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[Sticky] Forging Bevels

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Posts: 61
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i start my bevels by hand then knock them out pretty quickly on the power hammer.

Tucker Parris

TAPForge.com

 
Posted : 01/07/2016 11:32 am
Joshua States
Posts: 1157
Member
 

|quoted:

i start my bevels by hand then knock them out pretty quickly on the power hammer.

I used to do just that with the drawing dies because the power hammer is a lot better at hitting something in the same place every time than I am! However, not everyone has a power hammer and the hand skills are just as important, if not more so.

I always had to clean up those bevels at the anvil anyway because the power hammer isn't as good at making really smooth bevels. Or maybe, I not very good at it with the power hammer......whatever.

I made myself a little tool for holding the spine of the blade the same distance from the dies so I could flip the blade over and hammer bevels on both sides. No matter what you do, the face on the top side moves more than the one on the bottom and you have to flip the blade over to bevel the sides evenly. It's the same as what you do on the anvil.

Joshua States

www.dosgatosforge.com

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdJMFMqnbLYqv965xd64vYg

https://www.facebook.com/dos.gatos.71

Also on Instagram and Facebook as J.States Bladesmith

“So I'm lightin' out for the territory, ahead of the scared and the weak and the mean spirited, because Aunt Sally is fixin’ to adopt me and civilize me, and I can't stand it. I've been there before.”

 
Posted : 01/07/2016 11:13 pm
Posts: 11
Member
 

I fought this issue as well.  I clamp the ricasso in the vice with the plunge roughly in the middle of the jaws spine down and parallel with the jaws.  I use a large flathead screw driver to push the edge back to center. Then with another heat flatten the bevels back out.  Sometimes it takes a couple of heats and trips to the vice.  I normally save this towards the end when I’m tweaking the knife for straight.  This doesn’t keep me from practicing though.  I spent a while being afraid of this area of a knife for fear of hitting the ricasso.

 
Posted : 12/07/2022 11:01 am
Matthew Parkinson
Posts: 550
Honorable Member Journeyman Bladesmith (5yr)
 

one min in and there is miss-information .. not a good start.. clipping the point will not make an appreciable  difference in the finished knife.. in damascus for pattern control yes but not for "grain". 

from what I watched forging info seems fine, but this method has much less control over the shape of the choil than other method and relies entirely on hammer control allowing very little room for error. 

MP

 
Posted : 20/03/2023 8:16 am
Matthew Parkinson
Posts: 550
Honorable Member Journeyman Bladesmith (5yr)
 

most of my videos are behind the pay wall on Patreon. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rim5rO1iAC0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDh4aIFID9E these two are older but show my methods pretty well, though I don't have a description of what or why on them. Forging is just shifting volume around The order of operations is critical to controlling the process but the basic processes are simple and limited. drawing, upsetting, sholdering punching,  drifting and forge welding.   Lin Rhea has some of the bests explanations of this I have seen.  https://youtu.be/ephVTygusw8

As a side note I have had several interactions will Illa and he has left a bad taste in my mouth pretty much every time. I will admit that is likely coloring my reaction to his videos. regardless his methods can work, and if they work for you, great! There are other methods and other forging philosophies, I encourage anyone regardless of ability to explore other methods, that is my main reason for attending hammer-ins . 

MP

 
Posted : 29/03/2023 6:03 pm
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