[bifcake]

Thanks to all of you guys for your recommendations. I have pulled the trigger and bought my brother-in-law a custom made Buck Knife. I looked at other manufacturers and a few things that prompted me to go with buck:

• The only one I've seen that allows custom engraving
• The only one that offers sharpening services (it's $7 including return postage)
• S30V blade
• Custom handle with finger grooves
• Choice of wood inlays

My brother-in-law is a retired engineer, so he's not a law enforcement guy or a military guy. He just needs a utility knife that he can use for every day things and stuff around the house. He received it two days ago and he loved it - I guess that's the most important thing after all.

 

[smallcaps]

That pattern does look fantastic @smallcaps . Great job!


I've been using a Benchmade as my primary daily for a few years and have recently decided that it deserves retirement since it's been through a lot.
Having ended up with a few extra dollars for Christmas and selling a Sebenza that I hated the way it felt in hand, I picked up a few items to put into rotation. I prefer beefy folders for EDC since I can legally carry them here. I buy and use knives as the tools they are so I guess almost every knife I own will look heavily used eventually if it becomes the primary carry in my rotation. I think this knife will be perfect for EDC since it won't look beat up as quickly due to the heavily stonewashed blade and handle.

Very nice... Is that custom? Who's the maker? The scales and pivot are beautiful. Would love to see the blade.

Agree, I have a small Sebenza 31 and I'm really not a fan. Carried it for 1 day and now it sits in a tray waiting to be sold. I also have a small Inkosi tho and like it much better. While it's even a bit shorter that the Sebenza, it fits my medium hands better, and just feels and is build a bit more robustly.

My most carried knife tho has got to be the Spyderco Spydiechef. Love how flat it is, with no flipper tab to get in the way while in pocket. LC200n is a pretty great steel and strops up well. Best of all, the knife is easy to disassemble and the materials make it bomb-proof. I've left it sitting in the sink, dirty, for days... Not blemish or spot of rust anywhere. The only strike against it is that it's not very fidgety. I love that knife so much I even have a backup. So nice I bought it twice!

 

[cdf294]

Very nice... Is that custom? Who's the maker? The scales and pivot are beautiful. Would love to see the blade.

Thanks.

The knife is made by Curtiss Custom Knives. As for whether it's a custom, I would say yes although that is up for debate within the knife community depending of how you define custom. If your definition of custom means that there can be absolutely no automation in production and if special requests that stray from the original designs aren't an option, these people would likely consider Curtiss a mid tech production knife even though mid techs use parts manufactured from external sources. I suppose that in this case, the person that isn't trying to support themselves financially as a knife maker can afford to take the time to do something totally unique and different making what some feel is a true custom,

If your definition of custom is every part of the knife is designed, manufactured and assembled in house by a single person while allowing different options of titanium milling, flaming, or anodizing in a multitude of different colors with a few different blade configurations, this knife would be considered a custom. Dave Curtiss makes everything in house including the hardware but he uses CNC and water jet automation to get the job done which is a necessary evil IMO, especially if you make knives to earn a living. He also does all anodizing in house with multiple color options.

My most carried knife tho has got to be the Spyderco Spydiechef. Love how flat it is, with no flipper tab to get in the way while in pocket. LC200n is a pretty great steel and strops up well. Best of all, the knife is easy to disassemble and the materials make it bomb-proof. I've left it sitting in the sink, dirty, for days... Not blemish or spot of rust anywhere. The only strike against it is that it's not very fidgety. I love that knife so much I even have a backup. So nice I bought it twice!

After carrying the 5+ ounce Benchmade with a 3.6" blade as an EDC for the last several years, these are slightly larger and heavier but still comfortable for me to carry.
I've heard that LC200n is almost as rust/corrosion resistant as H1 although I have no personal experience with LC200n. I am familiar with H1 though since I had a Salt at one time that was treated with very little respect but never rebelled by showing any signs of rust. Sadly, it went for a dip in the Texas Gulf and was never seen again due to an unfortunate chain of events when the boss and I went bay fishing a couple of years back.

I know what you mean about fidgety knives. These ride on caged bearings and are addictive since they are super smooth and drop shutty. Much like you and your Spydiechef, I liked it enough to buy a 2nd but my 2nd has a different blade shape. I wasn't intending on buying 2 but I purchased the wharncliffe first and loved the fit but decided that it may be a bit too pretty to use the way I use knives on a frequent basis, or at least that was how I justified the 2nd knife at the time. Don't get me wrong, I'm still going to use the heck out of the wharnie but it won't be my daily. That's where the green one comes in.

