Michael Rader is in Washington. raderblade.com
Substrata makes cutting boards and counter tops and they are in Oregon. substrata.net
Jon Broida will soon have a store in L.A. that sells Japanese made knives. They aren't made in your 500 mile radius, but maybe he can sharpen whatever you come up with? japaneseknifeimports.com
Substrata makes mediocre boards. I wouldn't recommend them (from personal experience).
Wildfire Cutlery makes below par knives. Let's be a little more diligent in your referrals, folks. You have been on the forums for a while, you should know.
M
She's not looking for quality, she's looking for proximity.
The location of the knifemaker is irrelevant. It's where the steel comes from you should care about. Knives made close to their steel source in China, Japan, Europe or wherever then shipped to the US (or Canada, where I live) will be much more efficient emissions-wise than things made in the US with steel from far away.
Manufacturing process is also likely very important, but I don't know enough to talk intelligently about it. I would suspect that decent knives like we all have use more energy to be produced than cheap molded ones, but I don't really know. There's also something to be said for the longevity of a forged blade.
Gotta find someone who will make their own tamahagane then! For the OP, this is basically an ancient steel making technique where a small batch of metal made by the smith out of sand.
Another interesting knife making technique is where the smith re-purposes old steel into the knife making process. A user here StephanFowler (from Georgia) uses iron from old shipyard chains in some of his San Mai knives. It isn't local to you, but a good story for reusing existing materials.
Tamahagane is likely very high in energy consumption though, so I'm not sure that's the best way to go. Get someone to do that powered by a solar panel or something and you're in business. It would probably take several months to produce one knife, but what a knife!
The old shipyard chains, provided the energy costs in manipulating them aren't ridiculous, sounds like about as good a deal as you're likely to find.
I really want to reiterate that the location of the maker matters substantially less than the location of the source materials. Given the OP's starting location of California, what she's likely going to be looking for is a maker that sources from... I don't know actually. Are there any active steel mills on the West Coast? If not, probably as far away as Illinois, Ohio or Michigan.
i do try to sorce all my stuff from the good ol USA and for the most part i can between carpenter and crucible . tho the wood i use for scales might be out of the US. i have no problem using nice walnut or maple tho
What about your micarta? What goes into that and how is that made?
I make my own tamahagane from local magnetite and I am pretty sure that the energy I use is somewhat less than what is used in the bessemer process for Factory steel.
I guess I learned something today. I just assumed the mass-production would produce energy efficiencies over small traditional methods.
Good news,
Panaca is within the 500 mile radius, and I make a mid tech line. There is also an iron mine about 75 miles from me.
Hoss
It is possible that mass produced steel ends up greener per pound than mine to make. I was thinking about all the support and machines and transportation and the waste impact on the earth from the mineing of the ore to the finished bar.
This.
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