Thread: My first build

This is going to be my first build of a folding straight razor. I've built two others that were fixed (although they didn't turn out to well). It is a pretty dang big razor but I'll see how it turns out and keep updating this thread as I go. Any comments or tips would be greatly appreciated good or bad. It is made from a piece of rain drop Damascus. 1/4 inch thick about 1 inch wide and about 7 inches long overall.
Thank you guys.

Looks good to me - the only thing that scares me are the customs that have pointy heels and toes. I like how you rounded the tang (at least that's how it looks in the pic.)
I would say the razor crafters here will probably want a pic looking down the spine, shank to see the grind?

Ok thank you trimmy72 for the quick reply and kind words. I am seeing that everyone here is very nice and friendly! I will try to get a picture of it up today. It is ground and still left thick ready for heat treat. To answer your question, yes the tang is rounded... well ovalled.

I like the Irish point you chose for the blade. Monkey tail could use a bit more sweep, IMO.
Should be a nice looking completed project. Look forward to seeing the results.
Cheers.

Very nice! I like it a lot. What is the blade edge length? As Trimmy said a picture of the rind would be helpful. Thanks for sharing.

Very nice looking blade! Just a thought; most razors I have rescaled that had rounded shanks had a flat carefully ground on both sides at the pivot pin, allowing better use of thrust washers to stabilize the blade in it entire range of swing. Careful use of a counter bore before hardening could make a difference in future works. They are basically a larger drill ground to smooth minor diameter to assure the larger diameter flat portion is centered on the small diameter hole.
Any who! You done very well!
~Richard

Thanks you guys. Today I ground the blade down a little so it isn't as wide. All the handles I was trying to make were weird looking with how big the blade was. It is now about 3/4 inch wide. I forgot to measure how long it was. Believe it was right at 2.5" iirc. Geezer, thanks for the tip I will definitely have to look into getting some of
them.

Here's some pictures from today. The razor along with the narrower blade and the scales I'm making for it.

Heat treated the razor today. I'm kind of scared I think I got it to hot and it split right at the edge in the middle of the razor. I'm going to finish grinding the blade tomorrow and hopefully it will come out.

That looks waaaaaay too hot. Did you quench it like that?