The tools - part #2 - powered tools

Even though it is possible to make knives completely without powered tools, these will make your life considerably easier. so what it is that you may want/need.

Drill press

I have already mentioned it in the part #1 and only add it here for completeness. I got the Bosch PDB 40 for about 250€, but you can get a simpler drill press for half that much. I would add that you also want to get a drill vise so that you are able to safely and accurately position different parts you need to drill into. One will cost you around 30 - 50 €.

Steel cutting powered tools

Sooner or later you will find out that cutting blanks with hack saw is slow and tedious process - in particular with larger knives. So - the options are the following:

• Dedicated metal band saw. 
• Angle grinder. This is a relatively cheap (50€ - 70€) and fast solution. 
• Other types of hand-held saws which hold the blade on one end only like jigsaw. Some of these are designed to cut metal, so that could be an option too. However I have no experience there, nor did I find others that would use these kind of saws.

There are also options that you should rather avoid. In the first place these are wood band saws. The problem there is not necessarily in the power of the saw, but wood band saws run with much higher speeds and use different belt blades that will dull within few seconds on metal.


Metal band Saw

These start at around 400€. Make sure you get one that can be positioned vertically and have additional working plate attached. The fully professional vertical metal band saws are in 3000+€ range and I do not consider them here a viable alternative here for cost and size reasons.

Angle grinder

You may ask yourself - what is angle grinder good for? It is indeed not a tool for a detailed work, but it can be used to cut out (roughly) blanks. This only makes sense if you have a grinder to finish the blanks as it is advisable to leave 2-3 mm of material. That much steel would take long to remove with a file, but even with a small 1x30" belt grinder it takes just a few minutes. It is also one of the cheapest tools for this job.

I have used angle grinder to cut 8 blanks (180 mm petty knives) in about 30 minutes. That would have taken much longer with a hack saw.

Before you start to grind away do not forget to use your safety gear - you do not want to breathe the freshly burned steel and steel dust or get hit by flying pieces of steel or cutting wheel in your eyes or face.

You will want to use 1 mm thick cutting discs. I have completely used 1 disc on those 8 blanks.

If you decide to get an angle grinder, get the 125 mm instead of 115 mm. They cost the same, the cutting discs cost the same, but 125 mm will last you longer. 1000 W of power is enough. Getting a weaker model does not really save you much and a stronger one is not really needed for this job (the price start to go up for more powerful models.

After 30 minutes of work.

Last but not least - there are guys who manage to grind blades with an angle grinder (I presume with the sanding discs). There are some youtube videos on how to do that (even building a grinding jig). It would not be my method of choice - if anything because of the noise, dirt/smell and potential to unnecessarily overheat the steel, but hey, it can be done.


Belt saw (for wood)

When making handles from wood (in particular hidden tang handles or WA handles) what often means that you need to remove larger amount of material from the handle before you will start with some finer shaping. There are many options how to do that and one of them is belt saw. I am planning on getting one to be able to cut large wood pieces to blocks.

Disc grinder

There are several uses for one. I currently only have a very small one - just 125mm in diameter, but it already helps me to flatten metal before cutting out the blanks or bolsters and also do some grinding on wood (squaring up blocks before further use). Should you be getting one go for a full size (300mm or 12") one. Be careful when using one - these machines like to throw things around.

Belt grinder 

When one mentions a belt grinder in the context of knifemaking, one immediately has in mind a 2x72" 2kW machine with all bells and whistles for 2000+ $ or €. Sure - that is indeed a tool of trade for many full time knifemakers, but if you are just starting you may want to have a look at a small and simple 1x30" grinder that will cost you under 100 $/€ (OK, you will soon be out more than that on belts). While not a necessity, I am finding more and more use for mine. Check out my article on 1x30" belt sanders for more details. These little machines may surprise you and considerably speed up many steps in the knife making. I am currently working on my Project #7 which is the first when I use a belt grinder to grind the bevels prior and after HT. I seem to need about 1 - 1.5 hours to grind a 180 mm blank to 80-90% of the final geometry (before HT). Of course - with more power and experience one could be a lot faster, but this is where I am with my 3rd blade ground with this little too.

