Cracks are part of the game. Knife making is all about finding the balance between sharpness/thinness and durability. For kitchen knives, you usually want to go as thin as possible, but the thinner you go the more likely you are to get a warp or crack during heat treatment. Today, a got a warp in my quench and was trying to straighten it out during the temper. But I went a little too far and it cracked. Gonna see if I can pivot and still make a functional blade out of it by shortening it to where the crack is and switching from full tang to through tang.

With this latest batch, I wanted to experiment with natural forge finishes. When you quench carbon steel into oil during the heat treatment process, the oil soaks into the steel and leaves a natural dark patina. Sometimes it comes out solid black, other times there are bits of gold and other color that come out in it. It’s another way to bring out the natural beauty of the material and also make sure that each piece it completely unique.

Burn fitting has become a kind of controversial way to fit the handle of a knife. But the only time I see it being a problem is when you’re doing a hidden tang construction which is only secured with glue, no pin, which isn’t a great way to do it anyways. So I use burn fittings for almost all my knife projects.