Help - Thin steel stock for knife making

[Matthew N. Masail]

I recently started a Marquetry class, really fun! the Xacto knives given to us are anything but ideal, the teacher himself uses a shop made knife. so I searched my home but the only steel I could find to make one was a stainless steel steak knife.... so I made 3 knives (for my boss and his partner also taking the class) and they feel great, cut great, even the teacher really liked them. however the steel isn't good enough and the very tip of the knife, the only part doing 95% of the cutting, folds over into a hook..

Long story short I need and want to make few sets of knives, but can't seem to find suitable steel that doesn't need heat treatment. I was thinking maybe HSS ? I am looking for steel that is flat and around 0.6-0.8mm thick. any help or recommendations would be greatly appreciated.

[ian maybury]

Others will no doubt come in Matthew, but the bottom line is that you're unlikely to get a steel to work that doesn't have a decent amount of carbon in it (a plain but fairly high carbon steel), or probably less ideally carbon equivalent by way of carbon plus alloying elements (e.g. a ferritic/hardenable stainless steel) - and hardened and tempered appropriately.

One isssue even if you get something suitable by way of steel stock is that you would then have to cut and form/grind it without disturbing the temper - unless you decide to go the whole hog and get into heat treatment. There's quite a bit here via Google just now on knife making steels: http://www2.knifecenter.com/info/knife-blade-materials

Don't know what people use for marquetry - every sort of knife comes up on Google - but might it be worth thinking of finding something like a good quality and close to shape carving knife, and then rework it to suit?

These are pretty hard e.g. http://www.leevalley.com/en/Wood/page.aspx?p=45740&cat=1,130,43332,43339&ap=1 There are other much cheaper carving knives about like Kirschen, Flexcut etc. Quite a few either don't quote a hardness number, or are significantly softer.

I'd avoid an unspecified one, but against that don't have enough experience of the performance and behaviour of differing hardness steels in knives to advise what hardness might suit best for your sort of work. If you need to cut down with force a very hard steel can snap if it is thin enough to get bent sideways a bit, but against that a softer one may sacrifice some edge holding ability. Maybe somebody can advise a practicably workable hardness level to shoot for in a knife?

It can be very useful in fine work to have the right shape of knife with a replaceable blade as on an Xacto or a professional tool like a scalpel. (stuff sold to retail/non expert markets may anyway avoid high levels of hardness due to the risk of blades snapping and leading to claims) One to be aware of is that there's quite a lot of cheap knock off/commodity modelling knife blades about which anyway probably don't the have good quality steel in them. There are however scalpels and the like which do, maybe some good quality modelling/craft knives too.

One issue i found when i did a lot of modelling was that the sharpening bevel on these knives is typically a bit blunt/wide angled. I gravitated to buying a specific brand of knife and blade with good steel (actually Xacto - but it's years ago and i don't know what the quality is now), and then reworking and re-sharpening it. Waterstones as i'm sure you know would do a fabulous job on them...

[Nick Olimpi]

You are more than likely going to have to heat treat any steel you are working with even if it was already hardend if you Can do this yourself or no someone with a forge 1095 or o1 tool steel can easily be hardened then tempered in your oven at 325-400 for about an hour or find a local blacksmith they would be able to help they are all over. Depending where you are I may be able to find someone in your area with a forge that could treat the blade once it is shaped

[Nick Olimpi]

For a thin Ian in my experience your not going to want it to hard because as you said it can snap under pressure but not hold and edge as well but doesn't mean you will have to sharpen every 5 mins just more often. I don't know about specifics of hardiness but probably around 45 to 50 on the Rockwell scale would be a good balance for a thin knife but unless your having it treated no way of telling, but that's where your heat on the temper comes into play. Higher tempering heat will give you more flexible blade maybe in the 400f range would be what I would temper at.

[Pat Barry]

How wide and thick do you want the knife blade to be? If it is not too big you could try using a hacksaw blade

[Doug Trembath]

Call me crazy, but power hacksaw blades work great for larger marking knives, and jigsaw blades work wonderfully for smaller ones. Just use care not to turn them blue as you grind and sharpen. They are hard, edges last a LONG time, and they are easily found, worked, polished, and definitely appreciated!

