Bradford USA: Guardian 4, 5, 5.5, 6

Gary W. Graley

Gary W. Graley

“Imagination is more important than knowledge"
Knifemaker / Craftsman / Service Provider
Joined
Mar 2, 1999
Messages
27,271
This arrived from a friend out west for a visit, just so I could see what a beasty blade these Guardian 4 from Bradford Knives USA look and handle like. Wow, it is a sizeable knife! It does dwarf the Guardian 3 in most all respects.

Excellent machined G10 scales that are approx. .585" thick, very grippy
Blade length from scale to tip is 4.625" with 4.125" Cutting Edge
Overall length 9.1"
Blade thickness .165"

While some may want to have a full flat grind, this has a very high grind so I didn't get that feeling that it needed to be higher at all, on the Guardian 3 being a smaller blade, it seemed to warrant that and I think benefitted from that type of grind. But this is a nice high flat grind, down to quite a thin edge, about .023" at the edge bevel shoulders.

The sheath is a leather sheath with a plastic insert to help prevent cutting through, myself I feel the handle could be inserted a little further for better retention, I have plans to make a snap strap for my friends sheath before I send it back to him, just for a bit of added security. Bradford USA also offers a Kydex sheath as well, but if you are in the woods, trying to keep quiet, hunting mode as it were, leather doesn't transmit noise as readily as kydex might if you bump against some brush or sticks as you are walking.

Here are some shots of this knife, very cool, I'm liking this larger size, word tell is, there might be a Guardian 5 and maybe a 6 in the works but...that's just hearsay and not admissible in court ;)
BradfordG4 by GaryWGraley, on Flickr

BradfordG4_horiz by GaryWGraley, on Flickr

BradfordG4_jimping by GaryWGraley, on Flickr

BradfordG4_inhand by GaryWGraley, on Flickr

Overall one heck of a knife right there!

Here's some links to a couple other Bradford USA knives

Guardian 3

Gatsby

edited to add that the title changed with the bringing in of the 5 and 6 models on May 23, 2015 :)
 
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Love my Guardian3, need to get off my butt and get the 4 ordered. Fantastic work he does over there. I need to see if I can go visit his shop.
 
Thanks javareload, being in Seattle you could probably bike over to see Bradford!

Forgot to add this video that Gideons Tactical did of this knife, the one he had was with S30v steel, but this N690 took a very nice sharp edge!

[video=youtube;x_Pjsl7nUSs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_Pjsl7nUSs[/video]

G2
 
Thanks man and it IS a beast, but she's not mine, a friend sent it out so I could take a peek at it, glad he did !
G2
 
Thanks, Gary.

Is that the Sabre grind?

Any thoughts on N690 steel vs S30V?

Is the choil as sharp as it is on the G3s? My choil bit me and I haven't used it since.
 
Technically they both are Saber grinds, just you have the option of getting an unsharpened swedge ground in on one version.
And the choil isn't that sharp on this, but along the spine near the tip it was a bit crisp, but that's easily remedied.

As to the steels, this N690 took a very nice sharp edge, I've not run it through any paces, since it's not mine :( but from the steel makeup, I'd say it was pretty good stuff.

G2
 
It looks great.
I am very happy with my Guardian3. Coming soon I will ask one Guardian4. Is it possible in M390?.
Thanks for the review.
 
I've been eyeing the Guardian 4 since I became aware of it. Thank you for the review and photos, I may have to start pinching my pennies, as it looks like 2015 may be an expensive year.
 
Thanks guys and just remember, pace yourself, it's only Jan 14th...you have a long year ahead yet ;)

G2
 
Beans and rice, at least it's somewhat healthy diet, lots of folks eat that every day :)

I came up with a design for the strap, I'll get some photos up later on tonight but it worked out pretty well, you could toss the knife in the sheath to someone and not have a worry it would come free and yet when needed you can unsnap it and get to the knife quickly and also the strap is clear of the knife's passage too, best of both worlds ;)
G2
 
Gave this some thought on how to make it, fixing a strap to an existing sheath isn't always an easy task.

I wanted something that would be easy to open and once open it would be free of the knife area, so I didn't want to bring the strap across and back to the edge side of the sheath. Typically you want your strap end to be a trailing edge kind of thing, so as you are walking forward it doesn't present itself to become unsnapped by any objects you might come up against, branches, bushes and 'stuff'. SO, for this I took advantage of the empty area of the spine of the sheath, since it folds around the knife, there is a gap between the sheath and the spine of the handle, just room enough to place a snap fitting, a bit tight but it fits. I did trim down the sides of the snap so it would fit in there evenly, full round wasn't a good fit inside, but ok on the outside. So I roughed up the surface of the sheath's leather behind the strap area so I could glue that strap in place, and I put two vertical lines of stitching to keep it in place. You don't want to do a horizontal as that can shorten the sheath's life span, making it like a perforation across, so vertical helps keep that leather strong.

When open the strap falls aside, fairly wide, giving a lot of room to draw the knife and also return it. Returning the knife, you can close the snap one handed, the end of the strap wraps around the sheath and the tip of the strap is pointed in towards your body, which should help keep it from becoming unsnapped as you walk through the brush.

You do need to trim the original sheath area so that it follows the contours of the knife handle, that way the strap will wrap close to the handle and prevent it from being able to fall out.

I think the original design might have been modeled after a kydex style sheath, which would work well with just a small bit of that handle in the sheath, but not so much when it's leather.
BradfordG4_strap by GaryWGraley, on Flickr

BradfordG4_strap_ by GaryWGraley, on Flickr

BradfordG4_strap- by GaryWGraley, on Flickr

G2
 
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Very good thinking, execution and finish.I like that very much.
Beautiful pictures as usual.
Very nicely done Gary.
I See that the Guardian stays close to the 0770 for protection:D.
 
Thanks Raj ;) and yes I thought that was a decent method of retention for that sheath now, if it were kydex, then that small of an area would probably have held well, but being leather, it didn't take but a very light tug and it was free, so if you ever took a tumble, you might have injured yourself...possibly.

And yep, ZT0770cf hanging around to keep the other knives in line :)
G2
 
Yesterday was a banner day at the G2 home, a few knives arrived, one being this lovely Bradford USA Guardian 4 with Toxic Green/Black scales, at the end is a paracord lanyard of my making.

They offer these in S30v and N690, this one is the N690 and arrived really nicely sharpened, very toothy and cuts extremely well.

BradfordG4_Green by GaryWGraley, on Flickr

G2
 
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I just went through this thread again, very nice ,good photos & Info. Thanks
I like the overall design of the Bradford knives. Maybe one day I will own one.
 
Most welcome, he makes some pretty nice stuff for sure, and coming out with more all the time. I'd recommend getting a kydex sheath if you decide to pick up a Guardian 4.
G2
 
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