WEBVTT

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Welcome to the Knife Junkie podcast. Your weekly dose of knife

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news and information about knives and knife collecting. Here's your

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host, Bob The Knife Junkie DeMarco.

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Welcome to the Knife Junkie podcast. I'm Bob DiMarco.

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On this edition of the show, I'm speaking with custom knife maker Jeff

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Schafer. I first got wind of Jeff to through Rolando

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Escutada and the big beautiful Bowie chopper that

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he featured on his channel right After Blade Show 2025.

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Jeff's work features classic American knife profiles made

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by hand with attention to detail, balance and performance.

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Jeff is a martial artist and a man of adventure whose custom knives have

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caught the eye and attention of some of the finest practitioners

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and trusted voices. Of the bladed martial arts. We'll meet

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Jeff, check out his work and hear about his career in knife making. But first,

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be sure to like, comment, subscribe and hit the notification bell so you

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can download the show and listen on the go. You can put that

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on your favorite podcast app and all please. Also,

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Patreon and seeing what we have to offer there. Quickest

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way to do that is to head on over to the knife

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junkie.com/again. That's theknif

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junkie.com Patreon red your. Adventure delivered. Your

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monthly subscription for handpicked outdoor survival, EDC

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and other cool gear from our expert team of outdoor

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professionals. Theknife

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junkie.com/battlebox . Jeff welcome to

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the Knife Junkie podcast, sir. Oh, thank you. Thanks

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for having me on. Oh, it's my pleasure. It's really good to meet you.

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Rolando spoke very, very highly of you. The man and also

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the, the big Bowie chopper that he,

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he got from you. Let's just start there

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and then we'll go back and, and find out who you are and you

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got here. But that knife. Describe

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that knife. I. It's just a really

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big chopper knife. It's ADC RV2 steel,

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got a convex edge, a sharpened clip

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and. I can't. Remember what the handle was

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right now, but it's got like

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some nice wood handles on it. So the thing that really

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struck me about that knife is, well, first of all,

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I'm a sucker for a sharpened clip. Anyone who's watched this

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show for any length of time knows that, but also

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not used to seeing a sharpened clip on a chopper style knife like that. And

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when I think of a chopper, it's, it's what you were, what you made

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there. Something where the guard itself is the Wideness of the

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blade. Right? Yeah. How do you come up with that

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design? Well, it's, it's kind of

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inspired by a Jerry Fisk knife that

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he's made a long time ago and I

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had an order for one so I made couple.

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Yeah, Fisk. I know, I know that Rolando's a collector of him

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and, and, and like that. But so, so a knife

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like that, a chopper you don't think of as something

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that's going to move around as well as it

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does. Tell me about, tell me about the, the making of

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that and the kind of considerations you had going into that. Obviously it's a fighting

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knife. It's not necessarily like a, a go

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out in the woods and baton firewood kind of knife.

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Right. It can, it can be used as a fighting knife or you know,

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a woods chopper. You know, if you get attacked

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by an animal in the woods that could help really well. But the,

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the sharpening clip is really good for the back, back cuts

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and it's got a nice

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distal paper so, so that it's not super tip heavy

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even though is, it is heavier than a

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specific made for fighting knife. It's a little bit

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more weight forward than that. It will chop really well

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on two bars and any kind of limbs and stuff like that.

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So how'd you get into this? How did you get into knife making?

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Well, a long time ago when I was in high school,

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I bought a really cool double edged knife and

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I took it to school back in the 80s and a friend

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saw it, liked it more. He paid me double for what I paid for it.

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So I thought well I'll just make another one because I have, I have books

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on making knives and I tried but it was

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terrible. It was just like from a little pile

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and of course I had to do a double edged knife for the first knife

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and it was, it was terrible. And had a piece of two before for

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a handle and so I put that on the back shelf until

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I got married and moved to a house where I

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could have a shot. And so as soon as I got

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my shop built I was ready to start making knives. So I, I

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was. Where was the Arizona custom knives or somewhere

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where. I was reading a little bit about you and you mentioned something

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about your grandma. We hear a lot about

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grandpa's and that's where who I got my first knife from. Tell me about your

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grandmother. Well, my grandma, she had this little. Well I

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say little is about this long butcher knife

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that it was real cheap and wouldn't hold an edge. It

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had Hollow scales on it, like plastic

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scales. And she would

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like take, take the knife and put it down beside her leg

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and say, here, you can go play with it. I was like in the low

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mid single digit age and I don't know if she was

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trying to get, just get rid of me, let me go play or let me

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go hurt myself. But my mom really didn't like it, but she didn't say

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anything to her. And so that's where I really got

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playing with. I would go ask her for that knife every time we go

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to their house and I go outside and I would throw with it

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whatever, stumps, birds, anything that came along.

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And it was, it was just a lot of fun for me when I

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was a kid. Yeah, I think, I think you and I

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are similar generation. I was in, I graduated from high school at the very

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end of the 80s and back then, you know, we were a tougher

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breed. We, we were, we were talking for lions,

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right? We would just, we would just go out in the middle of

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the summertime and camp on the river for two or three weeks, you know, just

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wow. A few of our, our kids, you know, in

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like the 10, 11, 12 year old range,

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we would just go out there and camp and fish. Where, whereabouts

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were you? Northeast Arkansas. Arkansas. Okay. Yeah,

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well, I was in Bourbon Cleveland, so we didn't get as much as, as

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Arkansas. You were about to say something. I'm sorry. Uh, it's just we got, we

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got five rivers here in the county, so. And,

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and a guy knew, one of my friends knew a guy that had some

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river property. So we were back there on private property and,

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and his mom and dad would come out, check on us every once in a

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while. So you mentioned you had a, a

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Gerber, like double edge. And, and I know you didn't mention Gerber, but I remember

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reading that and you sold, you sold it to your, your friend

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at school and then decided, hey, I'll make one, right?

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You said you had knife books laying around already.

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So how did that come about? I mean, was it

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from like your grandmother's kind of

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encouraging it or how. Yeah, well, you know, she's, she

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started to spark. And I would look at all the really

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custom made knives from back in the era and

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I love those really nice buoys with the

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walrus handles and the nice guards and even

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Damascus back then. Was this really getting popular

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as far as I can remember. And

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I thought, well, the only way I'm ever going to be able to afford one

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of those is to make it myself. But Turns

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out it would have been cheaper for me to buy some knives the then

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build a shop. But anyway, this is a lot more fun. Well, yeah, thank

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God you didn't because we wouldn't be talking right now.

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So martial arts, what. What kind of role did martial

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arts play or do martial arts play in your life?

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The. I was very deeply into

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it for a very long time and I'm kind of out of

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it now because there's just. All I do is make knives now.

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But I started out in tang soo do

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right out of high school and later on

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got into the bujinkan and some

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screamer. And towards the

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end of my career as a martial artist, I was

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doing Brazilian jiu jitsu. Okay. All right. So

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escrima, that's I. That's the

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intersection of knives and martial arts to me though. I don't know what you said.

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Is it something about Buddha? It's a. It's a

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jab. Really old Japanese martial arts. Is

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that also blade oriented? It's weapon oriented, yes.

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It's like swords and we got

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weird sticks and chains and stuff like that. Oh, back in the

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80s that it was. What was the, the all the

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incapacity ninja. They.

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They marketed it as ninjutsu. I got you. Yeah,

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not really. It was mostly samurai. Okay. So

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escrima, that's what I'm most familiar with. I've. I've done

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a bit of. Well, I did a bunch of Kali for a long time, but

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same like you kind of been out of it for a little while.

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As far as like regularly practicing though, I

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practice around here. I just have no one to. Just a bob dummy to hit,

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but. That'S what I do. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know that.

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That's is better than nothing. You gotta swing the stick some. Yeah, yeah,

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exactly. Well, how much did Filipino martial

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arts encourage you? Or

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inspire, that's the word I'm looking for. Inspire you in your knife

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making Quite a bit. I, I love the

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Baron for one thing and just

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all the martial arts weapons are really cool.

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I like the butterfly knives and the Chinese

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side of things. I never studied that with anybody, you

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know, but those are basically giant

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Bowie knives. But I,

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I got a lot of inspiration from them. I still haven't made them barong

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yet, but I want to.

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Yeah, I'm thinking just knowing that the

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chopper and seeing how beautiful it is and

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it's a big. Your, your bowie chopper, the one we were talking about earlier,

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that's a pretty big knife. Looks like maybe a 11 inch blade or something.

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Well, it's 12 inches, 12 inch blade. You're.

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You're approaching that, that short sword area

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though. I know I say that and people like, oh, short sword. I know it's

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got to be bigger than that. But still, you know, that Barong. I've seen Barongs

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that are somewhat small, you know, and then, yeah, they get

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larger. That is one of my favorite all time blades. Yeah,

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it just looks like it got a lot of power out there in the meat

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of that blade. Yeah, yeah. And the

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handles too, I got. This is my favorite. I have a couple of Barongs that.

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This one right here is one of my favorites. That is really cool.

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So is this something that you're considering doing

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sometime in the offing here? All right. Yes, it'll

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probably be in the next year though. And you know, unless I

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get an order or something. Right now I'm focusing

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on the A.B.S.

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journeyman Smith test. Oh. So I'm trying to, I'm

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trying to do that. I said it out loud. There it is. For some reason,

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every, every year something happens and I don't actually

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get pickled. So I'm

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planning on this year making a solid stab at it. Oh,

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that's good. So that's, that's at Blade Show

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Atlanta, right? That's where they. Right, okay. Yeah. So what kind of prep are

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you doing to become a journeyman? Well,

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first off, you gotta, you gotta pass the performance knife test,

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which is a 10 inch blade with.

