Just a handy little knife

With a bit of fancy























Blade's O1 and about 4", grip is antler, fittings are brass with a bit of filework on the edges.

Just what IS going to happen to Russia?

The Geek had this up a few days back, and there've been other discussions about this for some time. Barring a miracle, I think Russia is pretty much screwed, and I think the big culprit is communism.

That faith dominated the Soviet Union for decades, and they're going to be dealing with the effects of it for decades longer(assuming Russia doesn't break up completely or get taken over). Lots of countries broke from being run by royal families and did well; Russia made a start and then the commies took over, cementing their control by any means available. Face it, at best a country run for so long by people like Stalin & Co. and their followers would take a long damn time to get over it. With the multiple shocks starting when the Wall came down, it was iffy but they had a real chance. But with so many- mostly older, true, but still...- actually wishing Stalin would come back...

I hate to see it happen.

Well, Murtha? We're waiting

And waiting. For you to actually show some integrity, considering what a jerk you've been proven to be:
In his recommendation, Lt. Col. Paul Ware said murder charges brought against Sharratt were based on unreliable witness accounts, poor forensic evidence and questionable legal theories.

"The government version is unsupported by independent evidence," Ware wrote in an 18-page report. "To believe the government version of facts is to disregard clear and convincing evidence to the contrary."

Which is a fancy way of saying 'innocent of the charges made against him'.

Mr. Murtha, those Marines and their families are waiting for your apology. Just in case you have the guts and integrity to make it.

Which I will not hold my breath waiting for.

Human-caused Globular Warmering Updated

my ass:
These graphs were created by NASA's Reto Ruedy and James Hansen (who shot to fame when he accused the administration of trying to censor his views on climate change). Hansen refused to provide McKintyre with the algorithm used to generate graph data, so McKintyre reverse-engineered it. The result appeared to be a Y2K bug in the handling of the raw data.

McKintyre notified the pair of the bug; Ruedy replied and acknowledged the problem as an "oversight" that would be fixed in the next data refresh.

NASA has now silently released corrected figures, and the changes are truly astounding. The warmest year on record is now 1934. 1998 (long trumpeted by the media as record-breaking) moves to second place. 1921 takes third. In fact, 5 of the 10 warmest years on record now all occur before World War II. Anthony Watts has put the new data in chart form, along with a more detailed summary of the events.

Which article led to this:
Two months ago, I reported on an effort to validate this network. A volunteer group headed by meteorologist Anthony Watts had found serious problems. Not only did sites fail to meet the NCDC's requirements, but encroaching development had put many in ridiculously unsuitable locations -- on hot black asphalt, next to trash burn barrels, beside heat exhaust vents, even attached to hot chimneys and above outdoor grills.

Got that? Sites recording weather data, including the temp readings used to say "We're going to burn up!"[/algore] were in not very suitable locations that would give higher readings.

Doesn't matter to the True Believers, as they have The Goreacle to lead them to his Revealed Truth, but for us infidels some very interesting information.

Update: here's more

Point shooting, and the current e-Postal Match Updated with Bill Jordan pictures

The current match is at Carnaby Fudge, and the first stage is 'no sights, point and shoot'. Which I rather like.

Current handgun training tends to be 'always use the sights unless you're at contact range', and without question it's generally easier to hit accurately, even at close range, with sights. But point-shooting can be very fast and- with practice- very accurate. And considering the number of reports I've read where someone said they never really used the sights(in normal manner), I think skipping it is a bad idea. At least some familiarizing would be a good idea.*

James at Hell in a Handbasket has a good piece on it here, and if you look around the gunboards you can find more. If you have time, one book I'd strongly recommend is No Second Place Winner, by Bill Jordan. If you've been around the shooting world a few years, you've probably heard of him; he was a Big Name for a long time, with a lot of years on the Border Patrol and having(as one guy put it) ended more gunfights than most would-be tough guys ever thought about starting. The book's good for the stories if nothing else, but his chapter on 'Combat Style Shooting' is what we're after here. To shorten it quite a bit, the closer the bad guy, the closer you have the pistol to you when you fire. To illustrate his method, I scanned these two pages from the book:















If you've never tried it, or never seen someone who's in practice shooting this way, the accuracy you can get is amazing. Jordan would, for demos, stand aspirin tablets on edge on a table about ten or fifteen feet away, draw and fire(S&W Model 19) and shoot the tablets off without touching the table. The man who handled firearms training for OK Highway Patrol for years, a gentleman named Dan Combs, was about that good, and I got to watch him a couple of times. Flat damned amazing, both accuracy and speed.

