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Thanks JonC, I have meaning to sign up to the site for ages so this was a good way of prompting me. Any idea who the Duncan the seller refers to is?

Not 100% sure, think its Dorset Woodland Blades
http://www.dorsetwoodlandblades.co.uk/
also worth checking
http://www.english-handmade-knives.co.u ... shing.html

many of the makers on BB will do blades that you handle yourself, there are also quiet a lot of step by step guides including adding scales and handles. Quiet a lot of the bushcraft type blades are quiet thick, I would tend more towards a hunting or field knife. Get a thread going on there and see what advice they can offer, plenty of the makers do blades you either finish or handle yourself. Stuart Mitchell and Owen Bush are two that spring to mind.

I make knives, sometimes even going so far as to smelt my own ore, make an iron bloom, alloy it to make steel, then turn the steel into a blade. It can become a hobby on a par with shooting for gadgets, fastidiousness, expense and time taken up if you let it.

And there's nothing wrong with that...

I'd recommend that as a beginner, you buy a kit from http://www.brisa.fi - Dennis there is a great guy to deal with and the kits an excellent starting point if you don't want to go out, dig up some bog ore, fell a tree for charcoal et cetera...

As above, I'd also recommend Owen Bush and Stuart Mitchell - both are superb makers and thoroughly nice oomans, always willing to teach a badger how to do things.

For some background information about blade types, steels, edge grinds and so forth, take a peek at the "knifemaking" tab on our own website: www.badgercorporation.com

Mick Wardell offers a great range of kits & parts, ALL you'd ever need really

The BRISA site is good too

Some brilliant links, thanks guys. I will spend some time having a proper look tonight :goodjob:

Hi ovenpaa, when I was an apprentice I made guns, moderators and knives. The knives were made from files and involved a lot of grinding. The only problems I had was files are made from cast steel and easily prone to snap. I like the idea that someone mentioned of a circular saw blade, which you could get cheap from a car boot. Ronboy

When i was a lot younger i knew a guy who made bowie knives (up to 16inch blades) from leaf springs ,very effective

Files make good knives, particularly older ones, and Sheffield made ones are the best. However, they need tempering to toughen them a little. Once you've ground a file to shape, give it about 45 minutes at 250 Centigrade - a domestic oven should be capable of that. Wrap the blade in cooking foil to:

a. reduce the oxidation rate
b. reduce complaints from the owner of the aforesaid oven...

They would need annealing (or letting down as the chap I knew used to call it) prior to any work on them, is that easy enough as well?

If you anneal them, you'll need to harden them again afterwards. I'd recommend that you don't anneal the files, just grind them to their new form and then temper them back.

If you do anneal them, that'll comprise heating them to a dull red heat and keeping them there for at least 30 minutes - probably well beyond the capability of the average domestic oven - and then allowing them to cool very slowly. Just switch off the oven and leave the file in there for a few hours until its cold again. Once they are annealed and re-worked to the required shape, you'll need to heat them again to a red heat and then plunge them into chilled brine to get them really hard again, or into oil at room temperature to harden them a little less. An oil quench is less likely to cause them to crack. Once they are hardened, temper them back as previously suggested...