Welcome to the forum Jason. Post a picture when you get a chance and let us know if we can be of help.

Welcome Jason,

Fun writeup intro. Keep on hammering, have fun and be safe!

Aloha, Phil

Jason

Welcome to the American Bladesmith Society and the ABS Forum. We are here for you so post any questions that you have and take a look at our ABS YouTube Channel for some outstanding How To videos.

Sally and I have been through your beautiful part of the country in the Finger Lakes Region of NY.

Hello and welcome Jason.........

I'm new to this site as well and I just wanted to pass along in my short time here the members that I have corresponded with have been fantastic, very generous with helpful hints and how to's, the knowledge and experience here just seems to be at another level.......money very well spent, I plan on staying for a while !!

Rob

Welcome Jason, good to have you on board. Very interesting introduction. I look forward to seeing your work. If you have any questions, post them up and we will do our best to answer them.

Welcome again.

Brion

I look forward to seeing your knives. There are some amazing kitchen knife makers in the ABS and that's a genre of knives I think my wife would like me to figure out <img src=' http://www.americanbladesmith.com/ipboard/public/style_emoticons//wink.gi f' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=';)' />. The folks here are more helpful than I can say. It's still a little weird for me to have members answer all kinds of my questions and share their time and knowledge. You made a good choice joining.

Jeremy

I'll probably spend next next couple of years trying to digest a fraction of the information available through the various abs outlets. Totally enjoying the people and the community and I hope to meet more folks at the New England Hammer-in. I think it will be a good long time until I have something worthwhile to contribute. I will be on these forums religiously studying what is generously given by more capable hands than my own.

~J

Let the fun begin!

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Howdy everyone!

I'm Jason from the finger lakes region of NY (recent transplant from Seattle). I'm a former chef/instructor currently back in school. I got into this after having spent thousands on disappointing kitchen knives. One day I was about to make another international call to my favorite maker in japan to put in an order when I decided to try it myself. I cold called a very well regarded blacksmith outside of Ithaca and trained at his shop for two summers. After that, I got in contact with M.S. Raymond Smith and, although we don't correspond very often, has incredibly generous with his time/knowledge/materials.

I've managed to set up a full smithy out of my house. It's a little pitiable, but it is completely functional and allll mine <img src=' http://www.americanbladesmith.com/ipboard/public/style_emoticons//smile.gi f' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':)' />. A few months back I sent some forged blades to a lab and the results were better than I could have hoped for....The smiths I admire use "start-Trek Technology", I'm still in the Star-Wars to Flintstones domain. So yah, with rays encouragement I joined the ABS and am going to see if I can make something the isn't meant for a kitchen for once....still don't know how I feel about that haha.

Cheers,

Jason Mendoza

Welcome Jason, expanding to other styles beyond the kitchen will be good for diversifying your skills, but I am not sure if one can do better than a well used kitchen knife for pushing the qualities desired in a fine blade, and better yet such a knife really has to earn its keep. Many outdoor knives are designed with unrealistic scenarios in mind that they will probably never see, but a good kitchen knife willget used and will need to live up to expectations. What tests did you have done at the lab?

|quoted:

Welcome Jason, expanding to other styles beyond the kitchen will be good for diversifying your skills, but I am not sure if one can do better than a well used kitchen knife for pushing the qualities desired in a fine blade, and better yet such a knife really has to earn its keep. Many outdoor knives are designed with unrealistic scenarios in mind that they will probably never see, but a good kitchen knife willget used and will need to live up to expectations. What tests did you have done at the lab?

Hrc, spectral analysis, broke the blade and checked particulate and carbide size and a few others. I wish I had more specifics, a friend runs the metallurgical lab for a well known corporation and I didn't want to bother him too much so other than the named tests I'm going off of him saying the steel was quite close to it's full potential in regards to what I was trying to get out of it. I'm in the process of making 3 identical knives, in 3 different humidity/heat conditions, in 3 different months to see how consistent the results will be. Hopefully I'll acquire a more precise tool to do my heat treating but for the time being I'm using an unmonitored gas forge.

I don't have any of the documentation handy but the test blade was 1080+ @hrc 61.25 and here is a not at all amazing photo of the cross section...

...not at all sure if that answers the question yer asking..... <img src=' http://www.americanbladesmith.com/ipboard/public/style_emoticons//mellow.gi f' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':mellow:' />

From the photo the cross section does look good.