That Creative Spark: Hands-on learning at MIT’s metal forge

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When we saw that there was a bladesmithing class, we all jumped on the idea of learning how to make a blade.

It was just an awesome new class that they decided to do because Bob Kramer was going to be here.

Bob Kramer has kind of a cult following in the knife community. So when I heard that he was coming to MIT, I knew this was a very unique opportunity I wouldn't really get again.

Bob Kramer is a master bladesmith whose specialty is actually cooking knives. But beyond that, as an artist, the pieces he makes are all singular, one of a kind.

I didn't really know who he was before, so I Googled, and I was like, wow, he makes very, very, very beautiful knives.

My background is cooking. And so, essentially, I'm cooking steel. I'm making up new recipes with steel.

If you look at the MIT logo, there's a blacksmith-- "mens et manus," minds and hands. And so the teaching and the practice of working with metals has been an important part of our department for a long time. And I just thought it would be a great time to bring Bob and have him, first, teach students and then, secondly, teach instructors.

Bob Kramer is the greatest knife maker in the world. And who better to learn from?

Blacksmithing was the king of crafts, because basically you go to a blacksmith, and they could make anything for you.

In the first day of the class, we practiced just the grinding technique that is essential for all knife making.

You pick up your piece of metal. And after drawing it with a Sharpie or something, you go on to the abrasive saw or the bandsaw, and you're just cutting that shape and trying to get it as best as possible and then go to the grinding wheel. You're grinding out your shape so that it's a smooth, little blade.

Now, this is the foundation of grinding. To learn to grind something that is flat and parallel is the best way to figure out how to grind.

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It did surprise me how 95% of making a knife is grinding it and polishing it.

And that's important because that's what really determines the final geometry of the knife, which is a huge part of the performance of the knife.

We learned how to grind down the edges and create this blade that you see here.

My favorite part of Bob's class was probably when we actually forged a knife. We started from a block of steel that was square, and we heated it up in the forge, and then we hammered it into a knife. And it was so cool.

And at this point, you're going to hand me the torch when you're ready. And you go into the oil and stay.

And then we learned the whole tempering process that you have to put it through in order to make sure that your knife is hard.

You heat up the blade to a certain temperature, and then you quench it in oil. And when you put in oil, you freeze the atomic structure, because if you just let it air cool, for example, the atoms will just rearrange back into their normal state.

And then once we did that, it was all about actually honing in your blade and making sure it was a razor sharp blade and then polishing.

He definitely sees all the different visual cues. He'll talk about the steel is like this color that means it's at 570 Celsius because you're forming this oxide. And I think that's something that I really learned from this experience is that there are so many ways materials science and chemistry in general is telling us what's going on, and it's our job for us to be able to identify that.

All this physical intuition that you're very far removed from when you're purely pursuing an academic route was kind of developed through this class.

As far as metallurgy goes, it's heat treatment, but it's also manipulation of the material. It's understanding the right choice of material. And so these students, being materials science students, get that.

By day four, when you have an actual knife that you made, that is the highlight of the entire class.

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It was a very nice payoff at the very end. Take a piece of paper, hold it in one hand, and the knife goes through the paper like butter, like just so good.

And then, the last week, you could call that the master class, where he worked with the instructors.

I'm really excited to have time with the teachers to ensure that they have the information, they have the skills to be able to pass this on.

You're going to go out here. I'm stronger. And then I can peck my way through.

And I'm hoping we can now transmit some of that to the students and build a bladesmithing program.

I plan to keep the knife that I made in Bob's class pretty much for the rest of my life.

For me, metal has always been a research topic, but this class kind of just introduces you to another idea of, like, metal doesn't just have to be that. Bladesmithing is an engineering effort, and it's fun, and it's creative.

What I got most out of it personally was feeling that connection with older techniques.

I really see this as a way to expose people to the fact that the human materials relationship is historical, it's traditional, and that even in today's age where we have very complex technology, this is still at the core of what we do.

It relates back to who we are as creatures on this planet. If we didn't have that creative spark, we wouldn't be here today. And so when you give someone the opportunity and guide them to actually make something with their hands, there's very few things that are as satisfying as that.

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