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And it has to be able to chop a 1 inch rope,

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1, 1 swipe, chop

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through 2, 2 befores and

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then bend. Well, then shave, gotta be shaving sharp

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after that. And then it's got to bend 90 degrees without

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breaking. That's crazy. It is.

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So is this a knife that you've already made or is this.

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I've made a few. I'm gonna make another one. Got one. One more to make.

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And then I'm hoping to test like next, next month. Okay. For the

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performance test, you got to do that first. And then whenever you

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go to Atlanta, you got to take five presentation

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knives that are just, you know, as perfect as you can make them.

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Well, for the testing, for the performance test, you're not doing the test though, are

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you? Oh, you do? Yeah, you do. You do the cutting

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and everything. And what do they do? What do you do? Videotape yourself

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and show it off or. Oh no, you go to a master bladesmith

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shop. Oh, okay. Yeah. And do you have someone already picked

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out or lined up? I. I do have a guy.

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Can I say his name? Sure, yeah. Tad lynch, he lives

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about a hour and a half, two hours from here and

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I've contacted him but it's been a little while and so

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I got to get back with him and try to get that test set

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up. Okay, so, so all right. We can

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assume from the fact that you're, you're going for your journeyman, you want to become

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a journeyman, that you are forging

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blades. Yes. So there is a

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huge process of

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learning there how tell take us through that. I mean the

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first knife you made was a file and you were trying to approximate a

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double edged Gerber boot knife or something like that. Yeah. And here you are

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now ready to, you know, ready to go into your journeyman testing.

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How did you take that journey?

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Well, mostly know I learned from books but

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I went to a lot of hammer ends

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to watch Master Smith. Like here, here in

242
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Arkansas. We have a really good school down

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there. The, in Old Washington is where I went

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most of the time and it has now moved over to Texarkana.

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But twice a year they have a hammer in where they

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do demonstrations and there's always a foraging, always,

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always grinding and a heat

248
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treating demonstration. And then there's other

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stuff, you know, as the mastersmiths want to do, wanted to

250
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show. So I've been doing that for about eight years.

251
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So you've learned a lot. Picked up a lot. Only eight years.

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I'm sorry, wait a sec. Really? Yes, I've been forging, you know, I've been

253
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learning to forage and stuff for about eight years. Wow. Okay. For some

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reason, just, I guess the reason is the work I've seen you make.

255
00:16:00.520 --> 00:16:04.160
It seems like you've been doing it longer. Oh, I appreciate it. Yeah.

256
00:16:04.160 --> 00:16:07.760
Yeah. So here's. Okay. I,

257
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I, at some point I always say like when I retire I'm a handy

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guy and I'm also kind of an artistic guy and there's a lot

259
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of untapped potential in me and, and, and

260
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a lot of that is because a lot of my artistic

261
00:16:22.640 --> 00:16:26.400
pursuits tapered down when I had a family and, and you know I

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do this show and I do a couple of other little things but at some

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point, and I always say in my retirement because I do have a day job,

264
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I, I want to throw myself into knife making

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just because I've dabbled a little tiny bit, but never with

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forging. What would you say to me if, if I were to tell you like,

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yeah, that's got a really, that's got to wait because of all the equipment and

268
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the, and the noise and is that true or am I just holding

269
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myself up? No,

270
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you know, it's a little bit of a, an expense to start out with

271
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and it, if you wanted to ease into

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it, you could just start doing stock removal knives.

273
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You got to do that anyway. After you forge a knife, you got to do

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some stock removal. And some knives are just better for stock removal

275
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than forging. And so

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get a grinder and a drill press and everything

277
00:17:22.219 --> 00:17:24.859
else you can, you can go from there with

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00:17:25.899 --> 00:17:29.739
and then do a few knives, you know, whatever

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has as. As

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funds allow. Get a, A nice. You could build a

281
00:17:37.339 --> 00:17:40.939
forge. I built my forge and I also built my grinder,

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but you could get an anvil and start

283
00:17:45.150 --> 00:17:48.790
to go into hammer ends and learn. Because it's much better

284
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to learn from somebody that knows what they're doing.

285
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It'll save you so many headaches to go and learn how to,

286
00:17:57.470 --> 00:18:00.590
you know, forging a point on a blade that can be

287
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persnickety at times. Yeah. And just learn the

288
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whole process. So were you always a handy

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person? Yes, I always, Always. My

290
00:18:11.870 --> 00:18:15.470
dad, he was, he was real handy. Anything he, he had, he

291
00:18:15.470 --> 00:18:18.870
built some little crafts and stuff, but he would always be working on the car

292
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and doing maintenance on the car and, and working on

293
00:18:23.190 --> 00:18:26.990
the lawnmower or whatever. He built the back half of our house

294
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when I was a kid. So I was there in the middle of all that.

295
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And I just, you know, I just think you can probably build

296
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whatever you want to build, you know, if you, if you

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really want to do it. And, and if you learn from books

298
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really well, which I'm sure you do, because you're a bookish

299
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person, you know, you said, and you can learn just about anything

300
00:18:48.760 --> 00:18:52.440
from, from books. But nowadays there's so many videos online

301
00:18:52.600 --> 00:18:55.880
that's. Or some of them aren't very good, but

302
00:18:56.280 --> 00:18:59.720
there are, you know, you can, you can, you can learn a lot of stuff.

303
00:18:59.800 --> 00:19:03.290
A lot of Master Smiths have content out now. That's

304
00:19:03.290 --> 00:19:07.050
exceptional. Who, who, who do you like? I

305
00:19:07.050 --> 00:19:10.290
like Kyle Royer on his. He, I,

306
00:19:10.530 --> 00:19:11.650
I get his,

307
00:19:14.530 --> 00:19:17.970
like, I get his courses online courses and

308
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I. Let's

309
00:19:21.810 --> 00:19:22.770
see who else.

310
00:19:26.850 --> 00:19:30.480
I got some more that are. Jason Knight. Oh, yeah,

311
00:19:30.480 --> 00:19:33.960
yeah, yeah. He's got some good classes out online

312
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and they also. Almost all, all

313
00:19:37.400 --> 00:19:41.160
mastersmiths will help you out. You know, for the most

314
00:19:41.160 --> 00:19:44.360
part. I, I haven't met one that's not really nice and

315
00:19:44.920 --> 00:19:48.760
loves talking about knives, you know. Yeah. In the abs,

316
00:19:49.160 --> 00:19:52.640
you're. If you're close to one of those guys, you can go visit Them and

317
00:19:52.640 --> 00:19:56.440
learn a ton in just a little while. So there, there's a

318
00:19:56.760 --> 00:20:00.520
connection actually, may as well just draw it

319
00:20:00.520 --> 00:20:03.920
right now. There's a connection between you and one of the

320
00:20:06.080 --> 00:20:09.880
founders of the abs and I'm thinking, and

321
00:20:09.880 --> 00:20:13.640
this might be the long way around, but Bill Bagwell, right, He was one

322
00:20:13.640 --> 00:20:17.200
of the founders, right? And I know that James Keating

323
00:20:17.360 --> 00:20:21.080
loved Bill Bagwell knives and he also loves your

324
00:20:21.080 --> 00:20:24.920
knives. Right James, Tell us who James Keating is and

325
00:20:24.920 --> 00:20:28.470
how did you get involved with him? Well, James Keating is a very

326
00:20:28.710 --> 00:20:32.390
long time martial artist who

327
00:20:32.390 --> 00:20:36.110
was back when I was a kid, he was on the COVID of Black

328
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Belt magazine. He had so many

329
00:20:40.070 --> 00:20:43.750
videos and stuff out. I had used to, whenever I'd be sitting at

330
00:20:43.750 --> 00:20:47.470
my computer I would have, I had a list hanging down off my bookshelf

331
00:20:47.470 --> 00:20:51.110
that, of his videos that I wanted, you know. And

332
00:20:52.240 --> 00:20:55.880
so we got together through a buddy of mine, David

333
00:20:55.880 --> 00:20:59.440
Benefield, he teaches at

334
00:20:59.440 --> 00:21:03.200
FLETC down in North Carolina. And I

335
00:21:03.280 --> 00:21:07.040
turned him on to James Keating and he went and trained with him

336
00:21:07.040 --> 00:21:10.800
and then he said, hey Jeff, James needs

337
00:21:10.880 --> 00:21:14.440
a, needs a knife maker. His knife

338
00:21:14.440 --> 00:21:18.240
maker is leaving him and said, wanted to know if you start. And that was

339
00:21:18.240 --> 00:21:21.880
right when I was first getting started. So there's a lot of work for me

340
00:21:21.880 --> 00:21:25.560
to get a knife fixed up and sent to him and let

341
00:21:25.560 --> 00:21:29.400
him check it out. And he liked it. So we've been, we've been making

342
00:21:30.120 --> 00:21:33.879
his knives ever since. So. Okay, all right, so you say, all

343
00:21:33.879 --> 00:21:37.160
right, there are a couple of things here, but first. Okay, the first, the thing

344
00:21:37.160 --> 00:21:40.920
is his knife maker left. So he's got his. So

345
00:21:40.920 --> 00:21:44.490
James Keating, master at arms. So

346
00:21:44.490 --> 00:21:48.210
he's, he is the man when it comes to bowie knife fighting. I know that.