1x30" belt grinder with Norton Blaze #60 belt

Vacuum cleaner

This is definitely not a 'must have' item, but an industrial vacuum cleaner will not only allow you to keep your shop clean, but you can attach it to some of the powered tools (e.g. some disc grinders, band saws, belt grinders, etc.) and that may keep the dust (in particular wood or other handle material) to get spread over the whole workshop. I have a small disc grinder and attaching a vacuum cleaner made huge difference.

Important to note here is that you do not want to use a normal household vacuum cleaner, as those will not survive long sucking fine dust and in particular metal dust. I finally chose Metabo 32 L and my first impressions are very positive.

Start grinding wood and you will really want one.

This is of course not an exclusive list. There are many more tools which you may or may not need (buffing wheel, dremel, etc.). Buffer will be something you want if you are making some hard wood handles for knives.  A dremel can help you with some detailed work around bolsters and help with many other smaller tasks.

The tools - part #1 - basic tools

There will be many tools that will find their way to your workshop. But you do not need them all at the start. Here I would like to first talk about those that you will need right from the start.

If you are just starting on considering it, you have surely seen a couple of videos on youtube that are meant for the beginner. There is lots of good stuff out there. I personally found videos from several knifemakers very helpful (see a short, non exclusive list below), but I found that usually far from all tools are mentioned.  Since I was really starting from scratch I realized that those little things add up to a considerable budget. For that reason here is a more comprehensive list of items with their use and necessity 'grade' - at least as I found them to be.

If you already have some sort of workshop with basic tool, than you may really need very little to start, but for guys like me - living in a flat with just a small basement with limited space, it does make sense to consider what it is that you need and how are you going to manage it.

Safety equipment.

Do NOT skip this just because it does not sound manly or relevant - especially if yo are new to this kind of stuff and have little experience in using tools or working in a shop. You really do not need much to avoid unnecessary injuries and exposure. You are basically going to need 3 things + some nice-to-have

• Safety goggles (about 10€) will keep you eyes safe from little sharp objects (steel while cutting, sand paper grit, wooden splinter, etc.). I would not turn a belt or disc grinder without having these on.
•  Respiratory mask with filters - something like the half mask from 3M (series 6000 or 7000) or even full face mask (which will give better eye protection). The mask is super important. I wear mine always when I cut, file or sand stuff. Be specially careful if you plan using G10 (read up on the topic). I would add that with half mask the safety google will not sit quite as well. I currently use half mask, but consider getting full mask for this reason.
• Working glows. It may feel clunky wearing these, but they will keep your hands safe from trivial scratches and bruises (which will still take days to heal - in particular if your hands were dirty and/or oily) - you hand will often slip when cutting or filing. How eager you will be to wear the gloves will depend on the temperature in your shop, but my advice is - wear gloves every time you can. Unless you will need more precision, just keep them on. It will also help your hands not to look completely wasted at your day job.
• Should you be working with heat sources (kiln, gas torch) or tools that throw sparks (grinder) than it may make sense to get a fire extinguisher - in particular if you are working next to pile of cardboard boxes like I do :)
• Also - prepare a small first aid kit to be able to clean a wound and be able to stop bleeding - you need to be able to access it with one hand - as most of your injuries will be on your hands.
• I have recently got a face cover - 3M G500 that also has ear protection and it is excellent. In particular when grinding or working with angle grinder it offers full face protection and can be worn with the half-mask rather comfortably.

Basic safety set - goggles,respirator (half mask) and gloves.

Recent addition - head cover G500 from 3M

Notebook (an analogue one)

For me - this is one of the most important tools. I keep a log on what, why and how have I done things. I note mistakes under 'lessons learned' tags and also ideas (mine or from someone else) that have helped me to improve something. I would make a sketch or drawing of what I plan to do. I can always browse through my notes, find out how much time I needed to finish something and later may try to optimize the process. It also gives me a bit of feel that I actually did something - in particular in the stage, when I do not have any of my projects finished, but several at works.

I recommend A4 size with hard cover, so that you have enough room for some drawings and so that the notebook survives the environment.

