What blade did you EDC today?

EDC Gear for Flashlight Carriers
3073

Xevious.

You May be lucky with that one.
But the Steel itself.is not the be all.
It’s the heat treatment and rolling that makes them.

Never used Jap b4. they feel like magic. For a while.

200 layers of real steel with a reasonable Smith would cost you a starting price of $250+.

There are a zillion Chinese and otherwise (European.Eastern) MFG’s, retailers nowadays.
ALL flashy, multi layer blades. but ALL built to their price.
Not the quality. Some look beautiful. as desired.

Do yourself a favour. For Western steel and cutting knives.
Wusthof. Brazilian Mundial. and French Scanpan if you don’t mind extra sharpening. (Beautiful handles)
They the ones I’ve stuck to over the yrs.
There are others preferred by others too.

The Shun. Global etc, are Western Japanese blades.
Exxy and niice looking. but for same $$’s you can get much better quality .feel. cutting. Actual true Japanese blades.
There are several Internet Jap blade dealers on net. But Hocho is the better,
real one. Next to actually going there yourself.

They have 6 months PLUS. of information on Japanese. Steel. Knives. Knife makers and how to sharpen. Use, and maintain the different steels.
With a decent grading on the Bladesmiths in there too.
With types of blade/Handle for EACH Cutting style.
and what to look out for.
White or Blue Powder alloy blends give usually the best Carbon steel.

You want a “cleaver” Go Chinese.

You can go forever on these things. And you thought Folders gave an interest.
They just the tip of it. Then Fixed.
Then Real knives… We have around 8 or 9 Kitchen knives here.
Wife uses 2. Occasionally the 10 in.
Me. I use 3 in the 3. 6. and 7in range. One Wusthof 8in Chef.
.Plus the 10 in. ( and chain Saw…chuckle)
I been doing it a looong time. MOST will get away with a
5 or 6in Petty and a 7in Santoku, or 6- 8in Chef. Some the 10+ inch.
a $5 Paring. and maybe a H/Duty something or other for Pumpkins etc.

I find Meatworks blades the best for that last job. Basic and reliable with decent.
Hard working steel.(Mine cost $11 AUD Del. Now is $17 DEL).

I’ve been through all the sharpening styles, Mostly. WET.Whet round etc.
Have settled on decent quality Diamond plates. (DMT) with 2 x Diamond Flat steels for finishing. 600 and smooth (Meat or vegies)
With a sliding rod system that gives even. Selected Angle,
level face to cutting edges.

You get a little fed up rubbing. rubbing. rubbing with wet hands after 50 odd yrs.
Believe me. I did.

GENTLE… With decent diamond. NEVER coarse.
Done in fraction of time and “Almost (But never quite) a finished edge to match.
I’m happy with it.
I can press my blades against finger tips and draw blood without slicing.
My strop.is a leather ”3in x 3\8th “Donkey Pack Strap” I brought out of Army with me in early ’60’s.
Oiled about 5 times so far. WAS 8ft long. Now. around 40inches.
Too short for my belly now.

I won’t touch a field knife without tang, and/or shaped handle grip with cut out for at least one finger.
Been bitten too many times by narrow blade straight sided folders with wet/Bloody, etc hands.
That Go Comma a nice little blade. But I’d be wiping a thin layer of clear Sikaflex down both scales to give a little more traction for your pinkies.

My G733 Ganzo. grows on you after a coupla days and a hinge (Teflon) oil
BUT. I find the inside flicking rivet “nips” the first finger tip area when closing.

Too close to handle, . OR too tall.
I’m grinding mine down this arvo to try.
I DO like the blade now.

WHOOPS.
SORRY.
753M Nipping. NOT the 733. Late night again.

3074

Yeah, I like Henckels and Wüsthof for most cutting, a Chinese cleaver for mooshing garlic and hacking through watermelon and the like.

10bux for the cleaver offa Amazon, best deal I got in a looooong time.

https://www.amazon.com/Winco-Chinese-Cleaver-wooden-handle/dp/B003HESNR8

Booyah.

