Forging a big chopping knife after the pattern of the Saami Leuku, a blade from the indigenous people of northern Scandinavia. firecreekforge... / firecreekforge #samiknife #blacksmithing #choppingknife
UGH, I wanna get into knife making so bad, and I always love learning new things before I start. Your videos give me a much better example of how to do things and I love that
Nice looking leuku! The shape and design is very much true to the tradition. Perhaps the widening end of the handle is a bit more pronounced and abrupt in many of the old skool originals, but I'm not complaining! I very much liked the analysis of the blade edge, the testing process, and the decision reg the final edge design. The word leuku is Finnish, and the etymological root of the word is leuka, meaning 'jaw'. The Sámi language name for this is stuorra niibi, meaning 'big knife'. Leuku is pronounced LE as in 'Lexington'... then U, as in 'ooh' but with short vowel... and then KU as in 'Ku Klux Klan'. Finally, just say in one smooth go LEUKU... 😀 (Finnish is spelled phonetically.)
Thanks, very interesting stuff :) One of the defining features of these knives is that they keep the 3mm thickness all the way to where the bevel starts right before the edge. This makes them very heavy for a knife, but lends itself very well to chopping. You're quite right in the spruce and birch would be the typical trees cut with these and the shaft is in fact traditionally made from birch.
Beautiful work. Knives and swords done right, are frigging awesome. Done wrong are a dangerous nightmare. I always thought I would make knives and bladed weaponry. I am a retired piping superintendent and have never forged a thing. I have built a chalice out of 316 ss 3" pipe and 3/8" ss tubing. Many of hours polishing to a mirror finish by flapper wheel and hand rubbed valve grind compound . I built it 29 years ago and lost it somewhere in that time. I digress.. God bless you and your loved ones Stay safe. Godspeed
For those who are not familiar with Pecan wood. It is actually a type of Hickory wood. Which is the same wood normally used to make hammer and axe handles.
The leuku is actually a hybrid Finnish knife, mostly made by Finns, and not Sami. It's a mix between Sami and Finnish knife traditions. The Sami knife is often referred to by the Finnish as a lapinleuku. The Finnish knives will most often have a high sabre grind with an acute secondary edge, and you will rarely find a scandi among the leuku. In Norway and Sweden I know you can find Sami manufacturers of the similar Sami knife, stuorranibbi (translated big knife in Sami). These will have a true scandi grind at a far more acute angle, and are meant for chopping. I bought a Stuorranibbi made by a Norwegian Sami manufacturer when I was in the army on our border to Northern Russia, and the knife cut frozen birch in -30c, even chopped right through barbwire, without any edge damage. I don't think the Scandi grind would be a problem for Australian wood. :D You have made a beautiful knife!
Thats gorgeus mate. Here in norway we call it. Same kniv. Strømeng is a well known maker here. It should do anything from feeling small trees to get a shelter to start a fire to make food in the camp
Love that you actually test your blade and try really find the form of the edge grind that leaves one with optimum utility for the inteded task and not just a 'good looking toy'. This really shows how much thought you put into your creations, an impressive and rare qualitiy among craftsmen these days. Also the endproduct is simply a work of art!
I have quite a few knives with scandi grinds. All of them have micro bevels. It's the way manufacturers recommend sharpening them. It's done to make the edge stronger. On Eräpuu micro bevel is so big that some people might count it as a regular bevel.
That's a really spectacular knife, the owner will surely be impressed. One of the good things about the scandi grind was that you can sharpen them easily in the field with nothing more than a flat rock. But like you also found its just not very good for edge stability and over here in Australia pretty much all of our native timbers (Acacia and Eucalyptus) are bone hard when dry and very tough when green to the point that we don't do a lot of bush crafting or processing on them starting with anything less than an axe. Which is much different to the European environment which is full of soft, springy timbers you can literally start lopping decent sized branches off with a Leuku.
Super nice build, beautiful finished knife. I appreciate your edge experimentation and explanations, that's great info and makes for an extraordinary video. Thank you, and stay safe.
that came out amazing im learning alot from your videos, ive been doing this little over a year each knife i put out looks better than the last thanks and see you on the next video Mark 😀👍👍
I've had my Peltonen M95 for about 20 years and its still my main knife out in the woods. Still has a nic on the blade from me accidentally hitting it on the stock of my assault rifle in thr army. And im not getting rid of that, bitter sweet memories... I would've hoped youd had a look at the sheath a bit more, I have the leather one and very much enjoy having it on the left shoulder strap of my backpack, upside down. It's made to be used in a variety of ways and has a genius roller mechanism.
Really great vid, I especially like your explanation of finding the right geometry for that particular blade. I have several Puukko and Leuku from a well know Finnish manufacturer that always grinds their edge to 22.5°. That's fine for most things when we are in Finland as mostly they are used for nothing harder than splitting pine logs and making shavings for the fire and preparing dinner. If you need a new edge you can just pop in to the agricultural shop in the supermarket. The ones I use for work though I noticed the same edge issues as you demonstrated, so to enable a steeper angle at the edge I took the first bevel back to a shallower angle with a grinding wheel. I didn't know it was called a Sabre grind until I watched this vid. Anyway, it works very well indeed, cuts just as well with less edge damage. Thank you for taking the time to share your knowledge 🙏 👍
Lovely forging! Scandi knives are for processing soft wood not for hard wood they used axes for hardwood. You dont need to make the steel so hard. Its easier to put a quick edge on softer steel. Its a modern concept to make 1 million rockwell because we have knives as a luxury now not a necessity
@@FireCreekForge interesting - what method would you typically use to find the ideal edge for a blade? Is it a similar iterative process or is there some other secret?
It turned out nice despite your trouble with the edge. I do suggest to make a test with the same width but with convex ground edge. Also you could achieve nice cutting with lesser angle of the grind, thicker blade should help with that.
Really awesome knife and expoanation as always. Hey, can you make a video sometime about rust care or ways to help prevent rust for more time after making a Blade? I've been having trouble with that. Thnx in advance
It is a nice knife, but I would say saami inspired instead since it has a few differences. Most notably the handle construction, it has a svell in the middle. Also the blade itself is a little wider at the tip.
i feel like the makers mark thing looks super deep, wont that cause a weak point? i mean it's almost a hole pretty much, i dunno anything about knives like this so i'm just wondering, if you start cracking on hard stuff with it will it still be okay even with a mark blasted 2 thirds of the way thru the blade metal? it looks really great, very well done on it :)
That depends on various factors. You want a heat treat that has an appropriate balance of toughness to hardness. Too hard and it will chip or break, too soft and it won't hold an edge. But then you have to consider blade geometry as well. A thin edge will deform or ( or chip if the steel is too hard) even when the heat treat is good, which is what happened here. Remember that you don't want to lose steel out of your blade if the edge does fail under high stress, which is the reason for leaning towards toughness with the heat treat on a tool that is made to be used under impact such as a chopping knife like this. Thanks for watching!
I think peanut oil would be ok. The ever popular canola oil does actually work for 5160 as it does not need a super fast quench speed, due to the chromium content. The only issue after that is that vegetable oils do not hold upon to repeated use like quench oil does, so there's no guarantee in the properties of the vegetable oil as you continue to use it.
Actually, the name of the knife is "stuorra niibi"(depending on exactly which Sami language you use), which means "big knife". "Leuku" is the name in Finnish. That's not to say that the Finnish name isn't used, of course, but Finnish isn't Sami, and vice versa. There are 9-10 forms of Sami, depending on how you count, and a couple of extinct versions. These are all closely related but distinct from each other in pronunciation and spelling.
