Friday 2 March 2012

Chef Knife - pt 3 - Master Cut ...

Short post this week. We started on the Master Cut (the primary cut to give an edge). I'll give more on this next week.

First we had to make some more decisions on the bolster style. After sketching out a design based on some sample knives Chuck sent me, we agreed on this look. However this required a change to the pin hole locations. Some quick math and adjustments got us ready. No biggie since the extra hole will be filled with epoxy.

Some other cleanup on some rough curves and the point and we were ready to get started on the master grind. First it needed some fresh tooling dye.
Using this marking tool, we found a spot that would give us about a 1/32" knife edge. 

And we set our marks for the grind. We'd have to bring the edges of the knife down to these marks on both sides.
Chuck did the Master Grind work. This is the most critical step and if we screwed up it's game over. I was happy to hand over the reins ... maybe next knife.

This step involves starting your Grind Edge on one side, moving it down and across the whole blade, but not losing the bottom curve or taking too much from the top side of the knife. For a chef's knife we want, essentially, a triangular cut from top to edge (vs. a curved cut in traditional knives).
Here's we are one-quarter done. Have to bring the other side down like the left side here and then do it all over again to get to the etch lines. The metal gets really hot doing this. 


In the next couple of weeks I'll show the final result of this cut.

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