Any update on the spyderco bushcraft knife? Sal?

C_Claycomb said:
Philthygeezer,

While the blade may be stronger due to coming with a Scandi single bevel grind, this is incidental and wasn’t something that figured in the thought process behind the design. When we were talking to Sal about edge geometry we suggested 20-25 degrees total, the prototypes were ground at a greater angle and although I can’t find the exact figure, I am pretty sure it was 30 degrees total. This isn’t a weak edge for wood working, but some care will be needed if you want to bang it against bone when dressing big game or doing heavy splitting. Being able to carve really well was one of the leading pieces of design intent. There are lots of sturdy knives out there, but not so many that cut (wood) really well. The guard design looks about perfect. Puukos don't have guards, but I like a little one to index my hand. Any bigger just gets in the way.

On the rock sharpening thing. I have yet to actually meet someone who uses knives of the style that I make who has this as a criteria when choosing a knife. I have read it a few times on US forums, maybe its a cultural thing, or maybe geographic:confused: Anyway, I had dismissed it as something I should be worrying about well before designing this knife, and while working on this project it never re-entered my mind.

Let me explain why. There are several reasons.

The first is possibly due to a complete lack of imagination on my part:D. In spite of trying, I cannot conceive of a situation where I would plan on sharpening my knife on a rock; if I expect that I will need to sharpen my knife, I would plan on taking a pocket hone to do so. This would go in whatever clothing or pack would be going with me. If I didn’t have space for a pocket hone, some wet-n-dry paper would do almost as well. Good, fine grained, stones aren’t all that common in the areas that I have spent time. I don’t generally want anything harder to sharpen than D2 or S30V, but given the choice between something that would keep its edge even longer, and something softer that would respond well to a rock, I would have to go for the super-steel because suitable stones seem so rare. Good stones may be available to some people, but I don’t think that chancing on finding one should be part of most folks plan. If that is the case, then it shouldn’t be a major consideration during a production knife’s design process either.

Next, the only thing that really strikes me as an activity that will dull a knife such that it needs repeated in-field sharpening, that could be achieved on a 220grit river stone ;) would be skinning big game. While this is a bushcraft knife, bushcraft has many meanings for different people, field dressing and skinning ability were not at the top of the list of design requirements for this knife. If they had been, the handle would have been flatter, much narrower at the front, there might well have been more guard, and it would have had a flat or hollow grind. This knife was intended to be good at woodwork, first and foremost. Whenever I have been on extended trips and have been doing a lot of carving, battoning, splitting and cleaning small game, I have wanted to sharpen occasionally, but only because I have wanted to restore a shaving edge. Using a local stone would have been worse than just carrying on with stropping against a dirty leather belt.

Scandi single bevels sharpen easy on nice flat hones. Their purpose is to give extra control on cuts where the width of the bevel acts like the sole of a plane. I do know that some people like to use convex scandis and others like to add a micro bevel, but for them to work best on wood, the bevel must be dead flat, or slightly concave. Unless you were able to find or produce a flat surface from your local stone, you would quickly render your flat bevel into a convex shape which would take quite a lot of effort to remove at a later date. If you really feel that a bush knife needs to be something that can be sharpened on a rock, I would think that a flat grind with a secondary bevel would be a better buy. That smaller bevel would be a lot easier to work and there would be fewer problems with inadvertently changing the edge geometry. Having to take 5/16” of steel off has to be harder than just working on just 3/32 or so.

Finally, if everything really has gone to hell in a hand cart and someone just must re-sharpen on a rock, and they are lucky enough to find a good one, it’s not likely to be situation where they are going to worry much what it does to the knife. I would hope though that such occurrences are rare enough that anticipating them does not become the primary driver when buying kit. If it does, there are already a whole lot of other knives on the market that are designed for chopping, prying, pounding on…. and sharpening on rocks ;)

I know that some people will disagree strongly with the above, but any designers out there will recognise that it is nigh on impossible to please everyone. Pretty much every feature of this knife was chosen knowing that whatever was done, somewhere, someone, was going to be annoyed :grumpy: that we hadn’t done it some other way! :D:D
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Chris, thanks for taking the time to write this. I don't have much time to reply so will be a bit shorter, though I feel I'm not putting as much back as I got! The jist of it is that I consider your design extremely adept for bush work. Heaven forbid this turn into another skinner! As you point out eloquently, this knife will be built for working with wood - and that's exactly my mindset for bushcraft. Fire, shelter, water, then food. And food is quite often vegetable in nature. :D A bush knife should be tuned to wood.

