Knives

Charles, spring steel makes a very good blade if it is done right. Rudy Ruana, who was one of the three big custom knife makers during the 1940's-1970's along with Bill Scagel and Bill Moran, made his knives out of automotive spring steel and they are still some of the best knives ever made. People are still using his knives and some of them are over 60-70 years old and are worth several thousand dollars to collectors. I would'nt use the springs off of your trailer though. I would get a spring off of an old Ford or Chevy because the new springs are not made out of as high quality steel as the old ones, kind of like the vehicles they come on are not as high quality. When I first started makeing knives I made them out of spring steel, files,hoof rasp and saw mill blades because they were cheap and easy to get and held a good edge. One good thing about spring steel is that it is not as hard to sharpen as a knife made from a file. I can talk you through most of it over the phone and if there is something that I can't then you don't live very far away. They're pretty easy to make the poor boy way which is how all knife makers start out. Just let me know when you get ready to start.