Hyde 514: Kitchen Cutlass

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Sam Cade

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Rural Kentucky, surrounded by Amish
Hyde Tools offers a large variety of knives and other assorted tools targeted toward the industrial consumer.

Hyde Tools is an offshoot of Dexter-Russell and many of their items are simply re-badged, however, there are a few knives sold under the Hyde marquee that do not appear in the standard Dexter-Russel catalog.

Most interesting among them is the Hyde 514.

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14" flat ground blade.
The absolute worst palletwood scales I have ever seen in my life.
Blade polished to a wobbly mirror finish.
Thin stamped steel guard.

Being Dexter produced we can safely assume that the blade is 1095 with nominal Rc being 55-56 and well heat treated.

http://www.amazon.com/Hyde-68180-14...=UTF8&qid=1372206768&sr=8-1&keywords=hyde+514

I notice that Amazon has sold their last remaining 514 after it was mentioned in a thread yesterday. Go THR! :D

One of the THR family sent the above pictured 514 to me for a bit of a tune up.

Step one is to drill the compression rivets and ditch the scales.
Easily done.

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See the notch?
That is where the guard indexes.
I grind the spine side of the tang down flush with that notch so that we can have a little more meat on our faux-carta grip without it being too large. Probably was a stress riser anyway.

Hmmmm.... End of the tang is a bit warped. I wonder if it is from heat treat or is an artifact of the stamping on the blank? Ah well no matter but good to know.

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Raided the parts bin for some wee nuts and bolts.
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Cleaned and scuffed the tang, cut out a template so I will know when to say when.
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I then gird my loins and begin the wrapping process to the dulcet sounds of Die Antwoord's paen to young love, Cookie Thumper.
 

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Never trust a guy with Girded Loins I always say! :D

No telling what evil lurks in their hearts, or what they are going to do next.

rc
 
A couple hours later we have a nice big lump of awfulness.

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Time to make some dust.


A bit later and we have this:

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Somewhere along the way I reprofiled the point to something much stabbier per the owners wishes.

POB is about two inches north of the grip. Feels very good.

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Annoying flaw:

I didn't make the layers over the butt end of the tang thick enough and had some minor surface voids once it was cut to size. :banghead:

Also note the off center tang from the warp.

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Seems like the words Seax, Scramasax, or short Falchion come to mind after looking at the last few photos. Price of HYDE 514 looks to be low enough to play with for custom modification.

blindhari
 
Eager to get my hands on it, Sam. Thanks for the pics of the process. :)

John
 
Excellent thread, and the same goes for the workmanship... You've opened my eyes a bit, I've always used Forschner for my boning, breaking, and butcher knives. I've known about Dexter Russell for years but my wholesaler didn't carry them. I still have the older Forschner cimeter and breaking knives with the rosewood handles.

In this era of greatly reduced and controlled take of saltwater fish my old large knives rarely see the light of day... I've never been a collector... all of my blades are strictly working tools.
 
I then gird my loins and begin the wrapping process to the dulcet sounds of Die Antwoord's paen to young love, Cookie Thumper.

I had to look it up. Damn!! That is Twisted. I like it.


The knife is sweet too. That is just denim from jeans, right?

Are you sawing this to a more manageable size and then grinding or doing it all on a grinder/belt sander?
 
I had to look it up. Damn!! That is Twisted. I like it.

South Africa is not a place for the gentle of heart is it?

I can't work without appropriate shop-music. :D

That is just denim from jeans, right?
Yup.

Thus far I haven't used anything other than natural fibers. I need to do some test swatches before using any polyester or poly/cotton fabrics since the resin itself is polyester and if the softeners in the resin break down the fibers in the fabric the composite would be very weak.


Any polymer materials guys in the house with good intel? This is a bit out of my pervue.


In any case, you don't have to use denim but thicker fabric equates to less layers and a faster wrap. Important since you are always racing against the clock.

Gonna try some silk later today.:cool:

Are you sawing this to a more manageable size and then grinding or doing it all on a grinder/belt sander?

If the block is standing very proud of the tang I will take a slice with the band-saw. Screeeeeeee!

I square the flats and back with a belt-grinder against the platen and then slack-belt grind the rest of it.
 
So...this is a big "knife"! It's light for its size, at 16.1 oz. (The RTAK 2 weighs 5 oz more.)

The handle feels very good, though it could have been left even rougher. The grip is pretty comfortable, but since it's both thick and wide, I'll have to use it a bit to know if it's too big. My sense is that it probably should be a bit thinner.

The shape of the handle seems well-considered. The handle swell just beneath the blade could be a bit thicker to give extra protection from sliding onto the blade.The handle colors are extremely attractive.

John
 

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I'm over at bikerdoc's...and the Cutlass finally got a workout.

Before.
 

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After pics.

The Cutlass is heavy-bladed enough to swing well, despite being short for a machete.

That 2nd picture is sideways- the "bottom" is the now-clear wall.
 

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I took on this small tree.


2 min, 24 sec.

John
 

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Heh. So it can only get better! :D

I'm getting ready to move, and at my unit for training...so I forgot to see if the knife was sharp. I did look at it, a few minutes in, and think, Huh. That doesn't look like much of an edge.
Oh, and Sam, I emailed the Cutlass vs. milk jug video.

John
 
Heh. So it can only get better! :D
Oh yeah!

The fact that the blade can still cut/chop in a useful way despite the edge itself being relatively dull really makes one think about the effects that blade thickness and grind has on cuts.



Oh, and Sam, I emailed the Cutlass vs. milk jug video.
Tiiiiiing!! :D

Full flat ground for the win!
 
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