I'll throw in, the way dad was taught(and he taught me) was to get both hands on the piece as soon as possible: so for anything beyond contact range to, say, five or six feet, use both hands as the additional control and accuracy is worth it. Jordan was a big, strong man(look at the hand holding that Model 19) and shot with one hand a lot, and could handle .357 Mag loads one-handed with no problem even in rapid fire; most of us ain't quite to that point.

That kind of speed and accuracy takes a LOT of practice for all but a few gifted people, but for the practical need of placing shots in an attacker's vitals at close range, just about anybody can pick it up with a bit of practice. It's a skill well worth working on. Let me close with a couple of paragraphs from the end of the chapter:

"One last suggestion: For 90% of your practice, draw from the holster and fire one shot. It's that first shot that is important and it is the one most difficult to place accurately. Don't practice "hosing" your shots, depending on seeing hits to get you on target. You learn nothing from this and you are lost if you can't see the strike of your bullets. Your crutch won't work at night or with no background to mark your shots, and then you will be in bad trouble. The first shot is all important, and if it is in, the others will follow.

For the other 10%, if you are concentrating on that first shot and it goes in you will have no difficulty with the rest of the burst. your wrist and forearm will stiffen automatically for recoil control. And above all, take al the time necessary but don't dawdle. Remember, "speed's fine, but accuracy's final"- if you are given time to display it!"


*A while back I read a piece by a police officer whose department had gone back to training on point-shooting after numerous reports of close range and/or low-light fights found that officers either didn't use the sights(seldom) or kept moving their eyes from sights to target(very often); if I remember right, the training improved their record quite a bit.

UPDATED It's been two years since I wrote this, and I've got a new post up here that touches on the subject. I'll also add that I think you should practice firing quick pairs in point-shooting, same as sighted fire; What I should have written here originally was 'fire single shots to learn point-shooting, and when you have the idea start firing pairs'.

And please remember: I'm not an Expert, I'm a guy stating opinions and thoughts. Don't think I'm the last word on a subject(I may luck out at some point says ego, but ignore that); if you want to try something I've mentioned, check out everything you can on the subject. There are very good books, like Massad Ayoob's and Jordan's, and nowadays lots of stuff on blogs(remember, some of those folks are just like me, while some of them really are experts), so there's lots out there to read on just about any subject or method you can think of. Do your research.

Yeah, just a nice little multi-culti school

As long as it's the RIGHT multi-culti:

The first New York Charter School for Arab girls is selling T-shirts emblazoned with the words "Intifada - New York."

The principle of the school, Dhabah Almontaser, said "I think it's pretty much an opportunity for girls to express that they are part of New York City society ... and shaking off oppression."

Just absolutely freakin' wonderful, isn't it?

Only thing I'll post on this piece of idiocy

is the same thing Uncle, Xavier and Kevin said:
"Rule 4, Goddammit!"

Here's another one to hold you over

Spent a couple of days visiting my parents(not long enough, but what time I had) and I need some sleep before work. So here's another past product of the forge:














Blade is 5160 spring steel, about 11" from the guard to the point and about 16" overall. Fittings are copper, and the grip is a piece of leg bone from a whitetail. Yeah, the forge marks on the blade were left there deliberately; I like the way it looks.

Cutting tests

One thing I've always done, with every blade I've made, is test it. Both for cutting ability, edge-holding and toughness. Reason is, most of the blades I make have been tools, not wallhangers. Something like the dagger, I know, isn't likely to be actually used much, but it might. And it might be at a critical time. The other stuff, even the somewhat fancy, I expect will be used, sometimes a lot. And one thing that could keep me up at night would be the thought of someone really needing a knife I made to work and hold up to stress, and failing. It's not bridge engineering, but it's still not to be tolerated.

So I worked up a routine, varying a bit for different blade types. First step is to look the blade over very closely after heat-treating. Then sharpen it*. The most basic test is toughness, for which I take the blade, clamp the tip in a vise(how much in the vise depends on length/thickness) and flex it back & forth. It should flex and return to straight, repeatedly(amount of flex depending on the blade).

Second is the edge hardness with the brass rod, posted before.

Third is cutting. For edge-holding, I use 1/4" sisal or manilla rope, depending on which I've got or can find. I clamp a piece of 1x3 or 2x4 lumber in the vise. Then I use a marker to mark an area about an inch long. Then lay the rope on the wood, set the blade on it a little back from the end and push it down to cut through, then move the blade back a touch and repeat, over and over. A blade made of O1 or 5160 or harrow tooth, any good high-carbon steel, should make at least fifty cuts, and that area still be sharp enough to shave hair off your arm, and at seventy-five cleanly slice a piece of typing paper**.