347
00:21:48.450 --> 00:21:52.130
Yes. And I can presume that he's a lot, a lot of other stuff, right?

348
00:21:52.210 --> 00:21:55.490
Well, yeah, pretty much all swords,

349
00:21:55.810 --> 00:21:59.490
handkerchiefs, guns. He's really good with guns too.

350
00:22:00.130 --> 00:22:03.490
And he's, he's, he's made, he's made it

351
00:22:03.810 --> 00:22:06.450
several knives over the years that were custom made

352
00:22:07.970 --> 00:22:11.420
and he's got like his, the little

353
00:22:11.420 --> 00:22:15.220
stinger that you. I got one somewhere, but I don't know, I didn't think about

354
00:22:15.220 --> 00:22:18.620
it that you put in, in your hand, you know, and it's like a. Kind

355
00:22:18.620 --> 00:22:22.300
of like a plastic push dagger. Yeah. You know that he,

356
00:22:22.380 --> 00:22:25.740
he invented that and got a bunch of those that. He sells

357
00:22:26.620 --> 00:22:30.180
and, and he invented and designed. So first of all, I think it's just so

358
00:22:30.180 --> 00:22:33.980
cool to have your own knife maker. Oh, I have, I have my, my

359
00:22:34.920 --> 00:22:38.640
guy who Makes all my knife ideas, but he had that. Is

360
00:22:38.640 --> 00:22:41.320
it the court? Not the cortado. What is it called?

361
00:22:42.200 --> 00:22:45.880
That long double edged fighting knife? The.

362
00:22:46.120 --> 00:22:49.400
The crusader crusada. Yeah, right.

363
00:22:50.520 --> 00:22:53.720
I know, he designed it. Do you make that for him now? Yeah, I make

364
00:22:53.720 --> 00:22:57.160
it for him. And all I have are some

365
00:22:57.160 --> 00:23:00.600
trainers, something like this, about this size,

366
00:23:02.170 --> 00:23:05.690
as you can see. And this hole is for quillians that come out. So when

367
00:23:05.690 --> 00:23:09.050
you're looking at it, the quillions will stick out like this. And that's where the

368
00:23:09.050 --> 00:23:12.090
cross, the croissantic name comes from.

369
00:23:13.370 --> 00:23:17.089
Hold, hold that up if you would. Okay. It's, this

370
00:23:17.089 --> 00:23:20.890
is my own one that I trained with, so it's a little. Bit beat

371
00:23:20.890 --> 00:23:24.450
up, but. Okay. So it's got the, it's got the big guards

372
00:23:24.450 --> 00:23:26.810
there and it's got a Spanish notch. Right.

373
00:23:28.780 --> 00:23:32.260
And what's that for? It's for catching

374
00:23:32.260 --> 00:23:36.060
blades. Kind of like that. We really

375
00:23:36.060 --> 00:23:39.740
lock in there. And if you look at the design,

376
00:23:39.900 --> 00:23:42.060
the tip of this quillion

377
00:23:43.420 --> 00:23:46.900
feeds, feeds the blade into the, the

378
00:23:46.900 --> 00:23:50.580
notch. So this slides down and then it catches in

379
00:23:50.580 --> 00:23:53.920
there. It can also work in the back. It'd be used as,

380
00:23:54.160 --> 00:23:55.600
you know, a disarm.

381
00:23:58.320 --> 00:24:02.040
You know, it's hard, it's hard to use. And for me, I

382
00:24:02.040 --> 00:24:05.360
mean, he knows. He knows how to do it really well. Yeah.

383
00:24:06.560 --> 00:24:10.240
And I love the look of that knife. I think that's one of the

384
00:24:10.240 --> 00:24:14.040
coolest knives I've ever seen. And the idea of those little quillians that

385
00:24:14.040 --> 00:24:16.800
screw in through the center right

386
00:24:17.600 --> 00:24:20.970
there. Yeah. This is the buoy model.

387
00:24:21.290 --> 00:24:25.050
I haven't made any of the double edged ones, the spear point ones.

388
00:24:26.410 --> 00:24:28.730
It's got a slight recurve right here

389
00:24:29.930 --> 00:24:32.890
and it's made for fat cutting and,

390
00:24:33.930 --> 00:24:37.650
and fighting. That's so cool. So, okay,

391
00:24:37.650 --> 00:24:41.330
before we got started, you showed me a bowie of your

392
00:24:41.330 --> 00:24:45.140
own making that I made for a friend. Can you show this off and

393
00:24:45.140 --> 00:24:48.780
talk about it a little bit? Okay. This knife

394
00:24:48.780 --> 00:24:52.420
right here. Yeah. That is so

395
00:24:52.420 --> 00:24:55.900
cool. A buddy, he contacted me and he wanted,

396
00:24:57.020 --> 00:24:59.500
he wanted a knife, you know, the Louis Lamour.

397
00:25:00.540 --> 00:25:04.220
There's a, there's a, there's a character in there called the Tinker.

398
00:25:05.500 --> 00:25:09.060
And he, he's a knife maker, a martial artist and knows

399
00:25:09.060 --> 00:25:12.640
languages and stuff and he makes the best knives. So my

400
00:25:12.640 --> 00:25:16.360
buddy said, hey, would you make me a knife that the Tinker might make?

401
00:25:16.760 --> 00:25:20.600
And Louis Lamour and I go, okay. So I checked it out and

402
00:25:20.920 --> 00:25:24.600
this. Is. 1084

403
00:25:24.600 --> 00:25:28.120
steel with a mild steel forged guard,

404
00:25:29.080 --> 00:25:32.200
a sunset bronze spacer, and a

405
00:25:33.240 --> 00:25:36.940
Crown stag crown handle. Oh,

406
00:25:36.940 --> 00:25:40.100
God, that's so. Okay, hold, hold it up so we can see it. Yeah,

407
00:25:40.980 --> 00:25:44.420
there you go. So this, this an interesting.

408
00:25:45.140 --> 00:25:47.700
So it's a long, sort of slender

409
00:25:48.500 --> 00:25:52.220
Bowie profile. It doesn't have much of a curved

410
00:25:52.220 --> 00:25:55.300
clip at all, but it's got. It looks like that clip is sharp. Is that

411
00:25:55.300 --> 00:25:58.900
right? It is, it is sharp. Yep. I don't like, you know, dough

412
00:25:58.900 --> 00:26:01.460
clips either. Yeah. But

413
00:26:04.880 --> 00:26:08.560
I made the sheath. It's a, it's a sheath that goes, that fits

414
00:26:08.560 --> 00:26:12.240
in between your belt and the belt comes along and

415
00:26:12.400 --> 00:26:15.880
snags right there. So you can put it in your gun belt and it just

416
00:26:15.880 --> 00:26:18.800
sits there. You can put it cross draw or

417
00:26:19.920 --> 00:26:23.760
however, however way you want to do it. I, I love that

418
00:26:23.760 --> 00:26:27.520
knife. I gotta say. Totally. I love that knife. That

419
00:26:27.520 --> 00:26:31.230
giant S guard is pretty impressive too. How does

420
00:26:31.230 --> 00:26:34.910
it. When you're, when you're using it, how does that fit in the

421
00:26:34.910 --> 00:26:38.230
hand? You see, there's, there's plenty of clearance for your

422
00:26:39.030 --> 00:26:42.830
fingers and it's, it's almost like

423
00:26:42.830 --> 00:26:46.390
a D guard. So any, any blades

424
00:26:46.390 --> 00:26:50.070
comes down this way. It's pretty good. You

425
00:26:50.070 --> 00:26:53.270
got a pretty good hand protection there. And this is,

426
00:26:54.390 --> 00:26:56.820
this top part is good enough that you, you could

427
00:26:58.020 --> 00:27:01.780
possibly catch a blade with it or whatever. Oh,

428
00:27:01.780 --> 00:27:05.420
yeah, I see what you mean. Like you got a blade sliding across the spine

429
00:27:05.420 --> 00:27:08.900
and you twist it. Yeah. Lock it up

430
00:27:08.980 --> 00:27:12.700
like one of these coming down here like this

431
00:27:12.700 --> 00:27:16.420
and then. Yeah. So what, what is

432
00:27:16.420 --> 00:27:19.980
the, what are the knives that people come to you for? I, I would imagine

433
00:27:19.980 --> 00:27:23.620
you're not always making tinker bowies or the giant choppers. What,

434
00:27:24.130 --> 00:27:27.970
what's your real Brett and Butter style of knife? Well,

435
00:27:28.610 --> 00:27:32.450
probably a hunter. I got, I got. I, I was trying

436
00:27:32.450 --> 00:27:36.290
to get one done for you. I made a bunch of these, but I,

437
00:27:36.290 --> 00:27:39.809
I didn't get it finished. My, my

438
00:27:39.809 --> 00:27:42.930
friend back when I was doing jiu jitsu, he has his own

439
00:27:43.730 --> 00:27:46.210
school now. And so whenever he,

440
00:27:48.530 --> 00:27:52.310
whenever he gives a new belt, a new person, what's that called,

441
00:27:52.310 --> 00:27:56.110
Promotes a person, he gives them a knife. One of my knives. So

442
00:27:56.110 --> 00:27:59.550
I, I make a custom knife for him and he, like right now I'm g.