3075

Well I didn’t get to carry it today. I was at work when it hit the mail box, which subsequently got me into a interesting conversation with the wife. All I heard was blah blah blah, too many knives, blah blah blah, not enough jewlery, blah blah blah. I think I got her point though. She has recently gotten into collecting geodes. Totally not my area of expertise but, I will start my research.

Kizer Begleiter. My first Kizer. I really like it. Buttery smooth, good lock up, wickedly sharp, not too fat but not to thin either. The clip is okay, a bit small and something you might see on a minimalistic gentleman’s knife but still has enough room to fit over a jean pocket without too much trouble. It’s a winner I think. Time will tell.

Manker Timeback Cu helping to hold it up a bit. Thank you to TurboBB for parting with it. It’s a hefty, chunky little fella.

3076

/\ Nice!! :+1:

3077

Koenig x Sharknivco Mini Goblin

3078

rcwilly, you are killing me. Such great looking knives. I fall in love with the pictures of them then, I make the mistake of looking at the price.

I’m buying a bunch of Powerball tickets this week. :slight_smile:

3079

3080

/\ . Me too!! … :person_facepalming: … :wink:

3081

Sorry guys… I’m a bad influence. :smiling_imp:

Even with the $100 off on this one I don’t think I’ll end up keeping it…but that milling sure is pretty!

Spyderco Drunken

3082

What is it? It sure is a beauty…. :wink:

3083

:wink:

3084

Thanks!! Sorry, I must have overlooked your previous post, my bad. :wink:

I had to get away from knives for a few years because I was spending too much. :person_facepalming:
So I have not kept up with most of the newer ones from Spyderco, Benchmade (my personal favorites) or anyone else really. But it appears, by some of the pics you post; that Spyderco has really upped their game over the last few years. The ones you have posted are nice!!

Oh yeah… I replaced “Knives” with “Lights” those few years ago. That really helped a lot…. :person_facepalming: :person_facepalming: . :money_mouth_face:

3085

@teacher I should be getting away from knives and back into lights but as you point out some of these new Spyderco knives have been really nice and every time I say last one to myself, they announce something new and pull me back in. lol

3086

Trust me my friend, I completely understand… :wink:

The struggle is real…… :money_mouth_face: :money_mouth_face:

Hey, I see your location is “The Beach”…. are you on the East Coast, West Coast, or Gulf Coast?? If your in the USA of course. lol

3087

Unfortunately I was not lucky.

It was so bad that there was a “spot” where the Damascus pattern was obviously missing and breaking the pattern.

As they say “you get what you pay for,” most of the time. Of course the auction photos showed a nice natural pattern of a “model” knife. The wooden handle is nice. The knife is a bit heavy… can’t say whether or not the steel is good quality. The edge came a little dull. I honed it and that helped. But my Calphalon Santoku feels better.

3088

Dragged the Ganzo FH31 out of hiding today. I was actually looking for something else and found this still in the box at the bottom of a drawer. No clue as to why I put it there. Nice little knife. Not as nice a rcwilly’s EDC knives but it will have to do. :slight_smile:

3089

!

!

3090

Xevious.

And that (unfortunately) is the way we all get experience.

Hopefully you won’t get caught again.

Just remember. TOP line knives. Damascus or otherwise.
Will start around $850 and up to multiple thousands.
Good. Mid range from a top name. $450 to $700.

Tojiro. Iseya and others that YOU have read up on and talked about.
“YOU Have, Haven’t you.
Will start at around $65/80 and go up through different models
to around $350 ISH.

You will NOT Get cheap. Chinese cooks knives like you do Folders.
(Size alone precludes that…) THAT ARE ANY GOOD EDGE WISE.
Hundreds of yrs of Blade Quality skills don’t come cheap.

Accept that ONE good “speshul” knife will cost you $350 to 600.
At your skill, experience levels.
Just hold and drool on every now and then.

No2 White Powder Carbon Steel will give you a good blade
for a half sensible price.
And get the Tojiro, Iseya. etc From the Upper end of the lower/Mid range blades around $65/230. for your daily use.