YMMV, of course. Check Derek's site for more. He presents it better than I, but I was using this stuff many years ago for carving knives, etc. Cheap and effective.

Doug Trembath

[Jamie Buxton]

Many planers have throw away knives. When they get dull, you just replace them. The dulled knives might be what you're looking for.

[mark weathersbee]

Old hand files, old circular saw blades no carbide, railroad spikes, bandsaw blades, all make excellent starter knives. To make a knife from steel that is already hardened you first need to soften it or anneal it. Basically you need to get it to red hot and let it slowly cool down.

For steels I'd recommend 107x, 108x, 5160, or the w1/w2 steels. Those you can get red hot dunk in a bucket of oil or water and they'll harden. Many other steels require more precise temp control.

I'm a hobby bladesmith and do some nice work but there are some amazing makers out there. Hope this helps. I'll type more later.

[Lonnie Gallaher]

CS makes marking knives out of spade bits. I don't know what the steel type is, but it would be worth a try. Most of the work is already done.

[Brian Thornock]

I like to get jigsaw blades, grind off the teeth (without wrecking the temper), and turn it into knives. My #1 marking knife is made from this. Takes a beautiful edge and lasts a really long time.

[Dan Hulbert]

I've made some marking knives using strips cut from a broken saw plate,

[Matthew N. Masail]

Thanks, a lot of good advice here. the main Issue here is the thickness of the blade as I mentioned in my first post 0.6-0.8mm thick or 0.025"-0.030". hacksaw blades are too flexible.

I was able to see online that jigsaw blades might be available at 0.030" thick so I will try to find something locally, I hope I do. but if not this might just be my entry gate to hardening and tempering.

ready made knives are not an option, at minimum I need to make 15 knives... I planned to post a pic here, but life happened and I just don't have the time.

Thanks again to everyone, hopefully I will post results soon, I have a few tool projects to finish that I would like to share.

[ian maybury]

It might be worth having a sniff around to see what some of the knife making people have to say regarding the choice of steel, and what's involved in hardening and tempering Matthew. Most jigsaw and hacksaw blades will have quite a lot by way of chrome, molybdenum etc in them for toughness and abrasion resistance, but will sacrifice some hardness to achieve this. They definitely make a reasonable knife blade, but it could be that something more like a suitable mostly carbon steel will take a slightly better edge.

Since you're going to be doing quite a lot of shaping it might be as well to to bite the bullet and commit to going the hardening and tempering route. That way you can grind away to your heart's content for the rough shaping without worrying about doing harm. Since it'll be pretty lightweight it probably won't be too hard to set up to this anyway...

[Matthew N. Masail]

Good point Ian about the shaping. although it is quite easy with such thin stock. it's also super easy to burn the edge when grinding the bevel, I think I need to make a jig for the belt sander.

The edge doesn't need to be super razor sharp, but it needs to hold a reasonably sharp point at the very tip. I hope to post a picture tomorrow.

[ian maybury]

It'd make it all a lot safer for the steel if you could drop the speed of the belt sander from that of the typical woodworking type. It'd give decent control too. Something around 800ft/min as on a WorkSharp seems about right. The 6 x 1/2in diamond lapidary discs we've talked about putting on a WS before run significantly cooler than does aluminium oxide paper, and as you know are pretty cheap off the web. There's a guy in Hong Kong that does them mail order...

[Pat Barry]

Thanks, a lot of good advice here. the main Issue here is the thickness of the blade as I mentioned in my first post 0.6-0.8mm thick or 0.025"-0.030". hacksaw blades are too flexible..
I didn't see the thickness mentioned in your first posting Matthew but knowing the dimensions leads me to something like a sawzall metal cutting blade

[bridger berdel]

sawzall blades




Thanks, a lot of good advice here. the main Issue here is the thickness of the blade as I mentioned in my first post 0.6-0.8mm thick or 0.025"-0.030". hacksaw blades are too flexible.

I was able to see online that jigsaw blades might be available at 0.030" thick so I will try to find something locally, I hope I do. but if not this might just be my entry gate to hardening and tempering.

ready made knives are not an option, at minimum I need to make 15 knives... I planned to post a pic here, but life happened and I just don't have the time.

Thanks again to everyone, hopefully I will post results soon, I have a few tool projects to finish that I would like to share.

