/diy/ - Do It Yourself

Blarg! This is the ugliest knife I've made since that one time I hammered out a railroad spike while drunk. However, it is highly effective against its main enemy, apples! The hard part was making the blade concave. I first tried hammering it around a rod, but that was not the right idea. Instead I ended up hammering it into the crevice of the open jaws of my largest bench vice. The ball peen on the hammer was perfect for getting to the desired curve. In hind sight I should have sanded it down all shiny before hammering. Oh well. Now it has tiger stripe patina. Annealing, hardening, and tempering all went very well. I messed up a bit with the file when making the edges. At least sharpening is super easy. Both sides can be sharpened by laying it dome-side up on a stone or sandpaper and doing circles. I can sharpen both edge of the blade at the same time doing that.

In case you have not guessed, this is an apple coring knife which removes the core with a twist of the wrist. I can also peel with it easily. It is much longer than store versions and is able to reach all the way through even the largest of apples I've seen. The blade is 4.5" long and 5/8" wide and doubled edged.