Figured I'd share one of the posts that I made on another forum as to what tolerances mean to me.
The Maker
Lee is a 27 year-old Knifemaker from Israel who's a very friendly dude, willing to share his knowledge and passion for knives. The Hydra by Lee Lerman has been synonymous with quality at the top echelons of Knifemaking.
Lee and I have been communicating with each other for over a year and he's one of the best makers out there, involving the customer at every step of the way, considering every alternative proposed and providing his expert opinion before proceeding with the material procurement and the build.
At an age of 27, I think he's got tremendous potential and promise and if you stick around my post, you'll see why that's so for yourself.
As Ari (Megalobyte) recently posted his WIP Pics and made everybody lose their minds, I figured I'd share my build, but from a different perspective.
The Hydra Heirloom
That's what we've decided to term this knife. An heirloom piece to us meant that it should be classy, timeless and ultimately, to be passed on to the next generation. To us, there is no classier material than Mother Of Pearl, which will be the focus of this piece.
The Initial Stage
We begin this journey with a selection of the materials and the basic removal of the handle materials.
Moving onto the rotary table, we arrive at the radial arc bolsters.
The Pursuit Of Perfection
The MOP scale here is a ZERO-tolerance fit, meaning that it is EXACTLY the same shape and size as the arc on the bolster. To the untrained eye, one would have stopped here, because this is very difficult to achieve and would be considered sufficient for most makers. However, for the scale to be fit in, some material will need to be removed from the ZERO-tolerance fit.
This is not good enough for Lee and so, the insanity begins. He proceeds to take off 0.005mm (0.07mm is the width of an average human hair, for comparison) off each time. That's
1/14th of the width of a human hair, for some context.
Until we get...
Side by side:
We shall continue with the further milling for the lockbar...
Till then...