[Brian Thornock]

The jigsaw blades I used were a great thickness, I thought. I made a jig for the belt sander so that I got a symmetric point and bevels. It was just scrap wood at the correct angle. I sharpen them on 1000 grit paper and they hold an edge for a really long time.

[Matthew N. Masail]

I didn't see the thickness mentioned in your first posting Matthew but knowing the dimensions leads me to something like a sawzall metal cutting blade

It's there, but in mm, easy for an inch user to miss... sawzall blade are indeed thinner, thank you (and bridger)! I would have never thought of that since I've never used one. it seems to be hard to find one that is solid HSS though... most are bimetal, we'll see what I find. I also might try a hacksaw blade that is "All Hard M2 HSS", if I can get one without paying a tone on shipping.

Also, I took a look and XAcato knife website, it seems all good, but reviews point out that quality is not what it once was, and the hobby knife I tried was awful, so I'm putting that option on standby for now.

Thanks again to everyone who replied.

[Gary Viggers]

Also, I took a look and XAcato knife website, it seems all good, but reviews point out that quality is not what it once was, and the hobby knife I tried was awful, so I'm putting that option on standby for now.

Thanks again to everyone who replied.

I use a No. 3 scalpel with a 10A blade. Search ebay for a seller named echoengineer; lots of blades to choose from, fast service, good prices.

[Kees Heiden]

How about one of the modern PM steels? Most modern tool steels are chock full of carbides, which make large grains in a conventionally produced steel. Large grains make it hard to get a real sharp edge and it promotes micro cracking, thus reducing the toughness. But it wears very well. It grinds slow too! Powder metal makes the grain size a lot smaller which helps in each of these.

It surely isn't going to be cheap! Here is a supplier in the US. They probably can send it over the ocean too. You'll need the help from a professional heat treater too.
http://shop.sbsm.com/

So, which one to choose? Not something with loads of vanadium. That reduces the wear rate tremendously, but also makes it hard to sharpen. CTS-XHP seems like a good choice and gets great reviews on the knife forums. It's stainless which doesn't hurt in a knife. It wears well, is quite tough and sharpens easilly. All hearsay of course, I am just replicating what I read on those knife forums. I wonder how it would do in a plane blade or a chisel.

[Matthew N. Masail]

How about one of the modern PM steels? Most modern tool steels are chock full of carbides, which make large grains in a conventionally produced steel. Large grains make it hard to get a real sharp edge and it promotes micro cracking, thus reducing the toughness. But it wears very well. It grinds slow too! Powder metal makes the grain size a lot smaller which helps in each of these.

It surely isn't going to be cheap! Here is a supplier in the US. They probably can send it over the ocean too. You'll need the help from a professional heat treater too.
http://shop.sbsm.com/

So, which one to choose? Not something with loads of vanadium. That reduces the wear rate tremendously, but also makes it hard to sharpen. CTS-XHP seems like a good choice and gets great reviews on the knife forums. It's stainless which doesn't hurt in a knife. It wears well, is quite tough and sharpens easilly. All hearsay of course, I am just replicating what I read on those knife forums. I wonder how it would do in a plane blade or a chisel.

Are you trying to say I'm over thinking this? :)

[Matthew N. Masail]

I use a No. 3 scalpel with a 10A blade. Search ebay for a seller named echoengineer; lots of blades to choose from, fast service, good prices.

Thank you Gary! Swann-Morton according to this site http://www.scalpelsandblades.co.uk/blade-detail_180_swann-morton-sm-03-blades-box-of-50-4213.php the blades are 0.63mm thick, perfect! thanks for sending me in that direction.
also there are these but no blade thickness http://www.craftknives.co.uk/product/supatool

[Kees Heiden]

Are you trying to say I'm over thinking this? :)

Ha ha! I'm clearly overthinking myself too. I want to try a bit of knife making too and have been browsing those forums and kind of got sucked in. When you are looking for a bunch of overthinkers, then they can surely apply for the job.

Nonetheless these PM steels are fascinating and I can now understand why the new PMV-11 steel from Lee Valley gets so much praise.