443
00:27:59.550 --> 00:28:02.870
Making a brown belt knife. We, we started out

444
00:28:02.870 --> 00:28:06.270
originally with these little knives here

445
00:28:08.670 --> 00:28:12.230
for the, the blue belts. You can

446
00:28:12.230 --> 00:28:15.630
see maybe. How cool. Yeah, we can see that

447
00:28:16.330 --> 00:28:20.130
beautiful little clip point looks like a mini fighting bowie. But you've got the blue

448
00:28:20.130 --> 00:28:23.930
pins, right. And it's got a blue liners. Oh, that's so

449
00:28:23.930 --> 00:28:27.690
cool. And I call it the baby buoy. You know, but

450
00:28:28.730 --> 00:28:32.090
baby boy, that's the. One we first started with with him

451
00:28:32.970 --> 00:28:36.370
making these little knives, and now I've sold a bunch to law

452
00:28:36.370 --> 00:28:39.770
enforcement, you know, because they like the thin blue line. And

453
00:28:41.540 --> 00:28:44.900
this one made for my, my mother in law.

454
00:28:46.260 --> 00:28:49.940
I don't know if you can see it, but it's pink. Put your hand

455
00:28:49.940 --> 00:28:52.980
behind it. We might see the color better. Yeah, there we go.

456
00:28:54.180 --> 00:28:57.620
Oh, that cool. It's pink with the white liners.

457
00:28:59.220 --> 00:29:03.020
Love how those are. Let me ask you a question about the jiu jitsu

458
00:29:03.020 --> 00:29:06.860
knives. Okay. So this isn't like taking taekwondo

459
00:29:06.860 --> 00:29:10.340
at the mall. You're not, you're not getting a new belt every week. And I

460
00:29:10.340 --> 00:29:13.890
don't mean to be dissing taekwondo or anything like that, but, but, but

461
00:29:13.890 --> 00:29:17.650
Brazilian Jiu jitsu is notorious for the length of time between

462
00:29:17.650 --> 00:29:21.410
each belt, so it's not like he's giving these things away all the

463
00:29:21.410 --> 00:29:25.250
time. No, not all the time, but he has given out quite a few of

464
00:29:25.250 --> 00:29:28.490
them. And I think it took me,

465
00:29:28.970 --> 00:29:32.690
I went one day a week and it took me

466
00:29:32.690 --> 00:29:36.250
almost three years to get my blue belt. So, you know, that's your first

467
00:29:36.970 --> 00:29:40.740
from the white belt. So as, as they

468
00:29:40.820 --> 00:29:44.100
progress, did the, did the knives get larger?

469
00:29:45.220 --> 00:29:48.900
Yes, we, we haven't made a black belt one yet. Okay. We,

470
00:29:48.900 --> 00:29:52.340
we've talked about it and it might be, it might be a bowie knife, so

471
00:29:53.300 --> 00:29:56.980
we don't know for sure on that yet. Wow, that's pretty

472
00:29:56.980 --> 00:30:00.180
cool. So with the,

473
00:30:00.660 --> 00:30:04.020
with, with your progression of your ability to

474
00:30:04.180 --> 00:30:08.000
knife fight and use a bowie, what have you learned from working

475
00:30:08.000 --> 00:30:11.760
with James Keating on, on his knives? What kind of

476
00:30:11.760 --> 00:30:15.440
things have you learned about knives that you, you maybe didn't think about before

477
00:30:15.440 --> 00:30:19.120
you were working with him? I don't really

478
00:30:19.120 --> 00:30:22.920
know. He, he has had a lot of insight in the, the

479
00:30:22.920 --> 00:30:25.040
knife industry and

480
00:30:26.640 --> 00:30:30.000
some general business stuff. Like somebody would

481
00:30:30.240 --> 00:30:33.610
buy something from him and they would tell

482
00:30:34.170 --> 00:30:37.730
PayPal that they didn't get it, you know, and so they got

483
00:30:37.730 --> 00:30:41.450
scammed. He. PayPal would give their money back and then they,

484
00:30:42.010 --> 00:30:45.250
you know, if it was a knife or something, he, he would be out as

485
00:30:45.250 --> 00:30:48.970
a knife too. So he still need to watch out. For that kind of

486
00:30:48.970 --> 00:30:52.690
thing, man. I mean, you would think knowing who this

487
00:30:52.690 --> 00:30:56.330
guy is, you wouldn't mess with him because they, these things called

488
00:30:56.330 --> 00:31:00.120
airplanes, you could get on one and go find that guy. Exactly. And he's got

489
00:31:00.120 --> 00:31:03.920
your address. But in terms

490
00:31:03.920 --> 00:31:07.480
of knife design for what, what his purpose is, you know, I'm,

491
00:31:07.480 --> 00:31:10.480
I'm presuming you're making him fighting knives.

492
00:31:11.440 --> 00:31:15.040
Well what are the knives you're making him right now? Well,

493
00:31:15.440 --> 00:31:16.480
all I have are

494
00:31:18.640 --> 00:31:21.440
trainers. He has a sub hilt

495
00:31:22.400 --> 00:31:26.180
that you can see. These aren't

496
00:31:26.180 --> 00:31:29.700
forced or anything. These are a water jet cut and

497
00:31:30.740 --> 00:31:33.860
but this is, you know, he's, he likes the trigger

498
00:31:34.900 --> 00:31:38.660
on there. Whenever he, he has a specific

499
00:31:38.660 --> 00:31:42.500
purpose for the trigger. If you go learn from him, he will teach

500
00:31:42.500 --> 00:31:45.780
you how to use it in the, the knife fighting perspective.

501
00:31:46.740 --> 00:31:50.440
And but this is a trainer. I got one. You

502
00:31:50.440 --> 00:31:54.240
know, I have one that's bead blasted. It might not glare as much. Oh

503
00:31:54.240 --> 00:31:56.760
wow, that is, that's crazy.

504
00:31:58.040 --> 00:32:00.840
But it's a neat, it's a neat little knife. It's kind of,

505
00:32:02.200 --> 00:32:05.320
the blade is sort of like a Randall number one. Yeah.

506
00:32:05.800 --> 00:32:08.840
And then his handle is, it

507
00:32:09.400 --> 00:32:13.000
comes down pretty good ways here where it's like a pistol, almost

508
00:32:13.000 --> 00:32:16.680
like a pistol grip so that the alignment of your hand.

509
00:32:17.290 --> 00:32:21.130
Oh, I'm bleeding. Alignment of your hand is,

510
00:32:22.490 --> 00:32:26.170
is, you know, in line with the thrust and a sharpened

511
00:32:26.170 --> 00:32:29.850
clip so that you can back cut with it too. That

512
00:32:29.850 --> 00:32:32.890
looks smaller than what a lot of his

513
00:32:33.610 --> 00:32:37.370
knives tend to be. At least that I know of.

514
00:32:37.930 --> 00:32:41.690
Right. He's had this one out for a while, a pretty good while.

515
00:32:42.250 --> 00:32:46.090
And but the,

516
00:32:46.490 --> 00:32:49.370
there's several people who every day carry this

517
00:32:50.410 --> 00:32:54.010
even though it, it is, it's big knife but it's not

518
00:32:54.250 --> 00:32:57.050
nearly as big as the Cassada. Right.

519
00:32:59.050 --> 00:33:02.890
So in terms of making a knife that's meant

520
00:33:02.890 --> 00:33:06.730
for fighting balance,

521
00:33:06.970 --> 00:33:09.850
this is something Rolando for instance was talking about.

522
00:33:10.760 --> 00:33:14.520
He talks about that a lot and he's a, if, if people don't know him,

523
00:33:14.520 --> 00:33:18.120
they, they need to check out our many conversations on this show. I love

524
00:33:18.360 --> 00:33:22.040
he's a great guy but also he's very interesting to talk to

525
00:33:22.040 --> 00:33:25.840
about the specifics of knife fighting and he frequently talks about the balance

526
00:33:25.840 --> 00:33:29.400
of a knife. And with my limited knowledge I can, I can

527
00:33:29.400 --> 00:33:32.960
feel how a well balanced knife or a knife that's

528
00:33:32.960 --> 00:33:36.720
balanced for the purpose is superior to, to

529
00:33:36.720 --> 00:33:40.520
another. When you're making a knife say for James Keating or just

530
00:33:40.520 --> 00:33:44.360
in general a knife that you consider to be a self defense or a

531
00:33:44.360 --> 00:33:47.800
fighting knife. What goes into it in terms of that

532
00:33:47.960 --> 00:33:50.840
aspect of the design, the balance and the feel.

533
00:33:51.320 --> 00:33:54.760
Okay. Like the, the, the big chopper that

534
00:33:54.760 --> 00:33:58.440
Rolando has that has a forward balance

535
00:33:58.920 --> 00:34:02.200
for, for chopping and but

536
00:34:03.410 --> 00:34:07.250
the, the croissanta, I make these to balance right here in the

537
00:34:07.250 --> 00:34:10.130
quillian. This is the aluminum version so

538
00:34:10.930 --> 00:34:13.250
it doesn't, doesn't really balance. But

539
00:34:14.690 --> 00:34:18.490
right here in the Quillion so that it's fairly

540
00:34:18.490 --> 00:34:22.330
lightweight at the tip. So the tip is really fast and whenever you put

541
00:34:22.330 --> 00:34:26.010
the quillions in, it doesn't change the balance. Oh, that's

542
00:34:26.010 --> 00:34:29.849
smart. So that's why I like on this one. That's what I

543
00:34:30.009 --> 00:34:32.489
worry about. This one is a little bit

544
00:34:34.249 --> 00:34:37.489
light in the tip as well because there's quite a bit of meat in the

545
00:34:37.489 --> 00:34:40.329
handle. So they're quick.