They WILL do a great job. And the likes of our blade skills.
WE will NEVER know the difference.

The Iseya are 1\2 a level UP on Tojiro. But NEED more care in handling.

But a LOT of pro Kitchens all over the world
Use and are happy with results from Tojiro DP Blades. and the models above.

Tojiro DP Petty Around $65 OR…
Iseya I ser, 33 layer Hammered $85ish.
Tojiro DP 7in Santoku $?? OR……
Iseya 33, Damascus Santoku $???
With Any comfortable feeling $20 Paring for now.

Look on net for Wusthof 8in Chef (Narrow blade) on special.
But any decent Euro blade form will do for that. I like the Brazilian one. (Mundial) but it is soft steel. Wears quick. Feels good.

Look in Hocho for prices PLUS freight added.

And…. I think a local Meatworks supplier would be best for a 10/11in Butchers knife for any heavy work.
Good blade, cheap price for minimal usage.
I’m a few yrs out of touch with pricing nowadays
hence the Look??.
$200ish will get you a basic. usable couple with parer,
with another $40/50 for meatworks blade.
THEN… Start saving for the Drool item/s.

A lot depends on your income.
Working I was on $2.500ish a week plus tonnage,
Nowadays, OLD age Pension.
Slows you down a bit once you spent it all hey.

3091

3092

Yeah, I hear you. Sad thing is, this seller has 100% positive feedback and over 20,000 transactions. There must be a lot of naive buyers out there. This was his response: “we are really sorry about the inconvenience you had as these minor scratches should not be there, as far as those spots are concerned which are called ball spots are due to forging, Damascus steel is alloy or carbon and steel which forged into layers and some of the time it happens, this is true Damascus and not etched, we have been selling for over ten years and have more than 20000 feedback.”

But there’s no sign of Damascus pattern on the bald spots, in addition to no smooth transition there—it’s a sharp cut off. Plus, the back side of the exposed blade shows no pattern either (I looked up close with a 30x magnifier).

The seller (damascus007) listed the auction as no returns, but is offering me a 40% discount or a return. I’m going to return it. When there’s a return, there’s no feedback. So maybe that’s how he escapes the criticism (since if he refused, there would be negative feedback due to the deception).

I’d be curious to know if you’re able to look directly at his auctions and see for yourself if it’s possible to ascertain that his claims are true, or he’s peddling a massive scam.

Anyway, I appreciate all the details you provide, though overwhelming. I do realize that you have to pay many hundreds to get really good quality Damascus steel blades. My hope was to get a mediocre example that is at least the simulated Damascus steel by process, not by faux surface etching. But in the end… I think I’ll let go of this. The “white powder carbon steel” sounds more interesting and within a more practical budget. Where do you suggest looking on-line?

UPDATE: Interesting that the seller issued me a refund and stated “please cut the blade part right from the centre and see it’s genuine or not, we are not the trader it’s our family business for the last 40 years and we never sell anything fake and offer money back guarantee on our products.”

So I made another pass at examining the knife up close. I did find a consistency of pattern from one side of the blade, across the top, and to the other side. No “flawed” match of pattern. On the back end of the knife, what seemed devoid of pattern with the naked eye revealed that there is a pattern there. It’s just most of it was covered up from the grinding. But it was uneven, so I could see the layered steel pattern within it.

Thus… it looks like this may actually be some primitive, rough form of Damascus styled steel. And that bald spot was just an unlucky happenstance of unfolded steel in the mix. That’s what I can perceive from the examination. This seller must not have a very good command of the language, as he could have tried to explain things better.

UPDATE #2: Rather than wiping out everything here, I just wanted to point out that the seller gave me a full refund and told me to keep the knife (“too expensive to mail back”). With the cosmetic fault, he’d probably not be able to resell it anyway, so it wouldn’t make sense to send back as it is. I wonder if there’s something I could do to the back end of the knife to help get the rest of the Damascus lines to come through?