[Matthew N. Masail]

Hi Kees, I agree it is totally fascinating. if one has the time and energy it's also quite exciting thinking about producing tools which will perform as one hopes, just way above what I'm looking to invest in this! I will probably get some of the thick scalpel\craft knives and blades from Swann-Morton they are on the bay, I'm thinking they should be really nice as thin double bevel marking knives. the more work I can save on this the better. I haven't tried PMV-11, but will do so soon, as my apron plane needs a new blade.

[Kees Heiden]

Yes I read about your misfortune with the apron plane. I hope the PMV-11 blade lasts you a little longer. It should be less chippy when we can believe all the hype.

[Al Launier]

I recently started a Marquetry class, really fun! the Xacto knives given to us are anything but ideal, the teacher himself uses a shop made knife. so I searched my home but the only steel I could find to make one was a stainless steel steak knife.... so I made 3 knives (for my boss and his partner also taking the class) and they feel great, cut great, even the teacher really liked them. however the steel isn't good enough and the very tip of the knife, the only part doing 95% of the cutting, folds over into a hook..

Long story short I need and want to make few sets of knives, but can't seem to find suitable steel that doesn't need heat treatment. I was thinking maybe HSS ? I am looking for steel that is flat and around 0.6-0.8mm thick. any help or recommendations would be greatly appreciated.

Just a thoought, but if you now consider your "made" knife as a lost cause, then you could try heat treating it yourself to see what you get. It might just surprise you, plus what would you have to lose?
Using a torch, propane but preferrably Mapp gas, heat the cutting area of the tip until it glows red. Then immediately quench it in oil (motor oil will do), or water if no oil is available, but oil is preferable. This will make the tip steel very hard & brittle (unusable at this point). Then apply torch heat to just below the tip cutting area until the tip mecomes a "straw" color. Then quench in oil oimmediately. This "draws" the hardness down to a suitable temper that will still be hard enough to serve as a good cutting edge, yet will not be as brittle. The new 95% cutting zone should serve you well.

[ian maybury]

Swann-Morton (surgical grade) scalpel blades were always on the hard side of tough years ago Matthew, which presuming it's still the case may well be what you want. Carbon steel too which is good - presuming consistent and appraopraite heat treatment.

As before i'd not underestimate the advantage of starting from a stock blade and using a knife that accepts replacements - even if you choose to rework them significantly. The one issue to be careful of if the historical position is still true is that they won't accept very heavy handed use (which shouldn't be what you have in mind), and can break - the slot for the scalpel mounting weakens them quite a bit....

[Matthew N. Masail]

[QUOTE=ian maybury;2415399]Swann-Morton scalpel blades were always on the hard side of tough years ago Matthew, which presuming it's still the case may well be what you want. Carbon steel too which is good - presuming consistent and appraopraite heat treatment.

As before i'd not underestimate the advantage of starting from a stock blade and using a knife that accepts replacements - even if you choose to rework them significantly. The one issue to be careful of if the historical position is still true is that they won't accept very heavy handed use (which shouldn't be what you have in mind), and can break - the slot for the scalpel mounting weakens them quite a bit....[/QUOTE

Yes I agree stock blades with a handle is best if the blades are good. I am going to try the Swann-Morotn SM00 handle and it's blades, they are 0.025" thick (the standard scalpel blade is about 0.016") which should be great as long as the steel is good. I assume if they are good I can also sharpen them and use them for quite a while. might take a month to get them but I'll report back.

[Matthew N. Masail]

Yes I read about your misfortune with the apron plane. I hope the PMV-11 blade lasts you a little longer. It should be less chippy when we can believe all the hype.

I guess I'll find out! but I'm stiill considering selling the plane with a new blade.

[Pat Barry]

Matthew, Thanks to this thread, and finding an old jig saw blade on my bench, I got motivated to make a marking knife for my general purpose use around the workbench. It was only intended to be something to try out the idea and I spent quite a lot of time wit the handle shape. So far it seems to work OK, we'll see how it holds an edge, but it sure does get sharp (with the help of my bench grinder, some 320 wet/dry paper and a piece of ceramic that I use for polishing edges) No heat treating involved. I cut myself a few time with this while tuning the handle shape and decided that an old piece of foam insulation I had laying around would be a necessary blade guard. Simple but effective.

313406

Sorry about the picture quality, and thanks again Matthew for the motivation!