The workbench

There is no way around. Without a stable workbench you can not start to make knives, unless you want to recreate stone age conditions. When I started I quickly realized that a decent, stable workbench is not cheap. I tried to find a used one, but nothing was available at reasonable price locally, so I finally decided to buy a new one. I got one from Powertools (in Germany) and while far from perfect (I naively expected more for 250€ shipped), I made it near-perfect with some added stabilization bars. Apart from the size (mine is 150cm long, 60cm wide and 92 cm tall) - the most important number is height - you want something around 85 - 95 cm, so that you do not have to bend when standing next to it and working. You will find that most of the work (because of the effort involved) needs to be done while standing and not sitting, so a bench of 80 - 85 cm tall may prove not tall enough. Also - the bench should have a wooden top board. It will allow you to mount a vice or other tools (or, as in my case - properly mount the articulated lamps)

Sturdy workbench with wood top. Yes, this is tidy in my book :)

Vise

I got mine, rather subtly build wise with 10 cm wide jaws, before I decided to take on knifemaking and I was concerned about its robustness, but I was pleasantly surprised that it works pretty well - even with added rotation base. In general - I would go with 10 or 12 cm large (wide) jaws and rotation ability around vertical axis. Horizontal rotation is a nice-to-have. I have not really needed it yet, but have seen on youtube that there is a legitimate case for it. One more detail - because of space constraints I have mounted my vise on separate board that I attach on the workbench with large clamps, so I can remove it when I need more space. Remember - that 150 cm long workbench is all I have.

Even though on the subtle side, this 100 mm vise does its job well.
The rotating base is very useful.

Hack saw

Since my presumption is that you do not have (or can not) use some sort of powered saw (band saw for steel cost upwards from 300€) - you want to get a decent hack saw. These do not cost much. Try to get one that has good provision to tension the blade and to set the blade under an angle to the saw (you need that if your make long cuts and the blank you are just cutting out starts to get in the way). Mine was about 20€ (something I consider 'no name'). But the real point are the blades. Most probably the one that will come with the saw will be far from the best you can get. For metal you want 24 teeth per inch (they do well with wood as well), bi-metal blades. Do not waste money buying them by piece - get 10 of them and get the best you can. They really make a difference once you start cutting out a blade from a steel. With a good quality saw you will be able to cut a knife blank with 10 cm blade out of 3-4 mm thick piece of steel in less than 30 minutes.

The hammer shown has a round end excellent for peening. The heavy duty scissors is
most often used to cut sanding paper.

Files

You will need a few different files one way or another, but if you plan to file the bevels (free hand or with a jig), than you want the best files you can get. In my case these are Swiss DICK Precision files. I have several of them today, but the following ones would be the most relevant to start with (I am quoting the ID from the DICK web page for clarity for some cases):

• 112300: 300 mm (12") flat file, Cut #1 (bastard in US naming convention). This is the main workhorse for the bevel grinding. I also used it to rough finish a blank after I was done with a hack saw. Consider 300 mm to be the minimal length, 350 mm would be even better.
• A possible alternative to the bastard file would be a dreadnought file - it has curved teeth and should have less of a tendency to clog during filing. I did not try one yet though.
• 200 - 250 mm flat file Cut #3 (medium cut file). I use this file mostly to smooth the edge of the blank out, or to work on ricasso shoulders for hidden tang knives.
• 1166200: 200 mm round file with diameter of 7.8mm - this is about the right size to work around the choil area. The file gets thinner towards the tip which can be practical
• 1156200 (or 1156250) Half round file in Cut #1. This file would allow you to contour the blank for a full tang knives. 
• Set of needle files. The main purpose of these is to work on bolsters for hidden tang knives as getting a nice clean fit is what you are after. You will need to very thin flat files as you will be filing openings as small as 3x10 mm and the file must fit in that opening. You will also want a very thin needle file - see Project #1 and #2 for details.

My most used files. The 300 mm #1 file is not shown as it is mounted on the grinding setup.
The 3 large files are 1x 250 mm and 2x 200 mm.

Sanding paper

You will need sanding paper to sand non hardened (e.g. when flattening the steel before you start), hardened (removing scale after HT , finishing the blade) and wood (handle finishing). The metal sanding makes more sense with wet sanding paper as it allows to last longer and will give you smoother finish. I have started with Matador (black on blue backing) papers and while it is a nice paper, I found that it was looking grit grains what gave me some problems when finishing the blade. The I have learned about Rhynowet Redline sanding paper. The feedback from knifemakers was so positive, that I directly ordered 50 sheets in grits from 60 to 400. My first impressions are very positive and the paper even costs a little less than the Matador. Within my limited experience I do not hesitate to recommend this sanding paper.

My stock of Rhynowet sanding paper. I will be adding #600 and #1200 soon.