546
00:34:41.129 --> 00:34:44.889
So do you test out your work? I do, yes.

547
00:34:45.529 --> 00:34:48.409
I test out on everything because I have,

548
00:34:49.369 --> 00:34:53.129
let's see, I like to chop

549
00:34:53.609 --> 00:34:57.300
into either some micarta or I, I've got a piece

550
00:34:57.300 --> 00:35:01.060
of a persimmon tree that persimmons really hard

551
00:35:02.980 --> 00:35:06.700
and maple. Some of the maple

552
00:35:06.700 --> 00:35:10.260
can be soft pine trees. You know the pine lumber pretty

553
00:35:10.260 --> 00:35:13.980
soft. I, I test those specifically for. To make sure

554
00:35:13.980 --> 00:35:17.380
that I heat treated it because I have forgotten to heat treat one.

555
00:35:17.380 --> 00:35:21.140
I've. I've made a couple of knives and then whenever I, I just did a

556
00:35:21.140 --> 00:35:24.820
little thing like that and bent the edge and I'm like

557
00:35:24.820 --> 00:35:28.500
well start over. Oh, that's got to be

558
00:35:28.500 --> 00:35:32.060
brutal. You. So you can't just pop the handles off and heat treat it?

559
00:35:32.860 --> 00:35:35.820
No. Once you grind it thin enough to be a knife,

560
00:35:36.460 --> 00:35:40.060
whenever you heat treat it, the, the, the edge will wave like this,

561
00:35:40.460 --> 00:35:44.060
you know, at. And so you have to grind that all off

562
00:35:44.540 --> 00:35:46.780
and by then it's a completely different knife.

563
00:35:48.150 --> 00:35:51.910
Okay, so this reminds me of another

564
00:35:51.990 --> 00:35:55.630
topic. My wife and I are huge fans of Forged in Fire.

565
00:35:55.630 --> 00:35:59.350
And I understand you recently competed on that. Well,

566
00:35:59.430 --> 00:36:02.630
it was, it was recently aired. I,

567
00:36:03.510 --> 00:36:07.350
it was filmed four years ago. Oh geez. Okay. Yeah,

568
00:36:07.510 --> 00:36:10.950
yeah, they, they had a bunch in the can that they, you know, like

569
00:36:10.950 --> 00:36:14.660
25 to 30 shows that the, they had

570
00:36:14.660 --> 00:36:18.380
filmed but hadn't aired and mine was one of them.

571
00:36:18.380 --> 00:36:21.620
So on season, at least on our TV

572
00:36:22.100 --> 00:36:25.220
season 12, episode one, they finally

573
00:36:25.300 --> 00:36:28.940
released. Released that. What, what was the challenge

574
00:36:28.940 --> 00:36:32.260
knife? The, the. It was a machete.

575
00:36:32.260 --> 00:36:35.900
Machete. First. First round machete. That's the. At

576
00:36:35.900 --> 00:36:39.700
my what. There may have been some more big room ones since the,

577
00:36:40.050 --> 00:36:43.810
since you know, since

578
00:36:43.970 --> 00:36:47.810
you know before mine but not that I had seen at the time. So

579
00:36:47.810 --> 00:36:51.010
mine was the biggest knife that for the first round

580
00:36:51.570 --> 00:36:55.290
that I had seen and I was like, oh my goodness. This

581
00:36:55.290 --> 00:36:58.890
was the Pimp My Blade episode in My Blade. Yeah. Gosh. We just

582
00:36:58.890 --> 00:37:02.290
watched that and I didn't even know who I was watching. How crazy is that?

583
00:37:02.530 --> 00:37:06.290
Yep. Yep, that was me. It's awesome. So what was

584
00:37:06.290 --> 00:37:09.970
that experience like? It was awesome. I loved It. I

585
00:37:09.970 --> 00:37:13.610
would. I would go back again anytime. It was. It was really fun to see

586
00:37:13.850 --> 00:37:16.410
how it was made and everything.

587
00:37:17.530 --> 00:37:21.170
I had a whole lot of fun. Got to meet some cool

588
00:37:21.170 --> 00:37:24.810
guys and just make knives. It was. It was very

589
00:37:24.810 --> 00:37:28.650
fun. So working in the. On

590
00:37:28.650 --> 00:37:32.400
the. I mean, I'm not sure if it's a sound stage. It

591
00:37:32.400 --> 00:37:35.640
seems like it's a warehouse or something. Yeah, it's a warehouse.

592
00:37:36.200 --> 00:37:39.880
What's that place like? Well, it's

593
00:37:41.080 --> 00:37:44.840
really cool in the back area. You come through the

594
00:37:44.840 --> 00:37:48.680
back, and you stage back there. And whenever

595
00:37:49.240 --> 00:37:53.040
I was getting ready to go on, we have guys that stay with us the

596
00:37:53.040 --> 00:37:56.800
whole time so that there's no possibility of cheating going on.

597
00:37:56.800 --> 00:38:00.000
They take. They take the competition very

598
00:38:00.000 --> 00:38:03.680
seriously. And so one of the guys goes, okay,

599
00:38:03.680 --> 00:38:07.520
Jeff, whenever I say Action Jeff, you go out. And

600
00:38:07.520 --> 00:38:11.360
I said, oh, from now on, I'm gonna have everybody just call me Action Jeff,

601
00:38:11.440 --> 00:38:14.800
you know, and he goes, and.

602
00:38:15.360 --> 00:38:18.360
But I got out there the very first thing I did, you know, and they

603
00:38:18.360 --> 00:38:20.720
cut this out. But the first thing he did was, you know,

604
00:38:21.760 --> 00:38:25.320
Grady was like, hello, Jeff. Welcome to the forge. And I was like,

605
00:38:25.320 --> 00:38:28.080
hi, Cody. Sake. And I. Who's Cody?

606
00:38:29.200 --> 00:38:32.920
And every time I looked at one of the cameras, I was thinking, there's a

607
00:38:32.920 --> 00:38:36.520
million people looking at me. So what. What's the hardest part

608
00:38:36.520 --> 00:38:39.760
about competing on that show? Probably

609
00:38:40.640 --> 00:38:44.320
time. Worrying about the time, you know, Definitely the time. You

610
00:38:44.320 --> 00:38:48.040
can't make a really nice knife in five hours, right? And so you got

611
00:38:48.040 --> 00:38:51.560
to make a nice enough knife and try not to rush

612
00:38:51.560 --> 00:38:54.640
yourself, which is what I did and caused my problems.

613
00:38:55.870 --> 00:38:59.470
But, you know,

614
00:38:59.470 --> 00:39:02.750
whenever I got done with the forging the blade, I had, like

615
00:39:03.070 --> 00:39:06.910
20. 20 minutes left. I thought, wow, I could have. Could have

616
00:39:06.910 --> 00:39:10.670
done some. Something else. I didn't realize that I was done that fast,

617
00:39:10.670 --> 00:39:14.350
but I did get it. Get it finished. So what did you do

618
00:39:14.350 --> 00:39:18.150
before the show? Before you. I know this was four years ago

619
00:39:18.150 --> 00:39:21.550
at this point, but what did you do leading up to it to prep

620
00:39:21.550 --> 00:39:24.520
yourself? I made a list of things that I wanted to

621
00:39:25.640 --> 00:39:29.400
practice and to experience before I went to the show.

622
00:39:29.880 --> 00:39:33.720
And they. They had a question there, and they

623
00:39:33.720 --> 00:39:36.920
like, have you ever done this? Have you ever done coal? Have you ever made

624
00:39:36.920 --> 00:39:40.040
a crossbow? Have you made stuff like that?

625
00:39:40.600 --> 00:39:44.360
And I didn't practice making a Costco, but I did

626
00:39:44.360 --> 00:39:48.040
go practice. I don't have a hammer, a power hammer

627
00:39:48.470 --> 00:39:51.830
or a press. And so I went to a friend's shop and

628
00:39:52.310 --> 00:39:56.070
used his to make some Damascus and that sort of thing. Just

629
00:39:56.550 --> 00:39:58.590
make sure I knew What I was doing when I got out there and did

630
00:39:58.590 --> 00:40:02.310
that, that's. So is that something that you plan on

631
00:40:02.310 --> 00:40:05.270
investing in at some point, like a big. Oh, yeah, definitely. So

632
00:40:05.990 --> 00:40:09.430
when I retire, the. When you retire. Okay, so the, the.

633
00:40:09.670 --> 00:40:13.030
Is the press the same machine as the hammer?

634
00:40:13.920 --> 00:40:17.360
No, they're two different machines. The press just

635
00:40:17.840 --> 00:40:21.600
squishes for like 25 tons or more. You

636
00:40:21.600 --> 00:40:25.440
can get smaller ones and it's really great for making

637
00:40:25.440 --> 00:40:29.120
Damascus. Any kind of Damascus you can use that. The

638
00:40:29.120 --> 00:40:32.840
hammer is just beef like that. And it's great for

639
00:40:32.840 --> 00:40:36.600
forging out blades. You know, you can forge them out and you can also

640
00:40:36.600 --> 00:40:40.200
do certain types of Damascus on those as well.