That's for all knives. For a big one that might well be used for heavy cutting(firewood, etc.), I save branches pruned from the trees to test with, limb thickness depending on blade size, I usually use 2-3" for this(a lot of makers use 2x4). Set the branch on a solid surface(bigger branch) and chop it in two, then repeat. It's got to do this at least twice with no damage to the edge or bending of the blade, and still be at least usably sharp. The typing paper is good for this; you hold it by a corner, start near your grip and slice. If it won't cut it, or snags the paper where the blade's been cutting, problem: if it just won't cut it dulled too much, if it snags the edge roughened or nicked. If the latter, check the wood. I've seen a knot in some types of wood hard enough to mess with a knife edge, and if it's an old limb or used 2x4 there might have been a nail or staple in it.

That's the general process I use. It is subject to adjustment depending on the individual knife(I wouldn't expect one forged from a railroad spike to hold an edge like harrow tooth, for instance, but it'll be hell for tough).


*Remember, if the final grinding and polishing did not move the edge back any, you may well have an edge with a little bit of carbon loss from the heat-treating. I've read a couple of makers who say they don't expect a knife to show it's best edge-holding until it's been sharpened at least twice to make sure that decarburized layer is removed. And most bladesmiths leave the final-forged blade just a bit oversize, so the final grinding removes that layer.

**This is subject to the type of steel AND the use expected. Make a blade a little too hard and, while it may well pass the tests just fine it'll be a bitch to sharpen when it dulls; pain for the owner. Something of a lower carbon content- generally speaking- won't hold an edge as well, but can be made incredibly tough and will be easier to sharpen. Everything is a balance.

And the survey says:

Beauchamp is a damn liar.

In other news, people who keep some kinds of pets may pay for it.

A pair from a few years back

The dirk, as I recall was 13" in the blade, about 18.5" overall and about 1.5" wide at the widest, 1/4" thick at the spine near the back, tapering a bit along the length. 5160 spring steel, copper fittings and twisted copper wire inlaid in the grip.

The sgian dhu is about 3.5-4" in the blade, nickel-silver fittings, walnut grip.

In both of these, there's not a guard; that's a collar. It's sized so the mouth of the sheath actually slides inside.

Damn, a British tribunal with intelligence and honor!

I took note here of the utter bullshit being used to refuse entry of Gurkha veterans of British military service to Britain for medical treatment. Well, thanks to Theo I found this:
Two thousand Gurkha veterans should be allowed to live in Britain because their heroic service demonstrates the "strongest ties" to this country, a tribunal heard today.
...
Since the handover of Hong Kong in 1997, Gurkhas are almost automatically entitled to live in Britain after completing at least four years of service - even if it was "just polishing boots in the barracks".

But those who retired before that date have to rely on the discretion of the British entry clearance officer and the diplomatic service procedure.

This states that only those who can demonstrate "strong ties" are allowed residency - and a distinguished Army career is not always sufficient.

Assuming you, as Kim puts it, remove breakables from reach first, I'd really recommend you read what kind of service the God-cursed bureaucrats consider 'not sufficient' to allow them entry to Britain for medical treatment, for God's sake.

Mind you, these are the same jackasses that will let any islamist nutcase who shows up illegally stay, even after they threaten to/plan to/assist in attempts to blow the damn country up.

We need another bumper sticker: Lamppost, rope, bureaucrat...

Well, that was interesting

Went to the range yesterday afternoon, both for some general stress relief and to start testing something(more on that later). I was shooting my M1 Carbine when something bumped off my left hand and fell to the shelf. Picked it up, what the hell... BLEEP! That's my extractor plunger! Look at the bolt, and the bleeping extractor is gone.

If you're not familiar with the bolt on these, the firing pin, ejector & spring and extractor spring and plunger all fit into the bolt, then(and it's a pain in the ass without one) you use the bolt tool to push the ejector back into the bolt and push the extractor spring & plunger back into their recess, slide the firing pin in and then push the extractor into place; sounds a lot more complicated than it is. The extractor locks everything else in, so if it breaks or comes out...

Happily, I found the extractor, only bounced about two feet away and appears undamaged, and everything went back together properly. I've heard of this happening, but this is the first time I've seen it with a carbine. One day at another range I saw this happen to a M1A: first time to the range, about the fifth round of factory ammo. I was firing a mix of Amerc ball(yeah, it's pretty crappy, I wanted to finish off the last bit of it) and some handloads with LC brass and Remington softpoint bullets.