Drill 

You have basically 3 options. Manual drill, hand held drill and drill press. All 3 of them will get the job done. I have started with the hand held Li-ion drill I already had. Power was not the problem, but if you want to drill holes at well defined positions under well defined angles, than even a cheap drill press will make a huge difference.

It did not take me long to realize this and I got the Bosch PBD 40 and it is a very capable tool. There are cheaper options, but here in DE this particular one got very good feedback and I am happy with it.

Lightening

Easily overlooked, but you really want several strong light sources. In today's age you can get powerful LED bulbs. They are not cheap, but last long, consume little energy and, more importantly, do not get hot and thus do not want to grill you. I have in total about 40W of LED power divided in 3 lamps - one is on the ceiling and two are articulated lamps - one on each side of the workbench. I will get more sturdy lamps in the future (these were 10€ a piece and are meant for a writing table), but these do work, one just need to be careful with them. The most important feature is that they are articulated - I am able to get the light where I need it. On top of that I have a small lamp with a clamp - I often use this one 'free hand' to check for scratches when finish-sanding a blade (so that I can leave it clamped). Ideally I would like to get one more lamp from top-behind in the future.

Here you can see all 4 lamps.

There are many more tool you will sooner or later need. I will be posting a few more articles on this topic.

Do not underestimate 1x30" belt grinders

If you have ground a few knives with a file or filing jig, than you already know how much work it is to first prepare the blank for grinding, grind the bevels and then grind the final edge once the knife is heat treated. In particular if you find out that you actually need to thin the blade after HT because you left it too thick before (ask me how I know - see Project #3 for details).

But you probably also already know that a good quality 2x72" belt grinder cost around $2000 (OK, you can get a simpler 2x72" like Grizzly for about $600 in US, but it Europe you are out of luck).

There are however ways in between and about the cheapest option there is is a 1x30" grinder. These seem all to look rather similar and may come with a small (125 mm diameter) integrated disc grinder and cost under $100/100€. The question is - are these any good? The short answer is ... YES

Still clean. The work rest for the disc grinder is not attached yet.

The grinder in question is marketed in Germany under the name Scheppach. The belt grinder has some limited possibility to center the belt (with a small knob on the rear wheel) and that is it. It is even possible to attach a vacuum cleaner hose on the bottom-left side (something that proved very useful alraedy). The exposed part is partially supported with a thin steel plate (barely visible in the photo above) and part is unsupported (slack belt). You can also remove the upped plastic cover and use the upper wheel for grinding curves.

Basic features

The 'platen' of the grinder is a relatively thin L-shaped (attached with 2 screws) piece of steel that flexes relatively a bit under pressure.  If you plan doing some more precise work you will probably want to replace it with something more stable, but  you will have to make it yourself. Still - the platen as it is is usable.

I would also like to mention the speed of the belt. On this machine it is around 13 m/s - that is pretty much spot on - in particular given the low power of the grinder. Important is, it is not super high speed grinder as with just 250W it would be way to easy to stall (which you can still do, but it can be avoided with a little experience)

The work rest on this particular grinder as made out of aluminium and is not particularly strong. It is attached on one side and it does not really allow to be set under an angle.

The 'platen' and the work rest.

The side cover of the belt grinder has an attachment point for a vacuum cleaner. Since I got the Metabo ASA 32 L industrial vacuum cleaner I use it all the time. barely any dust (steel or wood) gets away.

Side cover of the belt grinder.

The disc grinder has a bit more substantial work rest (though still made out of aluminium) that can be adjusted from 45 to 90 degrees. A plastic part can be attached that allows to attach a hose from a vacuum cleaner. This proved VERY efficient in minimising the amount of dust (in particular when grinding wood) that would spread across the workshop.

The translucent  cover of the top wheel can be removed and you can grind some curves around a handle.

From inside

Removing the belt cover you can see the bottom large wheel that transfers the power from the motor to the belt, the top wheel and finally the rear wheel which has an adjustment knob.

This adjustment knob has 2 functions (which would be adjustable separately on a more upscale grinder) It tensions the belt AND it allows for certain left/right adjustments.

Adjustment knob on the rear wheel.