641
00:40:40.440 --> 00:40:44.280
Okay, so those, those presses. And they have those cool dieses that,

642
00:40:44.520 --> 00:40:48.040
that sort of press in. That's for getting your welds

643
00:40:48.040 --> 00:40:50.520
together. Right, right. Getting them, getting them,

644
00:40:51.560 --> 00:40:54.880
getting them there. You can, like, if you put like you, you had it like,

645
00:40:54.880 --> 00:40:58.600
like this, you can squish from the corners of the blade

646
00:40:58.600 --> 00:41:02.200
and make C's and W's

647
00:41:02.280 --> 00:41:06.110
to make all kinds of different patterns with that.

648
00:41:07.230 --> 00:41:10.950
But you. You're right. Whenever. Squish. But you can do. You can

649
00:41:10.950 --> 00:41:14.190
do the, the squishing to the initial weld on the hammer too.

650
00:41:14.590 --> 00:41:17.550
Okay. Okay. Is this something. Do you do Damascus

651
00:41:17.950 --> 00:41:21.670
regularly or. Not regularly, no, I, I

652
00:41:21.670 --> 00:41:24.990
just. Whenever I go to my friend's house, I'll make some. But

653
00:41:26.590 --> 00:41:30.430
it is, it's on the list. Right now I'm getting prepared

654
00:41:30.430 --> 00:41:33.840
for retirement. I got a year and a half to maybe two years,

655
00:41:34.400 --> 00:41:37.680
and so I'm getting stuff for the house. Retirement

656
00:41:38.720 --> 00:41:42.560
funds ready to go. But as soon as I retire,

657
00:41:42.640 --> 00:41:46.480
I'm going to be hitting some classes

658
00:41:46.800 --> 00:41:50.480
with the master smiths and

659
00:41:50.560 --> 00:41:54.160
getting the tools that I need for the. The press and

660
00:41:54.640 --> 00:41:58.480
maybe a hammer. What. What line of work are you retiring from?

661
00:41:58.760 --> 00:42:02.600
You don't. I am a letter carrier. City carrier. Oh, okay.

662
00:42:02.680 --> 00:42:05.720
Post office. Yeah. Oh, we are. We all. Thank you. Especially

663
00:42:06.600 --> 00:42:10.440
knife junkies such as myself who. Who rely on good folks like you.

664
00:42:11.240 --> 00:42:14.560
To bring our little addict the knives back and forth. Right? Yeah. Yeah,

665
00:42:14.560 --> 00:42:18.200
exactly. You know what? I'm going to knock on wood, but it's.

666
00:42:19.400 --> 00:42:23.200
I remember when I first. I mean, I've. I've been into knives since I was

667
00:42:23.200 --> 00:42:26.810
a little kid, but when I really like, I. I feel like it was

668
00:42:26.810 --> 00:42:30.650
2012 or 2013 when it really picked up for me and I

669
00:42:30.650 --> 00:42:34.490
started online and trading and mailing and

670
00:42:34.490 --> 00:42:38.290
people always used to complain about the post office, and I was like, geez,

671
00:42:38.370 --> 00:42:42.130
knock on wood. I've never had me too. I've never had, I've never lost

672
00:42:42.130 --> 00:42:45.650
a knife either coming or going, either way.

673
00:42:45.650 --> 00:42:49.490
And I have had some like a T shirt

674
00:42:49.490 --> 00:42:53.060
or something get lost in the mail, but nothing too, too bad.

675
00:42:54.100 --> 00:42:57.820
Yeah. Yeah. Which for like about 18 years I was my own mail

676
00:42:57.820 --> 00:43:01.620
carrier. So at least that last, that last mile, I knew I was

677
00:43:01.620 --> 00:43:05.260
going to get it then. Yeah. Yeah, man, that's, that's a lucky, that's. A bit

678
00:43:05.260 --> 00:43:08.500
of luck there. Yeah. For me, if it, if it makes it to

679
00:43:08.900 --> 00:43:12.700
my post office, I'm going. To get it, you know. Yeah. So I

680
00:43:12.700 --> 00:43:16.380
found something else about you and

681
00:43:16.380 --> 00:43:20.160
I'm not stalking you, but I had to do some research. Right. It said

682
00:43:20.160 --> 00:43:23.880
that you are a cold case murder investigation

683
00:43:25.000 --> 00:43:28.680
blade expert. What is that all about? Well, they.

684
00:43:29.240 --> 00:43:33.080
I got a friend who, who is a reporter and

685
00:43:34.040 --> 00:43:37.640
he has, he's covered a lot of cases here,

686
00:43:37.960 --> 00:43:40.200
Northeast Arkansas, so like the,

687
00:43:41.800 --> 00:43:44.600
the West Memphis Three and

688
00:43:45.310 --> 00:43:48.830
Rebecca Gould. Those are, they made national

689
00:43:48.830 --> 00:43:52.270
headlines and he's written books about them and stuff. And he

690
00:43:52.270 --> 00:43:55.710
combined with an investigator who came from

691
00:43:56.190 --> 00:43:59.990
the military. I'm not a hundred percent sure of all her background, but

692
00:43:59.990 --> 00:44:03.670
she has a, she's really good investigative, just, you

693
00:44:03.670 --> 00:44:07.310
know, investigator. And they

694
00:44:07.390 --> 00:44:10.830
had a, had a, a case where someone was

695
00:44:10.830 --> 00:44:14.190
stabbed and they just needed to like,

696
00:44:14.670 --> 00:44:18.270
wanted to learn as much as they could about the knife that

697
00:44:18.750 --> 00:44:22.470
might possibly have done it. So they brought me in and I consulted

698
00:44:22.470 --> 00:44:25.990
with like three or four cases for them. Now what's that

699
00:44:25.990 --> 00:44:29.390
like? It's pretty interesting,

700
00:44:30.030 --> 00:44:33.510
you know, do that to be able to view autopsy

701
00:44:33.510 --> 00:44:37.230
photos, but otherwise you get to

702
00:44:37.390 --> 00:44:41.150
like, just play the scenario over and over again, look at the wounds and see

703
00:44:41.150 --> 00:44:43.430
what kind of knife could have caused that. You know,

704
00:44:45.030 --> 00:44:48.070
this. It was pretty, pretty interesting.

705
00:44:48.950 --> 00:44:52.630
Yeah. I could see that being interesting and you know, at the same time.

706
00:44:52.870 --> 00:44:56.470
Well, kind of. I could see how it could be a difficult

707
00:44:56.630 --> 00:45:00.390
thing to, to manage. I guess you have to have a strong stomach, but.

708
00:45:00.470 --> 00:45:04.030
Yeah, yeah. And you know, you get to play over all the

709
00:45:04.030 --> 00:45:07.690
scenarios of what happened whenever, whenever the person

710
00:45:07.690 --> 00:45:11.210
was murdered. The last,

711
00:45:11.370 --> 00:45:15.050
I don't know if I'm supposed to talk about all specifics, but

712
00:45:16.090 --> 00:45:19.290
the first one that I did, it was

713
00:45:19.770 --> 00:45:23.050
fairly, fairly easy to see that

714
00:45:23.530 --> 00:45:26.810
it was a certain particular knife. And

715
00:45:27.530 --> 00:45:31.130
the others are probably more like just kitchen knives.

716
00:45:31.370 --> 00:45:34.370
Okay, so the first one, and I'm not going to press you for details you

717
00:45:34.370 --> 00:45:37.410
can't give, but are you saying that the first one had a,

718
00:45:38.450 --> 00:45:42.250
a profile? Like a wound profile, for lack of a better term,

719
00:45:42.250 --> 00:45:45.650
that was easily identifiable as a certain Type of knife.

720
00:45:45.970 --> 00:45:47.010
Right. And

721
00:45:49.890 --> 00:45:53.410
you know, you could see like where he hit

722
00:45:53.410 --> 00:45:57.090
bone and the knife didn't, didn't stab

723
00:45:57.170 --> 00:46:01.010
down a very deep. You can see it was a double edge.

724
00:46:01.650 --> 00:46:05.370
Oh, okay. And then the deeper it got, and some of the, the ones

725
00:46:05.370 --> 00:46:08.610
where he got way, you know, just buried it to the hilt.

726
00:46:09.570 --> 00:46:12.770
It was a fat on one side and the edge on the other side. So

727
00:46:12.770 --> 00:46:16.490
it had a double edge at the front of the blade and a single

728
00:46:16.490 --> 00:46:20.050
edge at the back. And it was fairly thick but pretty narrow.

729
00:46:21.410 --> 00:46:25.170
And so that led me to believe that it

730
00:46:25.170 --> 00:46:28.860
was most likely so something like a, a

731
00:46:28.860 --> 00:46:31.820
World War II trench knife. Oh, like an M3?