[Lee Schierer]

My Father used to do quite a bit of Marquetry and he used scalpels to do most of his veneer cutting. He was able to buy handles and boxes of the blades he wanted. Now that he is gone, I have several boxes of the blades. The labels on the blades say Sterisharp. I have no idea where he purchased them, but they came in a box of 100, so they were pretty inexpensive per blade as I recall.

[Matthew N. Masail]

Matthew, Thanks to this thread, and finding an old jig saw blade on my bench, I got motivated to make a marking knife for my general purpose use around the workbench. It was only intended to be something to try out the idea and I spent quite a lot of time wit the handle shape. So far it seems to work OK, we'll see how it holds an edge, but it sure does get sharp (with the help of my bench grinder, some 320 wet/dry paper and a piece of ceramic that I use for polishing edges) No heat treating involved. I cut myself a few time with this while tuning the handle shape and decided that an old piece of foam insulation I had laying around would be a necessary blade guard. Simple but effective.

313406

Sorry about the picture quality, and thanks again Matthew for the motivation!

Thanks Pat! nice and natural looking knife too. personally I really like a longish simple handle about 1.1cm thick and and 1.5cm wide, slightly tapered in width and thickness towards the blade and with the corners chamfered.

Thanks Lee, I just ordered a box of scalpel blades that are extra thick at 0.025". I will report back when I get them. also got some for marking knives. in the meanwhile I reworked the knives I made a little bit and they are working fine for now.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Call me crazy, but power hacksaw blades work great for larger marking knives, and jigsaw blades work wonderfully for smaller ones. Just use care not to turn them blue as you grind and sharpen. They are hard, edges last a LONG time, and they are easily found, worked, polished, and definitely appreciated!

YMMV, of course. Check Derek's site for more. He presents it better than I, but I was using this stuff many years ago for carving knives, etc. Cheap and effective.

Doug Trembath

Doug beat me to it! Look for metal cutting blades-either power hacksaw or bandsaw blades. Usually made from HSS and also work very well for scraper blades.

[Matthew N. Masail]

Update- I purchased some Swann-Morton SM03 and SM01 blades. they are great. at 0.025" they are strong and rigid. they come very sharp, and swann-morton must know a thing or two about treating metal because they are hard but not brittle. great blades for both marking and cutting veneer, they cut leather very well also.


the main difference is that the SM03 blade can be used with a pencil like grip, while the SM01 are almost identical to the Stanley blades P.Sellers uses, and are only comfortable with a upper hand grip with the index finger pointed forward.


The SM00 handles are heavy duty and the blades fit snugly and lock tightly. but a shop made handle is perfect too.


Thanks again for all the ideas, making blades is interesting, but this was a much more practical solution.

[Matt Lau]

Not to muddy waters...I really like a red bard Parker handle and a #25 blade...as do quite a few luthiers for rosette work.

Also, I recommend the pointy replacement mill knife blade from lee valley as a decent cheap kiridashi blade.

[Joe Tilson]

Has anyone thought about using an old saw plate. I sent my brother some saw plates from the old Kingsland saw works in GA. He and a friend are planning to make some carving knives out of this material. Have an old D-115, which has been beat to death, and plan to try to make some scrapers and knife blade from it. Would like to know the thoughts on this.
Joe

[Derek Cohen]

I'm a little late here, but want to suggest that the best steel for a thin blade is a HSS jigsaw blade.

These are just the right thickness, about the same as a dovetail saw kerf, and a good width - about 3/8" (off the top of my head). They have a little flex, which is great when you need to bend the blade against a wall. But most of all, they tolerate heat and do not require heat treating after grinding into shape. The existing hardness is excellent for honing. All mine hold an edge a long time. What more can one ask?

Grinding a V bevel end is the best choice here, permitting left-and right use (such as for dovetail transfer). There is a jig for accurate grinding in my article, below.

http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ShopMadeTools/A%20Knife%20for%20Marking%20Dovetails.html

I've lost track of how many of these I made, mainly as gifts. Now Chris Vesper makes them (I gave him the design to use and do not have any financial interest):

http://www.inthewoodshop.com/ShopMadeTools/A%20Knife%20for%20Marking%20Dovetails_html_m3f16fd e1.jpg

Regards from Perth

Derek