us, since we were indecisive for a while. Flaming really darkened the wood and gave it deeper character. I should get a picture of it in his woodland themed room.

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Your son is one lucky little boy. He will prolly grow up like I did and never remember a time when he didn't have a pocketknife on him.

I go by an Osage tree on my way to work. They are easily identified this time of the year by the softball size seed pods on the ground. To me they look like mini brains up close.
Grandma used to put one in the closet to repel spiders. Spider repeller.
I tried to cut a fallen branch a few years back and I quickly learned how tough that wood really is.
 
Our neighbors when I was growing up had an osage tree. We used to throw the green balls at each other like grenades, hurt when you got hit!

Reminds me of some shenanigans we did on the tennis courts during gym class in high school. There was a walnut tree right by the court... I think you can probably figure out how the rest plaid out. Pretty sure my twin brother was in the class too, and Mom didn't care for the results from the shenanigans either.
 
Got the knives in from John today, and as promised, more photos not taken by a professional ;). Medium SAK and native added for size reference. The pocket sheath is a $15 additional cost if you prefer something off the shelf instead of custom. It's thick leather so it should last a long time. Retention is pretty good with the leather doing all the retaining. I've used slip style sheaths like this for a long time and they work well and are ambidextrous (doesn't matter which direction you put the knife in) unless you wet form it.

Onto the tabletop pictures!
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In hand pics
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You can expect more throughout the week as I get these out for testing, and just for some nature shots. It's beautiful out there in Michigan today so I'm hoping to get a little hike in and drag these along for photo ops. Might do a bike ride instead. May even do both if I can get through hubby-do list quick enough :).
 
I'm especially interested in how the gray handled one will serve you. Not obvious to me how I might use such a blade shape but I'm thinking that there is an epiphany that will accompany that one ;) The other two could be decent chip carving knives - make another sign Chad?

As for oiling the osage - the advantage to that is that it will provide an even & clean coat compared to handling with dirty oily hands and hoping for some color. That is pretty hit or miss. Any wood finishing oil (not a varnish or urethane as these result in a film that wears off and needs repair over time) but an oil or very thinned out varnish applied in as many coats as you have patience with. Sand between coats for silky smooth or no sanding - just build up the coats until the wood seems that it will no longer absorb. Don't allow the finish to get sticky. Wipe off after 10 or 15 minutes. Buff or sand the next day and wipe on some more. Once the wood is saturated and the oil finish is dry, it is pretty easy to keep the handle clean.

An option is to apply 1 coat of oil to darken and then in a few days of drying, buff on some paste wax. Even car or shoe polish will work - not the liquid stuff. My 2¢ :)

Coming along very nicely gents :thumbsup:

Ray
 
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Okay, I think I got these guys named after a little use tonight with a few different tasks. I'm leaning towards the scandivex grind but may offer up both as I tend to prefer saber for most things, but the differences have been minor for most tasks except wood carding where the scandivex showed is colors. Really liking this one so far.

The Pocket Woodcrafters

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I haven't gotten to the cutting board yet but I think that's where the Sick Nasty (until I figure out a better fitting name... which may be never) but it's not the best wood carver. It did much better in softer targets like paper, cardboard, and plastic. Things it could slice into more. I'll be really interested to see what my group of testers think of this one. It kind of has 3 areas of slicing, before the belly where it's basically a recurve but flat, the belly, and then the front edge. It allows a lot of versatility cutting on a surface and I'm wondering if I should get something very similar with a full-size handle and another 1-1.5" of blade length on it. But, it's a lot of edge in a small package and that's what I was going for, for now.

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