732
00:46:32.380 --> 00:46:36.060
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And that was the only. I,

733
00:46:36.060 --> 00:46:39.860
I scoured all my books and on the Internet and I

734
00:46:39.860 --> 00:46:43.500
could not find a knife that had that blade profile that was

735
00:46:43.500 --> 00:46:47.180
that narrow, like three quarters of the inch wide and was very

736
00:46:47.180 --> 00:46:49.820
thick in the back and double edged. Right,

737
00:46:50.940 --> 00:46:54.590
Man. So I, my question, I think you

738
00:46:54.590 --> 00:46:58.190
pretty much answered it. In your experience, is it usually

739
00:46:58.270 --> 00:47:01.910
people doing bad stuff with everyday knives, like

740
00:47:01.910 --> 00:47:04.990
kitchen knives? Yeah, yeah. Most of the

741
00:47:05.470 --> 00:47:09.310
is sometimes they're hunting knives. But, you know,

742
00:47:10.110 --> 00:47:13.470
like, if someone really gets mad, a lot of serial

743
00:47:13.470 --> 00:47:16.350
killers will go into a house

744
00:47:17.070 --> 00:47:20.820
without any weapons for some reason. I don't know why, but

745
00:47:20.820 --> 00:47:24.420
in my study of serial killers, they would go into the house and

746
00:47:24.420 --> 00:47:28.260
find a weapon like they would do a lamp cord to choke somebody. There

747
00:47:28.260 --> 00:47:31.980
was famous cases of that and that. And once he found out that that

748
00:47:31.980 --> 00:47:35.780
worked, well, that's what he did from then on. And some of them go

749
00:47:35.780 --> 00:47:39.580
in there and get a knife out of the kitchen. And so usually it's something

750
00:47:39.580 --> 00:47:43.340
from inside the house that they use. Jeez,

751
00:47:43.340 --> 00:47:47.110
man. That's. This is, you know, tapping

752
00:47:47.110 --> 00:47:49.310
into some of my biggest

753
00:47:50.350 --> 00:47:54.110
concerns because I have a lot of these kind of implements in

754
00:47:54.110 --> 00:47:57.870
my house. I have a lot of other kind of implements to defend the family.

755
00:47:58.670 --> 00:48:02.470
But, you know, I always think about that. It, it pops into

756
00:48:02.470 --> 00:48:05.990
my head all the time. Like I got all these knives around, right? Yeah.

757
00:48:05.990 --> 00:48:09.710
But then again, I also think if someone were in this

758
00:48:09.710 --> 00:48:13.540
house, you know, hopefully they'd be met with

759
00:48:13.780 --> 00:48:17.300
a wall of flying metal. Yeah,

760
00:48:17.380 --> 00:48:21.220
exactly. And so, you know, I don't know, I don't even want to

761
00:48:21.220 --> 00:48:24.180
think about that kind of stuff. But it's, but it is very interesting to me

762
00:48:24.180 --> 00:48:27.700
to, to, to know that, you know, you're,

763
00:48:27.860 --> 00:48:31.540
you're kind of working on all sides of, of

764
00:48:31.540 --> 00:48:35.060
knives in the making. The making of some very

765
00:48:35.540 --> 00:48:39.120
specialized knives. Right. For some people who specialize

766
00:48:39.520 --> 00:48:42.320
in them, like James Keating. And

767
00:48:43.040 --> 00:48:46.240
you've done Forged in Fire. That's pretty cool.

768
00:48:47.520 --> 00:48:50.240
I also understand that you are a pilot.

769
00:48:51.520 --> 00:48:55.240
I did take lessons. I'm not a pilot now, but I

770
00:48:55.240 --> 00:48:58.400
took lessons. I went all the way.

771
00:48:58.880 --> 00:49:02.080
Took the written, made a 97 on my written. And

772
00:49:02.720 --> 00:49:05.840
that's the only thing I can brag about. But I didn't actually

773
00:49:06.960 --> 00:49:10.760
go take my final flight lessons. I. That

774
00:49:10.760 --> 00:49:14.320
was when I was in my 20s. I got about 75 hours in,

775
00:49:14.560 --> 00:49:18.200
and I love flying, but it was just getting too expensive at the

776
00:49:18.200 --> 00:49:21.680
time. I didn't have a good job, and so

777
00:49:22.080 --> 00:49:25.120
I had to quit about the time I was getting ready to take the test.

778
00:49:25.440 --> 00:49:29.040
Okay, so with. With all of these things, with, with your love of

779
00:49:29.040 --> 00:49:32.770
history and of knives and all this, what are

780
00:49:32.770 --> 00:49:36.450
the kind of knives that you see yourself making in the

781
00:49:36.450 --> 00:49:40.290
future as. As you continue, you know, you retire, you throw

782
00:49:40.290 --> 00:49:43.930
yourself even deeper into the. Into knife

783
00:49:43.930 --> 00:49:47.450
making and forging. Where do you see this going for you

784
00:49:47.850 --> 00:49:50.970
in the. In the terms of the types of

785
00:49:51.370 --> 00:49:55.170
knives you'd like to make? Well, the types of knives I like to

786
00:49:55.170 --> 00:49:58.380
make are bowie knives and, and daggers. And

787
00:49:58.700 --> 00:50:02.340
I really would love to make just a

788
00:50:02.340 --> 00:50:05.180
lot of really nice ones, you know, with

789
00:50:06.220 --> 00:50:08.780
Damascus engraving,

790
00:50:09.660 --> 00:50:13.500
checkering on, you know, stuff like that. I. I've taken.

791
00:50:13.580 --> 00:50:17.260
I've taken engraving classes. Oh. And. And

792
00:50:17.500 --> 00:50:21.300
so that's definitely in the future, and I

793
00:50:21.300 --> 00:50:24.920
hope to make some really cool knives. And later on,

794
00:50:25.080 --> 00:50:27.640
I'm making as good a night as I can make right now.

795
00:50:28.200 --> 00:50:31.400
Daggers present a special

796
00:50:31.720 --> 00:50:35.400
challenge, I would imagine. I cannot imagine. I mean, I can imagine making

797
00:50:35.400 --> 00:50:39.120
a really sweet Bowie in. Because I can see how I would do it, even

798
00:50:39.120 --> 00:50:42.320
though I don't know what I'm doing, but I have no idea how one would

799
00:50:42.320 --> 00:50:45.960
make a dagger. What are the. What are the special challenges?

800
00:50:46.600 --> 00:50:49.640
The, the biggest challenge with the dagger is symmetry.

801
00:50:50.540 --> 00:50:53.980
They have to be the same, not only just in

802
00:50:54.460 --> 00:50:57.340
one side to the other, but they got four sides,

803
00:50:58.300 --> 00:51:01.980
so. And they all had to be perfectly same. And

804
00:51:01.980 --> 00:51:05.820
then the guards have to be straight and symmetrical as well.

805
00:51:07.420 --> 00:51:11.020
So that's the biggest challenge of making a dagger,

806
00:51:11.020 --> 00:51:14.220
is symmetry. Have you, have you seen the

807
00:51:14.300 --> 00:51:18.020
daggers that, that they make? Mastersmiths, when you go for your

808
00:51:18.020 --> 00:51:21.420
mastersmith test those kind of daggers. Yeah, with the, with the

809
00:51:21.580 --> 00:51:25.300
tweet. Yeah. Wire inlay. Yeah.

810
00:51:25.300 --> 00:51:28.780
That's all. That's all a thing that you have to do to.

811
00:51:29.420 --> 00:51:33.020
That's one of the things is that it's the quillion dagger

812
00:51:33.020 --> 00:51:36.140
and it has to have a fluted handle with the twisted Wire

813
00:51:36.380 --> 00:51:38.860
inlays in the handle and

814
00:51:40.380 --> 00:51:43.320
I think at least a 300 layer blade

815
00:51:43.880 --> 00:51:47.560
Damascus blade. That's crazy. Do you, do you

816
00:51:47.640 --> 00:51:51.360
do, do you see any. I've, I've wondered

817
00:51:51.360 --> 00:51:55.160
this sometimes, especially when watching forging fire.

818
00:51:55.160 --> 00:51:58.920
We keep coming back to that, but in the, in the making of

819
00:51:58.920 --> 00:52:01.720
Damascus steel and is there any

820
00:52:03.160 --> 00:52:06.800
compromise to the, to the strength when you have two different

821
00:52:06.800 --> 00:52:10.480
steels and you're welding them together? Let's just assume all the welds are

822
00:52:10.480 --> 00:52:14.270
perfect, you know, and, and that's not the concern. Okay. Yeah. If they're all

823
00:52:14.270 --> 00:52:17.230
perfect and done. Done well, there's not really any,

824
00:52:17.790 --> 00:52:21.310
any less strength. Okay.

825
00:52:21.630 --> 00:52:25.430
Yeah. You know, there's a

826
00:52:25.430 --> 00:52:29.110
lot of, lot of little layers that, you know, there's a lot of opportunities to

827
00:52:29.110 --> 00:52:32.550
go bad in Damascus making

828
00:52:32.550 --> 00:52:36.390
Damascus, but there's not really. Once it's

829
00:52:36.390 --> 00:52:39.970
all basically one piece of metal, it should

830
00:52:39.970 --> 00:52:43.770
be pretty strong for a knife. Okay, so before I let

831
00:52:43.770 --> 00:52:46.850
you go here, you showed me a hunter

832
00:52:47.330 --> 00:52:51.090
before, before we started rolling here. I'd

833
00:52:51.090 --> 00:52:53.970
like you to show us that. And then, and then I also want to see

834
00:52:53.970 --> 00:52:57.610
the, the big Bowie again, the whole camera. This looks

835
00:52:57.610 --> 00:53:00.450
beautiful, right? This is a

836
00:53:02.050 --> 00:53:05.500
little hudder with African black wood handle.

837
00:53:06.060 --> 00:53:09.740
The 5160 blade and 416

838
00:53:09.820 --> 00:53:13.420
stainless guard. It's just pretty shiny.

839
00:53:13.820 --> 00:53:17.460
Yeah. So I got, right here on

840
00:53:17.460 --> 00:53:21.260
the, on the end, there's a neat little bird's beak

841
00:53:21.900 --> 00:53:25.500
type feature there. It's not too

842
00:53:25.500 --> 00:53:29.220
thick. So how does the blade stay in the hand?

843
00:53:29.220 --> 00:53:32.890
Oh, keep holding that up for a sec. Is there a mechanical

844
00:53:32.890 --> 00:53:36.730
connection there or is that epoxy? How does that fit in? Right now it's just

845
00:53:36.730 --> 00:53:40.290
epoxy. There's going to be a sterling silver pin.

