Thread: Making my own razor

It's looking good, grind looks even from the profile pic.

thanks, did most of the grinding on the belt sander. borrowed a micrometer for after heat treatment to get the thickness right on the edge. now on to sanding a bunch by hand , and drilling pivot hole.

Don't bother with sanding all that much on the hollow as you will be really taking all that material away with the final grind...but that's the only part you don't have to worry about. Everything else needs to be nice and at least satin-shiny as it will make finishing the razor much easier once the steel is hard.

Believe it or not, once your bevel starts to get thin, your eye will see what the micrometer won't even show. Pay attention to keep the grind parallel to the spine though, this is rather important for honing.

that's good advice. I marked center of the edge before hollow grinding. edge is now a little more on one side that the other. Thus , when I grind after heat treat I will have to keep that in mind so that the edge stays center. thus as you said . better for honing. so I will focus on the sholder, spine, tang etc. getting them the way I want them to look . What puzzles me is how much to taper the tang ? right now the steel from spine all the way down is 1/4 inch. by the way, the razor I "just" hollowed I am patterning after this one . I saw it on srp and thought , wow , love it . hopefully I don't step on toes . its pretty as all and I wanted one to look similar. that being said. taper question still stands

Particularly if you want a long tail like your example, you will want to taper the tail. Then it will fit the scales better, and open and close more smoothly. Maybe from a quarter down to 3/16ths. I'd also suggest mocking it up in scales before you heat treat, so you can see how it will feel, and also how it will work for stropping. It should balance, more or less, between the shoulder and the pivot hole, with the scales attached. Good luck - Looks great so far.

Mocking up some scales is a good idea. YOu can then mock strop and shave to see just how it feels. Once I have a blank profiled, I mark center all the way around it. This gives you a reference for things just like this, tapering the tail/tang. I actually like to take mine down to about 1/8" at the tip of the tail personally...but it's a personal thing. Having those mock scales will help you to decide what is right for you.

Center? From spine to edge?

No, the 1/4" stock. I scribe center around the entire perimeter of a profiled blank before I start removing material for the blade or tang. I don't have a scribe designed for this (yet), so I use a drill bit. I will scratch center on a flat surface all the way around from one side, then flip the blank and scribe center again from that side. Works great as long as you keep the bit stationary & don't let it rotate.

Copy that.