It’s done! Here’s the full video of this hand forged carbon steel chef knife project.

I went with a through tang takedown construction for the handle of this knife. First I did a burn fitting on the main hickory wood section of the handle. Then I welded on a threaded rod. I fit up a steel bolster which I darkened in oil. It’s all held together by a female binding barrel at the end.

For the heat treatment, I did three normalizing cycles, a quench in canola oil, and a two hour temper at 375° F. Normalizing is to relieve stresses from forging. Quenching is to harden the steel. Tempering is to removed brittleness from the quench so it is both hard and durable.

Update! Finished the grinding on this knife. I did a hollow s grind on this one - definitely becoming my favorite type of blade geometry for chef knives.

I started a new hand forged chef knife. This one is going to be a hidden tang construction forged out of 1084 carbon steel. So far, I’ve just hammered out the rough profile