How to set up

To attach and adjust a belt I found the following procedure to work the best:

1. Remove the plastic cover and unscrew the adjustment knob completely.
2. Put a belt on the bottom and back wheel - 1/2 of the width.  Hang the belt loosely on the screw next to the upper wheel.
3. Press with your left hand of the rear wheel and push it against the spring (towards the platen). 
4. Slide the belt on the upper wheel with your right hand.
5. Gently push on the belt from the side to get it fill width on all 3 wheels.
6. Screw the adjustment knob until you see the rear wheel moving (tensioning the belt)
7. Turn on the grinder briefly and see how the belt runs. If it is too far left or right adjust the rear wheel. If it keeps jumping off the wheels on the left irrespectively how much you adjust the rear wheel, than you will need to use a little brute force and push on the frame close to the upper wheel towards the right. I did have to do that. This will affect the belt alignment agains the platen, but it will run well without jumping off the wheels. 
8. Repeat the step 7 gently until you get the belt running stably with the adjustment know around the middle of its range.

Preparing to mount a belt.

Pushing on the rear wheel (once the adjustment knob has been screwed  loose).

Disc grinder side with the vacuum hose attached.
That big green thing in the background is the Metabo vacuum cleaner :)

Belts

The grinder comes with some sort of cheap aluminum oxide belt which will not last much when working with steel. To grind steel you will need to get belts that were designed for such purpose. In general this means to get Zirconia (also called ceramic) belts of some sorts. In Germany there are Klingspor belts available, I have got a few for testing, but I have not been too impressed (part of the reason was the grit - 24 is way too coarse and breaks off the belt easily).

Some really nice belts: from left ro right: 3M Trizat 'gator', Sait 7S #80, Norton Blaze #60 , Sait 7S #240

You basically need (want) 2 types of belts for the start (that is what I have at the moment)

• Ceramic belts (like Norton Blaze or Sait 7S) for bevel grinding or handle shaping. These belts are relatively hard and last a long time
• Softer belts (3M Trizact - 'gator' or 'normal' - these are available in higer grits and are great for removig scratches, or getting around the corners of a handle or a knife heel on a slack part of the belt.

I have also briefly tested Sait 7S and Norton Blaze belts. I have used Sait 7S in 40 grit to profile a blank (after rough cutting with angle grinder) and I have finished 6 blanks with single belt and the belt will do a couple more.

Norton Blaze in 60 grit seem to be the right fit for this grinder - they cat plenty fast (remember - this baby has only 1/3 hp) and seems to last well.

So - what can you do with this baby grinder?

• Profile blanks - this is so much faster than with a file AND i allows you to use a quick and dirty method of cutting your blanks with an angle grinder (the cheapest 'powered way' to do so).
• Grind bevels - there is quite some learning curve - the narrow belt does not make it easy to get even grind and the platen is not quite as sturdy, but it can be done - and it is of course faster than with a file.
• Final-grind bevels after heat treatment (care needs to be taken not to overheat the edge)
• Shape handles - you can use the slack belt part for easier rounding of the blades and the upper wheel for some radius grinding
• Shape bolsters
• Shape your hand-made fixtures and tools (i.e. to take off edges of a file if necessary)
• The little sanding wheel can be used (with some experience) to flatten/square blade steel and handle blocks. You would want larger disc sander for that, but hey, once it is there why not giving it a try.

Weak points

Not evetything is perfect though. With these simple machines you will have hard time to square things up, the 'platen' is rather weak and will flex under too much pressure making keeping constant angle harder. And, obviously, the narrow belt will make it harder to get even grind. But none of these little deficiencies is a show stopper. You have also very limited possibility to set the tension and position of the belt on the grinder.

A few examples

Grinding a bevel on a blade.

Grinding the glued WA handle to rectangular shape.

Flattening the sides of the handle with the disc grinder before final shaping.

Final shaping of the handle with the disc grinder.

Grinding to shape of integral handles (here birch bark handle).

General warning

When using the disc grinder (this one or bigger model) - be careful - if you do not hold the item you are working on firmly and the grinder bites into it (dents it in the process), it will send it flying across your workshop. Happened to me a few times with the WA handle shown above. So be careful and wear your safety gear.

Dust

If you start using the grinder (and in particular the disc grinder) to grind wood, you will find out that it will produce crazy amount of fine wood dust that will get everywhere. I finally broke down and got and industrial vacuum cleaner (Metabo ASA 32 L) which can be attached to simple plastic covers and can directly suck-away good 95% of the dust produced.

