Saturday Night Blade Porn – Rustick Knives

25 years ago today, Jack Stottlemire (SGM, USA Ret.) of Rustick Knives was getting it done in Panama. He was deployed there with A Co 2/9 Infantry during Operation Cause. For about the next 30 years he served in the Marines and the Army, including a long stretch in a SOF billet.

Now he builds bad ass axes, ‘hawks and knives in Fayetteville, NC.

I first met Stottlemire at the Blade Show in Atlanta (his first year there), where among assorted other lethal edged implements he was displaying the first 20 of a new axe design. He'd just finished up a 10 day Scandinavian blacksmithing course with Elmer Roush, which left him wanting to put a beard on his new design. He determined it would be sharpened at an angle at the bottom, so it would go all the way through a car door or something similar, and that it would have a distal taper on the spike so it can be used to pop locks and the like. The resultant axe (a short spiked axe that doesn't yet have a name as far as I know) works beautifully as a small manual breaching tool. Says Stottlemire,

“I also wanted to give it more blade down there so I can choke way up on it to do fine work and not cut a knuckle. The steel I use is 80CRV2, a German tool steel, it's extremely tough. I tempered it down to a 5553 Rockwell C so I don't get any chipping but it's still hard and holds an edge. It's been a great little axe. Ryan Johnston helped me with the design a little bit, he likes it, which is a good sign.”

Roush, who Stottlemire clearly has a great deal of respect for, has a number of pieces on the show Vikings. While studying with him Jack build a number of axe heads, spears and other implements the good old fashioned Viking way.

Follow Rustick Knives here on Facebook or purchase one at Yo Dude Tactical. Please also consider helping out Mission 22, an organization Stottlemire passionately supports. If you have any interest at all in blacksmithing, make sure you check out Elmer Roush's forge.