[Aaron Schnatterly]

While looking through Knives and Scabbards for inspiration for another knife project, I found it in #133, on page 96. It's a knife fragment - actually only the hilt remains, the blade having corroded completely away - which was dated to the late 14th C. In the sake of academic interest, here's the line drawing from that book (if this is inappropriate, I'll remove it):


As the blade was gone, I used blades from art and surviving examples of the time as guidelines to generate one that may well have been. The original had boxwood scales held with iron rivets. I did not follow this lead in this piece. Instead, I had some beautiful figured walnut which I used - when sanded to a fine grit and then hand-rubbed with Danish oil, it's just a beautiful wood. Also, a couple of months back, in Gordon's post about his wife's historical knife (link to thread), Peter Johnsson had discussed tubular rivets. Since then, I have been wanting to give this a go... The rivets are 1/8 inch brass tubing, placed in a similar method as described by Peter in his post in the thread referenced above.

So... without further ado...


The blade is heat-treated, tempered, and hand ground out of 6150. It has an overall length of 9 inches, 4 7/8 inches of which is blade. It will make an excellent utility/eating knife.

Thanks to the 14th C craftsman who made the interesting original piece, and to Peter for the nudge to give the tubular rivets a go.

This piece is spoken for.

[Dan P]

Thats a nice little knife there, great wood on the handle. Did you make a sheath to go with it?
A steel like 6150 seems like "quality overkill" for a blade that small to me... of course that's never a bad thing!

[Aaron Schnatterly]

Thanks, Dan!

I did not make a sheath to accompany this piece - the gentleman didn't want one, as he'd like to do that himself.


As to the steel choice, it was that ,O1, or ATS35. We opted to go with the spring. I really like the way the 6150 works and finishes. He intends to use this knife regularly as an eating and utility knife, so I wanted to give him a solid piece.

[Sean Flynt]

Another beauty! As the economy tanks, I find knives more appealing every day

Great job with the rivets! I mean, the grip and blade are wonderful, too, but as someone headed into a tubular rivet project I'm especially keen to see other examples of that.

[Chad Arnow]

Aaron,
Nice job! Clean and simple; I like that. I think knives are under-served in today's market. Daggers seem to be much more plentiful in the market, but the everyday-carry tools that must have been ubiquitous (perhaps more plentiful than specialized war daggers) don't seem to get as much attention.

Again, nice job.

[Aaron Schnatterly]

[Ken Speed]

Aaron,

Was the Bauhaus school designing knives in the 14th century? This a a beautiful knife and it doesn't look at all like a "period" knife quite the contrary it looks like it is a space age scalping knife!

Ken

[Jared Smith]

I like the tubular rivets. Nice variation, and also historically relevant and believable. I use a similar blade form (also a hand made knife) for my regular kitchen steak knives. Very satisfying!

[Leo Todeschini]

A lovely little knife and very cleanly done so congratulations and I also agree, the small eating knives are items I love making, they are often understated but I find are just likeable.

There is a lovely cheats way of setting tubular rivets. Fit the rivet tube, either split or seamless, into the handle and file it flat to the handle. Set a small counter sink that goes right to a point into a vice with the point upwards; place one side of the tube onto this countersink and put a similar countersink into your battery drill. Hold the knife with one hand onto the countersink and press down with the drill mounted countersink with the other and rev the drill in REVERSE. It is a bit like metal spinning and will deform the rivet out very easily and cleanly. The bottom sink bites very slightly and stops the tube from spinning, the top sink flares it out. Flip the knife over and do the other side - job jobbed.

Liability clause - try this a couple of times before doing it on your new prize project

Very bad things happen to your knife if run the top sink forward - always run it in REVERSE

For wood there is no need to countersink, for horn or bone make a tiny sink.

Hollow rivets are particularly good for setting thin bone scales as they much reduce the chance of splitting that is easily possible with solid rivets.

Good luck

Tod