In General - steel dust is rather heavy and does not tend to spread quite as much as wooden dust. In particular the disc grinder will tend to fan the fine wooden dust over quite a distance, so using some sort of suction device really helps.

The costs

Let's be honest here - the cost of this little grinder itself will sooner than later be topped by the cost of the grinding belts. Remember - the worse/slower the belt cuts, the faster will the blade heat up as the hot material that is directly in contact with the belt is not being removed and all the work the grinder does is being turned to heat.

You should expect to pay around 2 $/€ per good quality ceramic grinding belt and  more for those awesome 3M Trizact "gator" belts. And you want them.

The vacuum cost me around 150€ (but it also helps to keep the workshop in shape). There are cheaper models for under 100 € that will do the same job.

Summary

The take-aways are:

• This is a little capable machine that will alow you to get decent results and to learn how to use a belt grinder.
• When grinding handle material you may need a vacuum that will keep the dust in check
• Be careful with the disc grinder - it likes to send stuff flying around.
• Get high quality ceramic belts for steel grinding (like Norton Blaze or Sait 7S). Cheap aluminium oxide will last just a fraction of a ceramic belt and is not cost effective.
• The cost of the grinder will be quickly topped by the cost of the belts

Please do not hesitate to ask questions or share your views or ideas :)

Bevel grinding jig by Aaron Gough

When I started toying with the idea of knife making I was mostly put off by the fact that one needs a belt grinder (or so I thought at that time) to be able to grind the bevels and I had neither the workshop space, nor did I want to spend 1500€+ on one. This changed when I have accidentally came across the video from Aaron in which he describes in detail how to make a beveling jig using only very simple tools and materials - at that point I decided to give it a try - thank you Aaron! :)

I am not going to copy in words what Aaron describes very well in his video, I would only add my experience and some slight adjustments I did to the basic design. So before you read on, please watch the original video:

From my point of view the main properties of this jig are the following:

Advantages

• Faster than a free hand filing. Takes about an hour per side on a 10 cm long outdoor knife blade
• Fast learning curve
• Easy to get very consistently ground bevels and plunge lines - much easier than when you start learning how to use a belt grinder or free-hand filing.
• You can create flat or convex grinds

Disadvantages 

• Once you get to kitchen knives you need to get more careful about the grinding angles (as these will be as low as 1°)
• Also - with those low grinding angles (and large contact area while grinding) the file will have a tendency to skate on the blade (it is NOT dull, do not have yourself fooled)
• Long thing blades of kitchen knife will tend to flex under pressure while grinding and thus changing the grinding angle.
• Obviously slower than a belt grinder
• Does not work on hardened blades/steel (the files usually have hardness around HRC 64 - 66 - that is too close to the hardness of the blade, so you would just dull the files without removing much material.

My changes to the original design from Aaron

Aaron pretty much nailed the design. I found that the steel rod that serves as a guide was producing rather loud and unpleasant noise as it was riding in the steel bolt, so I have replaced the bolt with a 10mm thick PVC board with a hole attached to a piece of wood on 2 threaded rods for height adjustment. Now this part of the jig is completely silent.

I have also added a second raw of mounting holes for working on smaller blades and to avoid grinding into the wood when getting closer to the tip.

A small update was adding a 4mm thick rubber ring to the bottom clamp to protect the blade from damage when accidentally bumping to it with the clamp. A simple, but effective solution.

How to grind kitchen knives with this jig

The main difference between kitchen and outdoor knives:

• Longer AND thinner blade
• Much more acute grind
• A simple full flat grind will not make for a great  kitchen knife  - you want either a wide-bevel grind or a convex grind of some sorts
• Kitchen knives have pronounced distal taper from the handle towards the tip.

The above means - you will be working on a large blade that in non hardened state is not all that stiff. To grind the convex grind will take some basic math to thin of in advance and calculate the angles (and thus the height setting of the bolt) to make.

Before you start grinding make sure you have the centre line (or two lines close to centre that mark how thick the blade should be once it is ground) scribed onto the cutting edge. It is also a good idea to scribe a centre line on the spine so that you can grind the distal taper symmetrically.

Once you have the design and in particular the grind (geometric cross section) on paper - start to work your way down and draw straight lines how you want to get there with the grinding jig. In general you want to start from the edge (with the steepest grinding angle) and work your way towards the spine of the knife in subsequent steps. After each step you want to remove the knife from the holder and measure the blade thickness at few positions (and different distances from the cutting edge) to see whether the grind follows what you have intended. Remember - you can always remove metal if needed, but not put it back on the blade. So proceed carefully. Important is - before you start with the first grind measure the thickness of the blade carefully and calculate how thick the edge should be once you are finished with the first grind.