 

[smallcaps]

Thanks.

The knife is made by Curtiss Custom Knives. As for whether it's a custom, I would say yes although that is up for debate within the knife community depending of how you define custom. If your definition of custom means that there can be absolutely no automation in production and if special requests that stray from the original designs aren't an option, these people would likely consider Curtiss a mid tech production knife even though mid techs use parts manufactured from external sources. I suppose that in this case, the person that isn't trying to support themselves financially as a knife maker can afford to take the time to do something totally unique and different making what some feel is a true custom,

If your definition of custom is every part of the knife is designed, manufactured and assembled in house by a single person while allowing different options of titanium milling, flaming, or anodizing in a multitude of different colors with a few different blade configurations, this knife would be considered a custom. Dave Curtiss makes everything in house including the hardware but he uses CNC and water jet automation to get the job done which is a necessary evil IMO, especially if you make knives to earn a living. He also does all anodizing in house with multiple color options.




After carrying the 5+ ounce Benchmade with a 3.6" blade as an EDC for the last several years, these are slightly larger and heavier but still comfortable for me to carry.
I've heard that LC200n is almost as rust/corrosion resistant as H1 although I have no personal experience with LC200n. I am familiar with H1 though since I had a Salt at one time that was treated with very little respect but never rebelled by showing any signs of rust. Sadly, it went for a dip in the Texas Gulf and was never seen again due to an unfortunate chain of events when the boss and I went bay fishing a couple of years back.

I know what you mean about fidgety knives. These ride on caged bearings and are addictive since they are super smooth and drop shutty. Much like you and your Spydiechef, I liked it enough to buy a 2nd but my 2nd has a different blade shape. I wasn't intending on buying 2 but I purchased the wharncliffe first and loved the fit but decided that it may be a bit too pretty to use the way I use knives on a frequent basis, or at least that was how I justified the 2nd knife at the time. Don't get me wrong, I'm still going to use the heck out of the wharnie but it won't be my daily. That's where the green one comes in.

Thanks for sharing and just beautiful. I'll have to check him out at some point, but shipping out to my location is usually prohibitive.

I also just picked up a couple new midtechs to put into the rotation: Shirogorov Model F95R Slim (top) and the Custom Knife Factory Justice 2.0 (bottom). While the community might categorize them as midtechs, the craftsmanship is pretty bonkers, even if they touched a CNC at some point.

 

[cdf294]

Thanks for sharing and just beautiful. I'll have to check him out at some point, but shipping out to my location is usually prohibitive.

I also just picked up a couple new midtechs to put into the rotation: Shirogorov Model F95R Slim (top) and the Custom Knife Factory Justice 2.0 (bottom). While the community might categorize them as midtechs, the craftsmanship is pretty bonkers, even if they touched a CNC at some point.

You also have some lovely knives that I am enjoying seeing.
I honestly don't care about whether automation was used or whether the steel was mined from another planet. Some people just need something to obsess over, and there's nothing wrong with that but I am not one of those people. My only concern is whether I think the quality justifies the cost I paid for it. In many cases. I actually prefer automation on knives since I know if I were to purchase another Shiro F3 in 5 years from today, it will be just as well made as what I already have, if not better, and that I can count on the fit and feel to be as comfortable as what I already own.

The closest I've come to owning a CKF was when I purchased a Reate New Torrent last year. I purchased the Reate out of curiosity due to the reports of build quality. It's a nice knife and it has internal weight relief milling with fairly detailed exterior milling and nice attention to detail so the quality is definitely there for the money but it isn't a Shiro or a Curtiss by any stretch IMO. It has a MRBS but the final touches to action smoothness just aren't there. Yes, it's smooth but less so than the Shiro SRBS although I suppose that it may still be breaking in. The Shiro on washers is also smoother but not nearly as fidgety or drop shutty as the Reate. I've also read that CKF makes a great knife but I've yet to pick one up since some of their designs are a little too unique for my tastes. The same could also be said for some of the Reate designs too but I found something I liked so I am sure that a CKF is in my future somewhere. I would definitely want to pick up a used example to confirm whether I liked it or not, much like I did with the Reate.