Other than that, nice time at the boom-room. Ran into a man and woman(husband and wife for boyfriend-girlfriend, never did think to ask) who were having some difficulty: they'd rented a AR15 to try out, first time for that rifle with him and for her, the first time she'd ever been to a range. The rifle itself didn't bother her once she'd fired her first shot, but the noise really freaked her out at first. By the time I left she'd calmed down some on that and seemed to like shooting, so I recommended a couple of things, the big one(for an indoor range) being earplugs and muffs. They were planning to come back Saturday, I made a couple of suggestions. I think she'll turn into a shooter.

By the way, why is it that all the good-looking women you meet at the range are already either married or seeing someone? Dammit.

It's confirmed: I won't be browsing through eBay anymore

Fast response, at least. Got this this afternoon:
"Thank you for your recent email to Matt Halprin in regard to changes to our Firearms, Weapons and Knives policy. He has asked that I review your email and respond on his behalf.

At eBay we take the safety of our community and our marketplace very seriously. We have a Trust and Safety team which consists of more than 2,000 experts in online security and safety who are located around the globe. This team is dedicated to ensuring that our marketplace is a safe and trusted place for buyers and sellers to engage in trade.

We value an open and transparent marketplace; if items are legal to buy and sell in an unrestricted manner we allow them on our site. However, there are some items that while legal, may not be safe for our marketplace. In these instances, our applicable policies go beyond the
law to ensure that our marketplace is safe.

Currently we do not allow actual firearms on the site. After careful consideration our executives and our Trust and Safety team determined that any item required to fire a gun has no place on eBay. All of our policies are under constant review. As the Internet and the way our communities use the Internet evolves, our policies and our marketplace must evolve with it. We determined that this policy change was in the best interest of promoting a safe marketplace for all members."

Don't you just love that? "..promoting a safe marketplace for all members."

Now I need to hit the site one last time, to see if there's a way to delete the account.

If true, won't be buying from eBay or Half.Com anymore

Got a sale flyer from J&G today, and it included this:
Also, for years gun enthusiasts have bought and sold gun parts on eBay, J&G included. However eBay has announced that starting mid-August they will no longer allow gun parts to be sold through their website. We encourage you to contact Matt Halpin of eBay who is responsible for this decision at mhalprin@eBay.com. Please be respectful and considerate in your messages. Ask them to review this decision since it goes far beyond any state or federal laws.

I just sent an e-mail to ask if true, and if so, why? If true, hell with it, I'll stop using eBay and Half.com altogether; if they're more concerned with being politically correct and sensitive(which is what it would boil down to, whatever else they say) than with my business, to hell with them.

Found some pictures of a couple of knives

and, having had access to a scanner for a bit, scanned them and decided to post a couple.

This is one of the fanciest pieces I ever made. The blade is O1 tool steel, blade itself about eight inches long. The grip is curly maple stained dark, with spiral grooves carved in and twisted copper wire inlaid in the raised section between the grooves, about five inches long as I remember. Fittings are copper.

















The sheath was made of maple, also stained, with a leather collar around the mouth. You can't see it, but there was a belt hook on the back.

This is one of the pieces I took the time to do a mirror-polish on. Came out pretty nice.

Why Ahmadogcrap of Iran was so worried about squirrels

What do you think, .17M2?

Thanks to Theo

Putting pieces together

Eric at Classical Values has this post on digging out details of a possible murder in Philadelphia, which ends up with:
OK, if we play detective by piecing the three stories together, the following becomes the factual scenario:

Jason Brewer was murdered;

in a robbery;

at a residence;

where he did not live;

where his companion was also wounded during the same robbery;

As a whodunit, doesn't this just cry out for more detail?

I'd tend to think so. For instance, who was robbing who? And was this murder, or bad guy being shot by intended victim?

Down toward the end he leads us to this article, basically on the subject of 'nasty suburban(white) people don't care about black people in the city dying. Except for a few saints. Think I'm kidding?
Whenever I write about Philadelphia's homicide crisis, I hear from suburban readers who think it's a waste of space.

Poor black people killing poor black people, thugs shooting thugs - why should we cry?

Having informed us that people in the suburbs(apparently all white, no blacks/latinos/whatever need apply) don't care about those nasty minority types in the city dying, she brings out her saint:
The Jenkintown graphic designer is obsessed with the death toll - already over 200 - even though the bullets aren't flying anywhere near the home and family he holds dear.
and goes from there.

This is one of the people Alphecca noted had fits over "...Philly-based Urban Outfitters for selling $6 handgun Christmas ornaments in a city ravaged by bullets." Who's now got a poster- made with police department help- to find sponsors for.