Starting with first grind on 240 mm gyuto blade

Little tip: In the photo above note the brass screw used as a stop-pin (to keep the blade from moving). Kitchen knife blades are ground pretty thin towards the tip and thinner than any flat heat screw is. Using brass screw (softer than the steel) would mean that as your grind gets thin the screw will be also ground thinner and will not disturb the process. After that you have a nice flat stop-pin screw :)

In the knife shown below I have approximated the convex grind with 3 planes. You start with the one closest to the edge. Remember that you do not want to grind the edge to 0 thickness prior to HT - you want the edge to have some thickness (say 0.3mm) so that it does not crack or warp in the quench. The grind 2 and 3 are made under smaller angles, but you do not grind down to the edge, but stop a certain distance from the edge. I stopped 5 mm from the edge with the second grind and 10 mm from the edge with the 3rd grind. You can blend these multiple grinds afterward with cross-drawing a file (more on that below).

First grind nearly finished

Before changing the grinding angle re-paint the already ground part of the blade and scribe (or paint) in the distance from the edge where you want stop with subsequent grinding.

3rd grinding step - here I am stopping cca 10mm from the edge

You want to switch sides after each step and ideally a few times during the first grind as this is the one step in which you remove most of the material. The reason is as you grind higher up the blade you start to loose support area (once you switch to the other side). While you can not avoid that, with regular swapping you can minimize the effect of possible asymmetry while grinding. 

Once you are done with the grinding jig you move to free-hand grinding. You get one or two steps finer file (the Cut #1 would leave crazy deep scratches) - I am using Cut #2.  Holding the file on both ends with you hands you get very good control. If you have you edge at the final, pre-HT thickness and do not want to grind it down, than mark the edge with a permanent marker.

Cross-draw 'jig'. Note the small clamp in front of the tip that serves as a tip protector.

My cross-drawing 'jig' is just a piece of wood slightly shaped as the blade so that the blade, so the wood will not get in the way. Important - make sure the cutting edge is not sticking outside the wooden support - you risk cutting yourself and/or damaging the cutting edge (which at this stage is weak and easy to dent). I also use a simple clamp some 5-10 mm from the tip that stops the file from sliding off the tip. The reason is - you work with quite some force and if you slip off the blade you will most probably not manage to stop the next stroke and will hit the blade tip with a file and badly bend it (beyond repair). My first blade lost about 5 mm on the tip for this very reason.

You can speed the this process by slightly tilting the file and using the edge of the file. This will make the file bite much more aggressively into the steel, but it will leave deep scratches. Removing them with files and sanding paper will yield some additional material removal and if you do not take that into account you will loose some blade height - that is what happened to me with this very knife.

Deep scratches after cross-drawing with edge of the file. These are deeper than they may appear.

The solution is - stop some 0.3 mm from the desired blade thickness (geometry) and proceed with using the whole contact surface of the file and once you have removed all the deep scratches then  proceed to about grit 60 wet sanding paper (I use WD-40 as lubricant). Clean the blade (remove scratches) up to about grit 240 (i.e. 60, 80, 120, 180, 240) before going for HT. It minimizes the chance of micro-fractures during the quench and will also make your life easier finishing the blade after HT (since the blade will be much harder then).

After HT the knife will be too hard to work with files. If you have left the knife too thick further up from the edge you will need the most aggressive material that allows you to remove metal - for me it was Atoma 140 diamond plate. If you did the pre-HT grinding right, than you only need to work on the first 5 mm behind the edge - that should be doable on coarse sharpening stones. You can also use a diamond plate, but I would not go with one as coarse as 140, because you may 'overshoot' if you do not account for removing the scratches in subsequent steps (which is also material removal). Atoma 400 would probably be a better idea. I plan to stick to water stones if everything goes according to plan and starting with either Bester 220 or JNS 300.

So, this is what I have to say to using this grinding jig including some subsequent steps. Remember - this in only one possibly way - do not hesitate to come up with your own approach. And of course - have fun :)

Last but not least - thank you Aaron for sharing this simple, but very effective grinding jig!