Love your F95 and the CKF is a great looking knife as well. The one blade grind I try to avoid on all knives is a recurve since my sharpener doesn't play nice with recurves without getting creative and potentially damaging the stones. I tested this with the one mild recurve knife that I purchased a long time ago and the results were less than outstanding. Buying an extra set of stones to use for only recurves would be cost prohibitive for my sharpener since I could buy another nice knife for the cost of the stones. What do you use to sharpen your recurves? When I picked up these Curtiss knives, I was eyeballing both the F95 and Hati R but I just couldn't bring myself to make the purchase for some reason. I pained over what to purchase and finally decided that I should try something else that isn't a Shirogorov since my cup already runneth over. I instead chose to pick up the 2 Curtiss F3 knives which I've always had an interest in checking out since buying my 1st Shiro around 5 years ago. Well, isn't this odd? I ended up choosing a pair of Curtiss F3 to go with my, uhh, pair of Shiro F3. On the used market, you can usually negotiate a used Curtiss to less than a used Shiro, at least in the US although I get the idea that you may reside elsewhere due to your shipping comment above.
Anyway, I'm appreciating your taste in knives so thank you for sharing as well.

Edited to add that I also think we both have a similar position on buying a backup of knives that really work for us. My first Shiro was purchased around 5 years ago and it took no longer than a couple of months before I had a 2nd. The 2nd Curtiss happened within weeks of the first but that was mostly because it was a deal that I couldn't ignore and I really didn't want the Wharnie as my daily since it was quite a bit nicer than I was expecting on arrival.

 

[kadinh]

I have had so many knives I can't remember all of them, but my EDC is a Spyderco PM2 S110v with custom carbon fiber scales. It's lightweight, holds an edge really well, and not too hard to touch up the edge on a Sharpmaker.

 

[kadinh]

some beautiful custom knives in here too

 

[kadinh]

Would love to get a Shirogorov knife. Off the top of my head, I currently have:

- Spyderco PM2 (S110v) with CF scales from custom maker in Russia

- Spyderco PM2 (REX-45) with pure copper scales

- Spyderco Gayle Bradley (CPM-M4), stock carbon fiber scales

- Spyderco PM3 lightweight (S30v), black FRN scales

- Spyderco Native (S30v)

- Spyderco Ladybug (ZDP-189)

- Hinderer XM-18 Gen 2 Slicer (CPM-20CV) with blue G10 scales

- Strider SMF tanto (not sure what steel, maybe S30v), green scale, flamed Ti side

- Strider SJ75 Mini (maybe CPM-154), green scale

- Strider DB (CPM-3V), black/green frag pattern scales

- CRK Large Sebenza 21 (CPM-S30v), stock Ti scales

- BRKT Bravo 1.5 (CPM-3V), carbon fiber scales

- BRKT Pro Scalpel 2 (A2 steel?), blue/black G10 scales

- Mora Heavy Duty knife, military green/black handle, blade force patina with mustard for design

- Takeda Stainless Clad Gyuto (medium or large, idr)

I know I have more but I don't remember them. I have more kitchen knives that are a little more expensive than the TJ Max specials you find, but I dont remember the details. Brands are like Moritaka and Tojiro.

 

[X62503]

My EDC is a Case Trapper, and my favorite fixed blade is a "Frontier" made by Mel Sorg, R.I.P.

 

[smallcaps]

My EDC is a Case Trapper, and my favorite fixed blade is a "Frontier" made by Mel Sorg, R.I.P.

Always wanted to get a Case knife but not really sure where to start... so many models, patterns, handle materials, etc. There is one pattern that does definitely intrigue me tho but can't find one in stock currently, which is the Case Hobo.

That Sorg-designed Frontier is a beauty. Full tang with pinned handles?

 

[Zeppo19]

Custom SAK, Atwood, Laulima Metalcraft Hoku plus some listen stuff

 

[Trihexagonal]

These are matching Kershaw Oblivion, with the clip on one re-positioned to the other side for left and right hand draw from the back pockets:

Very nice feel to them, very sharp, very fast and easy to open.
And if you're going to have 2 you have to have a matching pair​

8Cr13MoV blade takes a sharp edge and is easy to re-sharpen when needed; stonewashed finish helps hide use scratches

Handle front combines durable glass-filled nylon and stainless steel; Kershaw's assisted opening mechanism rests inside that front handle for effortless opening​

https://kershaw.kaiusa.com/oblivion.html
​

 

[bobmysterious]

 

[mt877]

Hand forged this Railroad Spike knife a couple years ago (pre-Covid) while vacationing on Mackinac Island, Michigan, US. Went to this forge called "Forge a Memory" and had fun hammering on hot steel and twisting the handle. The bladesmiths there guide you through the forging process to form the unfinished blank, then they take over and harden and grind the blade to finish. It was a fun adventure and I ended up with a nice looking drop point railroad spike knife. Is it sharp?, indeed it is. It has a nice balanced heft to it and feels good in the hand. I use jojoba oil on it to keep it rust free.

 

[bifcake]

Wow! That's really nice!