From Arizona, Full-Time Student, Part-Time Knife Maker

[Don Nguyen]

Hello everyone, glad to be here.

While I am not very seasoned at cooking in general, I very much enjoy it. Always looking to improve at everything.

I am currently a full-time student at University of Arizona, Materials Science and Engineering major. It sucks up all my time, but when I can manage a few free hours, I like to make knives. I love a well-performing kitchen knife, and eventually I'd like to put in much more time developing the craft (perhaps even full-time).

Hope to learn tons from all of you Sincerely,

-Don Nguyen

p.s. Is it against the rules to have my Facebook page in my sig? I wasn't sure if it counts as a non-commercial page, and I can remove it if it violates the rule.

 

[CharlieD]

Knives. Making is indeed an art. I tried to get into it, but materials are so expensive, it makes no sense at al to even bother.

 

[Don Nguyen]

It can indeed get very expensive, but the basic tools and steel can be pretty affordable.

Though, the search for new materials and equipment never end

 

[Kylie1969]

Hello Don and welcome to DC

Great to have you onboard!

 

[chopper]

Welcome. Glad you are here.

 

[CharlieD]

It can indeed get very expensive, but the basic tools and steel can be pretty affordable.

Though, the search for new materials and equipment never end

So, where do you bye material. I was looking at some materials for a hunting knife and they wanted $200 hundred dollars, crazy

 

[Don Nguyen]

Wow! That's insane.

Aldo from NJSteelBaron is the most popular guy to get steel from. You can get big amounts of 1084 for much, much less than that.

Handle materials vary, but you can get basic micarta/g10 from most knifemaking supplys, like TexasKnife and USAKnifemaker for not too expensive either. Stabilized wood can start to get a little pricey, but Mark Farley at BurlSource (.us, not .com) is a fantastic source.

There are a couple people that you can send knives to for heat treating. Darrin Sanders over at BladeForums is an awesome guy who provides a very affordable service. Big companies will do it too, but many of them are strictly stainless.