Knives (handmade) 101 #4 Full Custom Build

So, for this session, I would like to show you what the procedure for a full custom build looks like in my workshop.

First of all, what is the difference between a hand-made knife and a full custom (hand-made) knife?

Well, both knives are made by hands, and both are hand-made, the main difference is that when I'm building a hand-made knife I don't consult with a customer or I don't even have a customer but am building a knife based on my own design. There are, of course, different grades; I could be building based on my predefined design, based on what I've built in the past, it could be I'm making a knife based on a new design, trying out a prototype or just letting the work take me wherever and just playing along.

The full custom knife, on the other hand, means that a customer has come to me with a request for a specific knife.
Most knifemakers don't like full customs - because of reasons - and I'm not an exception. It's a long process of back and forwards until ideas from a non-knifemaker meet the reality of a knifemaker in the point in spacetime continuum where both the customer and the knifemaker are satisfied. As you can guess that point is not reached easily.

This one was actually an unusually pleasant build and I have a relatively good documentation from start to finish so I will use it as an example. But, please, keep in mind the process is more often than not, not this smoot.

It all started with me posting one of my knives on 9GAG where one of the man of culture have shown interest in my knives and we started chatting which eventually lead to him asking me if I would build him a knife for a Christmas present to his mom.

If I'm not mistaken, this was in October, so seemingly enough time for a knife build, but really not too much. And honestly, I was reluctant to take the order.

The background story was that his mom has a knife that she really likes to use, it's comfortable in hand and it's her favourite knife in the whole world. The problem was that the knife was a pain in the ass to sharpen and didn't hold the edge long. This is often the case with stainless steel (I will cover this problem in some future post).

Anyhow, I did eventually agree to do it and here is the, somewhat simplified, process from start to finish.
To make things more narrative I will call the customer Bill - that's not his real name.

I. The Wishes
Bill was quite firm that he wanted the exact knife with jus the steel being more, let's say, user-friendly.
I did try to explain, that if you going full custom, and are already paying for it you might as well go nuts and get something you couldn't get anywhere.
But he was consistent - I did try, and succeed, to sneak some of my ideas, but that falls under licencia poetica rule and it is to be expected.
I did ask if he could send me a pic or two of the knife his mom has so I can get the general idea of where to go with my design.
this is what he sent me:

My first reaction was - what the hell did I get myself into? I was supposed to build a knife that is better than WÜSTHOF?! I was sure he'll send me a pic of some under $5 knife his mom bought in a nearby 7/11, but nooo it's a freaking WÜSTHOF.
I guess I could have backed out, but after thinking about it I've said to myself - come on man you can do this.

II. The First Draft
After thinking about how to approach this build I did a few free-hand sketches and after some additional screening sent three of them to Bill.

Bill took the sketches to his mom, and then got back to me with million questions, about curves, recurves, handles, materials for handles, pins, finishes and all the little tweaks that I was casually mentioning, knowing that everything I do bring up will generate 10 more Q. This lasted for 10 days or so.

We finally, settled on a slightly modified design shown in the first sketch with wooden handle, brass hardware and a hand-rubbed satin finish.

III. The Build

You can see the first attempt just cut-out with the stencil still glued on on the pic above.
After the heat treatment, I wasn't really satisfied with the results so I did the second one.
Well, I wasn't really too thrilled with that one also - it was probably the WÜSTHOF warning in the back of my mind that kept sounding off all the time.
You can see both of them in the scrap pile on this pic.

To cut this short, the third time was the charm.

You can see what will eventually become a knife cooking to the far left in my forge.

This is what it looked like strait of the grinder. You can see it was still a bit rough around the edges.

This is just after I've glued on the handle scales.

This is the handle after rough profiling.

And this is the finished knife just before the sharpening.

IV. Done

Eventually, I was able to ship it on time and both Bill and his mom were thrilled with the knife.

Honestly, even though it was a rather stressful build, especially at the very end where it was close to the deadline and there were so many things to go wrong, I was really happy with how it turned out.

Here are a few "better quality" pics of the final product.

As always, if you have any questions or you just want to say something or anything, feel free to leave a comment below.

Thank you for your support and see you soon.