846
00:53:40.530 --> 00:53:44.290
Oh, nice. Yeah, I have it. I still,

847
00:53:44.290 --> 00:53:47.250
I don't have my name on it either. And it's not sharp, so it's, it's

848
00:53:47.250 --> 00:53:51.010
on its way. It's. Yeah. That's beautiful.

849
00:53:51.410 --> 00:53:54.690
Thank you. I also brought one of these little

850
00:53:55.090 --> 00:53:58.140
paring knives I make. I made a bunch of these for people.

851
00:54:00.060 --> 00:54:03.660
Little paring knife with some. That antique

852
00:54:03.660 --> 00:54:06.220
micarta. Yes. Paper micarta.

853
00:54:07.340 --> 00:54:11.020
That's beautiful. This looks, yeah, it's a paring knife, but it also looks like it

854
00:54:11.020 --> 00:54:14.860
could be an, an everyday. Sort of looks like it has

855
00:54:14.860 --> 00:54:18.540
all sorts of uses. Yeah, I've made some sheaths for some.

856
00:54:19.340 --> 00:54:21.820
Yeah, I got a little knife that I made for my buddy. He was,

857
00:54:23.220 --> 00:54:26.820
he, he was going jogging and needed a little thing to

858
00:54:26.820 --> 00:54:30.660
carry while he was jogging. So I just made this out of Scrap

859
00:54:31.380 --> 00:54:34.740
for him gets a little sheath. Oh, that's nice.

860
00:54:35.460 --> 00:54:39.260
That's nice and thin too. You know that very. It doesn't, it doesn't get

861
00:54:39.260 --> 00:54:43.020
in the way when you're, when you're running. So I, this is

862
00:54:43.020 --> 00:54:46.100
a huge part of the market. I think this is where a lot of people

863
00:54:47.140 --> 00:54:50.770
who are, you know, traditionally into

864
00:54:50.770 --> 00:54:54.530
folders and, and just everyday carry folders

865
00:54:54.530 --> 00:54:58.210
and such, big trend over the past five years that keeps

866
00:54:58.210 --> 00:55:01.850
growing are these everyday carry fixed blades. I'm huge into them.

867
00:55:03.050 --> 00:55:06.890
But is this something that you're considering moving

868
00:55:06.890 --> 00:55:10.490
into? Right, yeah. I, I, I've been carrying

869
00:55:10.490 --> 00:55:14.210
a, what I call a front pocket knife, but

870
00:55:14.210 --> 00:55:17.320
I did not, did not bring it out here,

871
00:55:18.520 --> 00:55:21.640
but just a little front pocket knife that

872
00:55:22.680 --> 00:55:26.280
has kind of a, an oval handle with a deep

873
00:55:26.280 --> 00:55:29.160
finger spot where you can just

874
00:55:30.280 --> 00:55:34.080
fits perfectly in the hand, but it's only like 6 inches

875
00:55:34.080 --> 00:55:37.880
long and then it just. Fits right in the, in the

876
00:55:37.880 --> 00:55:41.730
pocket. I, I love that. I'm, I'm a huge

877
00:55:41.730 --> 00:55:45.090
fan of everyday carry fixed blade knives. I love neck knives,

878
00:55:45.490 --> 00:55:49.130
though. I don't tend to carry them as much as I used to. Right. Yeah.

879
00:55:49.130 --> 00:55:51.730
But I, that, that comes and goes. I still collect them.

880
00:55:53.650 --> 00:55:57.290
So maybe I just have to get my blue belt. Okay. Get

881
00:55:57.290 --> 00:56:00.370
my, There you go. My green belt or whatever comes after blue.

882
00:56:01.890 --> 00:56:05.730
All right, so before I let you go, please, let's see that big Bowie again.

883
00:56:05.810 --> 00:56:08.920
You're Tinker. Your Tinker Bowie. Your Louis l'. Amour.

884
00:56:10.040 --> 00:56:13.640
That's beautiful. So you do your own

885
00:56:13.640 --> 00:56:17.400
leather too, huh? Yes. Yeah, that.

886
00:56:17.400 --> 00:56:21.240
Okay. So this is something I want in my collection. Is a, is a,

887
00:56:21.480 --> 00:56:24.960
is a, a Bowie with a, a crown stag

888
00:56:24.960 --> 00:56:28.120
handle like that. That is just beautiful. This,

889
00:56:28.440 --> 00:56:31.800
these fit in the hand so well. If you get the right one.

890
00:56:32.610 --> 00:56:36.210
Yeah, this is all forged. It's got the kind of the brute Deforge

891
00:56:36.210 --> 00:56:39.770
look to it. You know, the Ricasso's

892
00:56:39.770 --> 00:56:43.490
forged finish and the spine is forged finish. And there's a little

893
00:56:43.490 --> 00:56:47.130
bit right here along the edges you

894
00:56:47.130 --> 00:56:50.210
can maybe see. Yeah, yeah, we can see that.

895
00:56:52.130 --> 00:56:55.170
And the guard is all forged finish.

896
00:56:56.050 --> 00:56:59.780
No grinding on that. So let people know how

897
00:56:59.780 --> 00:57:02.220
they can keep up with you.

898
00:57:03.420 --> 00:57:07.260
See what you're making. Reach out to you commission work,

899
00:57:07.420 --> 00:57:10.940
let everyone know. Okay. I'm Schaefer Jeff on

900
00:57:10.940 --> 00:57:13.340
Instagram. I also have Shaffer knives

901
00:57:14.860 --> 00:57:18.580
also on Facebook. Shaffer knives on Facebook. And you

902
00:57:18.580 --> 00:57:21.660
know, I got my own personal page as well. And

903
00:57:22.300 --> 00:57:24.988
my website is www.schaeffer

904
00:57:25.212 --> 00:57:28.860
knives.com. not much on there except T shirts right now.

905
00:57:29.660 --> 00:57:33.500
And let's See that, that's most, most

906
00:57:33.500 --> 00:57:36.780
of it. I have. I also have a YouTube channel, but it's,

907
00:57:37.180 --> 00:57:40.980
it's got a few videos of croissant and stuff on

908
00:57:40.980 --> 00:57:44.660
there. I'll have to check that out. That's one thing I did not find. In,

909
00:57:44.660 --> 00:57:48.500
in, in, in the, in my research. So I'll definitely have to

910
00:57:48.500 --> 00:57:52.260
check that out. It was really nice talking with you, Jeff. I,

911
00:57:52.260 --> 00:57:54.540
I cannot wait to get one of your knives in hand.

912
00:57:55.930 --> 00:57:59.690
And I, I know like the, the one that Rolando had

913
00:57:59.770 --> 00:58:03.330
is, is very appealing to me, but the Louis Lamour

914
00:58:03.330 --> 00:58:07.170
even more so. So I love what you do

915
00:58:07.170 --> 00:58:10.929
and it's been real nice talking with you. Thank you. It's been very nice talking

916
00:58:10.929 --> 00:58:14.530
to you. Been listening to you for a long time. Oh, cool. But I

917
00:58:14.530 --> 00:58:18.130
hadn't been a patreon just a few months and I was like amazed at how

918
00:58:18.130 --> 00:58:21.860
much content you put out. Wow, man, you, you really

919
00:58:21.940 --> 00:58:25.380
get with it. I love it all. I love, especially your Maker Mondays. I love

920
00:58:25.380 --> 00:58:29.060
those guys like Don Hansen here lately. And

921
00:58:30.340 --> 00:58:34.180
let's see, who else did you. Have that I like? Anyway, it doesn't

922
00:58:34.180 --> 00:58:37.900
matter. Yeah, Tony Bose. We've had a bunch of guys. This is, this

923
00:58:37.900 --> 00:58:41.540
is the, the handiwork of Jim, our producer here. Oh

924
00:58:41.540 --> 00:58:45.380
yeah, yeah. He does an awesome job. He does. Yeah. Right.

925
00:58:46.510 --> 00:58:50.190
Well, thank you so much, Jeff. The pleasure has been mine, sir. Thank

926
00:58:50.190 --> 00:58:54.030
you. I appreciate you. Want to sell your custom knives online

927
00:58:54.110 --> 00:58:57.550
with launch cart, you can easily create your own e commerce store,

928
00:58:57.790 --> 00:59:01.590
no coding required. Launch cart is designed for knife

929
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makers like you with built in tools to showcase your

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craftsmanship, manage orders and grow your brand.

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It's fast, flexible and even includes low cost payment

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processing to help you keep more of your profits. Start

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your online knife store today at the knife junkie.com launch

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and turn your passion into a business. There he goes. Ladies

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and gentlemen, Jeff Schafer of Schafer Knives. Go check him out

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and all the places he was discussing. Definitely Instagram. You'll see a

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lot of cool pictures and check out Rolando's video. He takes a

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deep dive, about a half hour deep dive into that big beautiful

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Bowie chopper. Also all right for Jim working his magic behind the

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switcher, I'm Bob DeMarco saying until next time, don't take dull

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for an answer. Thanks for listening to the Knife Junkie podcast. If

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you enjoyed the show, please rate and

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00:59:52.250 --> 00:59:56.050
review@reviewthepodcast.com for show notes for today's

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episode, additional resources and to listen to past episodes, Visit our

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website thenifejunkie.com you can also watch our latest

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videos on YouTube@thenifejunkie.com YouTube it.