Growing up in northern Canada, being out in the bush meant that you had to have things that would work even when you did stupid things like forget or lose or misplace your sharpener/knife. Orange or yellow handles are great if you drop them in the water while washing, or simply put the thing in camp some place and forget. Foliage green or camo need a bit more care. :) A $2.00 Lansky crossed sticks in a spare pocket helps, and I just bought the Spyderco sharpening rods for this reason. But now and then one ends up with a PFD, T-shirt, shorts and knife, soaking wet, and wondering how the boat sank. :D This is 0.00000001% likely to ever happen. The Moras' scandi grind seemed easier than the hollow-ground Buck to sharpen on a flat stone. I would find a piece of shale or siltstone to sharpen the knife if nothing else was on me. I hear you about accidentally making a convex edge when improvising like this though.

I used to marvel that a $9 carbon steel Mora was every bit and often more effective at doing a bit of whittling as my $50 Buck and Cold Steel knives. Soaked the blade in vinegar and it doesn't rust much. Mors Kochanski uses those thin narrow blades to fell small trees, pounding them in at the butt and pulling them straight out. One can pound them into a tree and stand on the handle without breakage, so I suspect 4mm blades are overkill.

This is the first knife to come along in years that I'd consider really useful in the bush, and so I'm very excited to have one. The design looks beautiful and seems to already be everything I want in a bush knife.

Thanks again for sharing your insights on the subject. I love to learn and will be reading your post a few more times.
 
Man, don't go reading it too closely!! Its just one bloke's ingrained bias and personal thoughts :p LOL!

I am friends with a really good open boat canoeist and expedition leader who carries a stainless Mora Clipper in a neck sheath as his boat knife and has any fancy knives wrapped up in his pack. His view is that a canoe is a bad place for carbon steel, wood handles and leather sheaths. Sinking your boat on a section of remote river would definitely count as a time to be able to use your knife hard and not worry about what effect the use will have on it. While I have done some canoe expeds, we are rather limited on how far from anywhere you can get here :(

I am not sure that I would carry something like this Spyderco, or a Skookum for that matter, as my exped knife. Personal preference again and I like my flat/convex knives... so I would have a much easier time touching up the edge on a river worn stone in the afore mentioned situation!:D
 
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I just got a Skookum in A2 and it will be really interesting to compare it to the Spyderco knife.
A couple things I noticed about the Skookum is, the lanyard hole is way to far forward to actually use it as a lanyard. It would be much better if they switched places between the lanyard hole and the pin closest to the pommel and possibly even moved it farther back.
I like to have a really deep sheath and a lanyard to help pull it out and for working over water.

The other thing I am not so thrilled about is the pommel. It has a piece of steel so you can hammer on it but it does bite into the hand a bit. I guess it is a trade off.

There could be a little bump where there is normally a guard just so you can tell where the edge starts. That was something i read in your previous post and seemed like a great idea.

Not only am I looking forward to the Spydy Bushcrafter for myself but for all the people who want a nice Bushcrafter but don't want to wait over a year for a Skookum or pay out the nose for a woodlore.
 
I don't want to revive a dead thread - but is there any release date or monetary amount placed on this knife yet.

I think this knife is VERY right headed. I think 4 mm was too large - and anything under 3MM doesn't make for a bushcraft knife of heirloom quality (IMHO). Part of the reason I see people abuse the hell out of Frost's Mora's is because they ARE 10 dollars each (or less) and the don't care if they snap.

I have a Koster's Bushcraft that is the same size and grind and I love it - it is thick enough to do some prying and batoning and yet not thick enough to feel like a sharpened prybar.

I am VERY excited about this release. I think it will get a Bushcrafter in the hands of the masses by a company with a good reputation instead of a Mear's style knife of similar make and model that costs 500 dollars or so.

Cheers to you at Spyderco - and release the danged thing already so I can buy one!

TF
 
you can go to spyderco website and download their new '09 product catalog. its in there... no price but its in there!
 
Spyderco 2009 Catalog pg. 43

Spyderco-Catalogpg43BushcraftStreet.jpg



:thumbup: ;)

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