Well, I spent my first night with my new knife (my wife's jealous). I never knew I could open and close a knife so many times in a single night. I just couldn't put it down. The action was soooooo smooth, I didn't know a knife could operate this well. I loved my Spyderco Delica, but it's not even in the same ball park. As a matter of fact, all the other knives I looked at, Kershaw, Spyderco, Emerson, and MOD just to name a few, pale in comparison as far as smoothness goes. The colors on the scales, on mine at least, is black and 2 different shades of purple. Everything seems to be put together very well. Everything lines up, the edges of the scales are flush with the liner, and the lock mechanism works beautifully. And, man this thing is sharp. I mean really sharp. I don't know if this is the factory edge, or if my dealer sharpened it (this was the last one he had and was in the display case, so he may have honed it a little), but either way you look at it, this thing is SHARP!!!! I'm still trying to learn the phraseology used in the knife world, but I would have to say this thing is Scary Sharp (at least to me).
I did a couple little tests just to see how sharp the blade was. I cut the end off of a cigar, and it was a smooth cut.....no tearing. My reasoning for doing this little test is because when I normally cut the end off a cigar with a knife, it usually pull out some of the tobacco and/or tears the outside wrapper. This blade cut it clean, like it was done with a razorblade.
The other test I did was to cut the end-grain of a piece of soft wood, in this case it was pine. Most woodworker will tell you that this is a good test to see how sharp a wood chisel is. You see, if you cut the end grain of a soft wood with a dull chisel, or blade in this case, the wood fibers actually break instead of being cut which leaves a rough surface. If the chisel/blade is sharp, and I mean SHARP, the end-grain cut will almost look burnished, and have a smooth surface. Well, this blade left a very nice, smooth surface after I made the cut.
I am very impressed with the quality and finish of this piece of mechanical art. In a way I'm kind of glad I lost my Delica, otherwise I wouldn't have started looking for a new replacement.
--Vader2K
