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#11
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How to Make 'X-ACTO' Knives
"vd" == veeduber writes:
vd Do this instead: vd you put the bomb into your forge, bury it vd in coke or charcoal, and blow-up a good blaze. Don't rush; vd take your time. You want the bomb to reach a BRIGHT YELLOW vd heat.... vd Use your tongs to pull the bomb out of the coals, and another vd set of tongs to unscrew one end. Do this right on the edge of vd the forge and right ABOVE a bucket full of old motor oil. Now vd tip the contents of the bomb into the bucket. vd The bucket is going to catch fire. Don't worry about it.... vd Collect all of the blades in a shallow pan and cover them with vd an eighth of an inch of motor oil. Now set the oil on fire. vd Allow the fire to burn out. It's going to be smokey as hell vd so you want to do this outside of your shop. When the fire vd goes out, tip the blades out of the shallow pan onto a piece vd of iron and allow them to cool. I'll give this a go in my 2-car suburban attached garage...a good test of the local fire dept, get the lads out of the station house playing jokes on each other. Really tho, great fun reading about the old-timey ways. Guess I'll continue to pay the $10 at my local Ace HW & Aviation Supply... -- Nothing overshadows truth so much as authority. ~ Leon Battista Alberti |
#12
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How to Make 'X-ACTO' Knives
Ever run across a CPO Hal Mitchell at either San Diego or Yokosuka? His
forte was cryptology and was my father in law. Retired to Paradise Hills (National CIty) and passed away about fifteen years ago. Jim Off & on, I spent a total of seven years in Japan, not always stationed ashore, but I pulled two fairly long hitches, both at HSA Yokosuka. |
#13
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How to Make 'X-ACTO' Knives
I take it you screw the second cap on 'very loosely' to prevent an explosion
in the forge. ********************************************** wrote in message ... To All: Often times we have the need to create small but accurate shapes in metal or wood. When the 'part' happens to be in two dimensions rather than three, such as a stencil (!) or an airfoil template, a common method of making the part is to simply print it out then glue the print-out to a piece of shim-stock and simply cut it out. The usual tool for cutting out such parts is an X-ACTO Knife which comes to a point (ie, the #11 X-acto Knife blade). But if you find the cupboard is bare and elect to order the part via telephone, you are in for a serious shock, which goes something like this: X-ACTO item# TCL X411, Classic Fine-point Blade, 15ea, X-ACTO#11, $5.99 Shipping $6.95 CA Tax $1.06 TOTAL $14.00 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- That's $0.93 PER BLADE. Do this instead: Find yourself some STEEL STRAPPING. Use your snips -- Dutchman or regular tinner's snips -- to make ONE cut at a shallow angle, then go about 2-1/2" down the strap and make ANOTHER cut... but at the OPPOSITE angle. Go over to your BENCH GRINDER, the one fitted with a pair of FINE stones, and SHARPEN the angles you've just created. Be careful sharpening the OPPOSITE angle. With both angles ROUGHLY sharpened, do whatever it is YOU do to FINISH the sharpening... but only go through HALF of your finish-sharpening procedue. That is, you want to leave the edges NOT QUITE FINISHED. Now cut the pieces exactly in the MIDDLE and you've got TWO pieces that look kinda like a #11 blade. You might as well make up a dozen or so PAIRS. If you do any metal work at all you probably have used a 'bomb' to convert MILD steel into High Carbon steel. The 'bomb' is nothing more than a NIPPLE of black iron pipe with a pipe CAP on either end. For little blades like this... or little screws or whatever... your 'bomb' is probably about three inches long. Chuck the 'bomb' into your bench vise and pour about an inch of CHARCOAL into the thing. Now pack the BLADES into the charcoal. Heap it up. Then pack charcoal into the pipe cap and screw it on. Hand- tight is fine. I've found the best charcoal for this is made from old LEATHER. Other common gunsmithing charcoals are made from BONE and so forth. And don''t laugh at any of this. What's happening is that the different charcoals contain TRACE ELEMENTS which makes them more suitable for springs; for hammer faces, for frizzens, fasteners and so forth. The TRACE ELEMENTS, along with the CARBON is infused into your MILD STEEL part when you put the bomb into your forge, bury it in coke or charcoal, and blow-up a good blaze. Don't rush; take your time. You want the bomb to reach a BRIGHT YELLOW heat. Once you've reached the proper temperature, you want to keep it there for about ten minutes for a small bomb (ie, one made from 1" pipe, 3" long. Larger (or smaller), work out the required heat by comparing the VOLUME of the bomb divided by its radius. ( A BIG bomb is something on the order of three inches in diameter by a foot in length -- it'll take you a couple of HOURS to properly infuse the part(s). ) Use your tongs to pull the bomb out of the coals, and another set of tongs to unscrew one end. Do this right on the edge of the forge and right ABOVE a bucket full of old motor oil. Now tip the contents of the bomb into the bucket. The bucket is going to catch fire. Don't worry about it. Put a cover over the bucket to smother the flames. Stir the contents of the bucket a few times then wait until the oil is cool enough for you to fish out the blades. Collect all of the blades in a shallow pan and cover them with an eighth of an inch of motor oil. Now set the oil on fire. Allow the fire to burn out. It's going to be smokey as hell so you want to do this outside of your shop. When the fire goes out, tip the blades out of the shallow pan onto a piece of iron and allow them to cool. Once the blades have cooled you may continue with your sharpening. They should take a razor edge. If they crack, you've either left them in the bomb too long or you've cooled them too fast. The tempering (ie, burning-off) should not effect the cracking one way or another. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- That's how you make blades (or leaf-springs or what-not). To make a HANDLE for your blade simply cut a slot in a dowel or a piece of pruning from a hardwood tree or shrub, and affix the blade in the slot using EPOXY. Epoxy holds the blade strong enough for most work but for metal engraving or wood carving, you'll want a more secure joining between the handle and the tool. You can achieve this drilling a hole (or holes) into the blade BEFORE the hardening, and affixing the blade with steel or brass pins. To add a bit of class to your burrens, gravures, knives and what-not, you can fit them with copper or brass ferules. (Looks very sexy to have an ENGRAVED data plate instead of some Joe Sixpak array of stamped letters & numbers.) -R.S.Hoover |
#14
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How to Make 'X-ACTO' Knives
"pintlar" wrote in message ... I take it you screw the second cap on 'very loosely' to prevent an explosion in the forge. Nope! You don't want any oxygen to get in. The amount of carbon you put in is much more than needed for both hardening and combining with any residual oxygen in the pipe. I use a similar method for annealing. Making small tools from allen wrenches or concrete nails, I put them in the pipe with 3 to 6 sq. inches of brown paper to get rid of residual oxygen, and put the pipe in the fire as Bob does. After the pipe gets to temperature, let the fire die out. When all is cool, nice non-scaled annealed steel. Bob |
#15
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How to Make 'X-ACTO' Knives
snip
Nope! You don't want any oxygen to get in. The amount of carbon you put in is much more than needed for both hardening and combining with any residual oxygen in the pipe. I use a similar method for annealing. Making small tools from allen wrenches or concrete nails, I put them in the pipe with 3 to 6 sq. inches of brown paper to get rid of residual oxygen, and put the pipe in the fire as Bob does. After the pipe gets to temperature, let the fire die out. When all is cool, nice non-scaled annealed steel. Bob ***************** Years ago ('50's) in one of the old Popular Science type mags there was a 'readers speak' article where a man made his own threading dies by using a hex nut with bolt stopped flush with one face of the nut. He then drilled his three holes, (half in the nut, half in the bolt) removed the bolt, and now he had a 'soft' die. He then heated that nut/die cherry red with his o/a torch and sprinkled powdered sugar on the inside of the red hot bolt. He said that hardened the threads of the bolt (now a die) sufficiently. |
#16
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How to Make 'X-ACTO' Knives
On Mar 16, 1:24*pm, "Flash" wrote:
You are simply amazing. *Your directions fit right there with what all my father attempted to teach so many years ago. *(The forge is long gone). But the tempering process . . . is there a method less smoky and noxious? For the faint of heart who live in an area where the neighbors are less tolerant of *flames and smoke? ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dear Flash, I'm sure there is. I've seen small gas-fired tempering furnaces in several shops I've visited. A copy of Brownell's catalog (...do they have a web site? ) should give you sources. -Bob |
#17
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How to Make 'X-ACTO' Knives
On Mar 17, 8:15*pm, "pintlar" wrote:
I take it you screw the second cap on 'very loosely' to prevent an explosion in the forge. ---------------------------------------------------------------- SOP was to drill a hole in the end-caps. For the box-type, the thing fit loosely enough that a vent wasn't required. -Bob |
#18
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How to Make 'X-ACTO' Knives
Bob Hoover schreef:
SOP was .... SOP? Shellack omnivisually painted? Silly operators propagated? Sundeck Only for Proprietors? Standard operational practice? Stupid options prerequisited? Subject Over Pressure? Standard operational procedures? ....??? Excuse my stupidity, KA |
#19
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How to Make 'X-ACTO' Knives
Bob Hoover wrote:
On Mar 16, 1:24 pm, "Flash" wrote: You are simply amazing. Your directions fit right there with what all my father attempted to teach so many years ago. (The forge is long gone). But the tempering process . . . is there a method less smoky and noxious? For the faint of heart who live in an area where the neighbors are less tolerant of flames and smoke? ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dear Flash, I'm sure there is. I've seen small gas-fired tempering furnaces in several shops I've visited. A copy of Brownell's catalog (...do they have a web site? ) should give you sources. -Bob You bet Brownells has a website: www.brownells.com Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired |
#20
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How to Make 'X-ACTO' Knives
jan olieslagers wrote:
Bob Hoover schreef: SOP was .... SOP? Shellack omnivisually painted? Silly operators propagated? Sundeck Only for Proprietors? Standard operational practice? Stupid options prerequisited? Subject Over Pressure? Standard operational procedures? ...??? Excuse my stupidity, KA Standard operating procedure. Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired |
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