The following day I heat treated the second knife, by now I am familiar with this process.

Heat the metal until it is orange at 1500 degrees and then submerge it in a pot of motor oil.

I then tempered in the toaster oven I used earlier for two hours at 400 degrees to soften the blade.

I then set out making the handle, I didn't do anything different in this area because I was more focused on perfecting the skills from the previous attempt than trying something new. 

I again, used curly maple and planned on staining with tung oil for this next knife. 

I drilled the holes in the metal a bit larger than the pins I was going to be using, this gives me a strategic advantage we in the machining world refer to as "Fudge Factor."

In addition to making holes so that the knife pins leave room to slide around, I managed to test the fit on the knife and did most of the woodworking like this. It meant I could shape the handle while it was not mounted to the metal, this way I could keep the blade pristine.