It's really fairly standard crap: white people don't care about black people dying, guns are evil, we need more laws, etc. Major Media at its finest.

What's more important? The matter at hand, or the time on stage?

What I've been thinking about is the attitude and thoughts of some of the activist types who do things like threaten the careers- and sometimes lives- of researchers who refuse to follow the 'consensus science' point of view, and the animal rights activists(to use a polite term) who do things like this. I'm not going into the 'a rat is a dog is a cat is a boy' crap of the extremists; they've got a severe mental problem and that's a whole 'nother thing.

I'm thinking of what someone wrote a couple of years ago about terrorism, and how for some of the bad guys it's 'terrorism as theater': something that, even when they know it'll not have the result they want and may even cause very bad things to happen(think WTC attack = special ops troops whacking Taliban) they have to do it anyway because that's what their image demands. Whether it actually accomplishes what they want doesn't matter, it allows them to see themselves as fearsome soldiers of Allah and that's what really matters.

I think that, to a lot of these people- the activists- it doesn't really, in their heart, matter if they actually change someone's mind; they want to
A. Get up in front of everyone and make a spectacle and
B. Force other people to do what they want. They don't care if you actually believe or agree with them, they don't care what the facts(any fact that doesn't agree with what they want is either wrong or simply to be disregarded) are; it's "I'm one of the superior beings, I think this is right, and you will do what I want."

Both are connected, but in some(maybe many) cases, I think A is more important.

Read that passage at Classical Values. This clown specifically sets out to be as offensive as possible, as threatening as possible*, as disruptive as possible without going to far as to be arrested. He dares people to beat him up, and- because they're civil, and not so stupid as to do it- he acts like he's actually braved danger. This jerk may actually care about the deer, but far more important than that is the theater, his theater. He has, in his mind, become the most important actor in that room and that's what really matters.

I'm wondering if this would explain some of the "Ban the evil guns!" activists. I have no doubt some are totally sincere, they've decided these objects are responsible for many ills and all we have to do is pass 'one more law'(Kevin's 'magical thinking') and All Will Be Well. But a good many of them seem to care at least as much about being in front of a crowd(preferably involving lots of cameras) and being seen as a Truly Caring Person as they do about actually accomplishing something.

No, that's not quite right. They DO accomplish something: they play their part in their theater. They have their time on stage and are seen in the manner they prefer. And if they actually do help to gain more control over other people's lives(for everybody's own good of course, and For The Children), that's a standing ovation and bouquet of roses for a fine performance.

Need I even speak of politicians?

Makes you wonder, just how much nanny-state bullshit is based, down inside, on someone playing out their self-made part on stage?

Some more general stuff

These globular warmering people are getting more unhinged:
The head of the Environmental Protection Agency says he will investigate a threatening letter sent by the leader of an EPA-member group, vowing to "destroy" the career of a climate skeptic.
...
"It is my intention to destroy your career as a liar," Mr. Eckhart wrote. "If you produce one more editorial against climate change, I will launch a campaign against your professional integrity. I will call you a liar and charlatan to the Harvard community of which you and I are members. I will call you out as a man who has been bought by Corporate America. Go ahead, guy. Take me on."

Nice, reasoned discourse. Consensus 'science'. Just bloody wonderful.

A Canadian doctor talks about socialized medicine:
Swinging open the door, I stepped into a nightmare: the ER overflowed with elderly people on stretchers, waiting for admission. Some, it turned out, had waited five days. The air stank with sweat and urine. Right then, I began to reconsider everything that I thought I knew about Canadian health care.

Yeah, Hillary, we really, really want to be just like Canada. And Britain and Europe:
Consider the recent British controversy over a cancer patient who tried to get an appointment with a specialist, only to have it canceled — 48 times. More than 1 million Britons must wait for some type of care, with 200,000 in line for longer than six months. In France, the supply of doctors is so limited that during an August 2003 heat wave — when many doctors were on vacation and hospitals were stretched beyond capacity — 15,000 elderly citizens died. Across Europe, state-of-the-art drugs aren't available. And so on.

And the arrogant, bullying stupidity of the bambiists:
"Today, I am not asking you to stop killing the deer, I am TELLING you to stop killing deer. There will be no more deer-killings at our metro-parks. It is off limits to you and your hunting buddies. If the HCMA continues on its bloody path, then I will execute justice the way I see fit ... and that means constructing a rogue, independent, deer-police unit to protect them from you. KAPISH!"

Hopefully, tomorrow will have a bit more time to actually write. Something I've been thinking about. So you have been warned.